West Pittston Historical Society to present history of mural and painter Francis W. Brackett

WEST PITTSTON — If you are from Greater Pittston, you know how iconic the former West Pittston/Wyoming Area High School built in the 1920s.

With so much history involved in the school, there’s one treasure that hits you as you enter the main doors of the school. It’s a Depression-era mural created in 1934 by Francis Brackett in the now named Wyoming Area Intermediate Center.

The West Pittston Historical Society (WPHS) will host a program on the history of the mural at noon Saturday, Sept. 26. WPHS President Mary Portelli will conduct the event. The program is free and open to the public. Learn more about the artist, the story behind the mural, and the possible identities of some of the local figures depicted in the painting.

Walk into the former West Pittston High School building today and there is a good chance that one of the first things to catch your eye is a large mural depicting students from another era.

For generations, children walked past the painting on their way to class. Some probably stopped to look at it. Others may hardly have noticed it.

Behind that familiar painting is the story of Francis W. Brackett, an accomplished landscape artist and art educator whose career eventually brought him to West Pittston and whose work remains on the walls nearly a century later.

Brackett was born in 1886 and died in 1977. Although his name is not widely known today, researchers have begun rediscovering an artist whose work once attracted considerable attention in New England and Pennsylvania.

The Bennington Museum’s Walloomsack Review devoted an extensive article to him in 2017 by researcher Warren F. Broderick, titled “Francis W. Brackett 1886-1977: America’s lost landscape artist.”

According to research published by the WPHS, Brackett came from New England and developed his artistic talents through formal education and study with prominent artists. He eventually earned an art degree from Columbia University’s Parsons School of Art. He also attended the Boston Normal School, according to the Bennington Museum’s index to its Walloomsack Review.

His career was not limited to painting. Brackett was an educator, and teaching would eventually become an important part of his life.

In 1916, while a young widower, Brackett left New England in search of a new beginning and accepted a position teaching art at what is now Penn State University. A decade later, after remarrying and moving to Forty Fort, he became an art teacher at West Pittston High School.

It was in the Wyoming Valley that Brackett’s artistic and educational interests came together.

He painted landscapes of the region and exhibited his work locally and in other parts of New England. In 1926, he held a large exhibition of his artwork at Isaac Long’s Department Store in Wilkes-Barre, an indication that his work had developed a following in the area.

Brackett’s paintings were part of a larger tradition of American landscape art that emphasized the beauty of the natural environment. His surviving work has helped researchers reconstruct an artist whose reputation faded after his lifetime.

But in West Pittston, Brackett would leave something much more personal.

In 1934, he created the mural that eventually became one of the most recognizable pieces of artwork associated with the former West Pittston High School. The painting was installed in the school’s lobby and remained there as generations of students passed through the building.

The mural was more than decoration.

According to the historical research conducted by Portelli, Brackett had become concerned about the number of young people leaving school to work in the mines during the difficult economic circumstances of the era. The mural reflected his belief in the importance of education and the value of encouraging young people to remain in school.

The mural is Brackett’s effort to encourage children not to leave school for employment in the coalmines and to demonstrate the importance of education.

During the program, Portelli will dive into who is pictured in Brackett’s mural. Names like former educators such as Mable Lorah, Mary Richards, Margaret Clelland and Catheran Fear, who wrote the Wyoming Area School District’s alma mater song, and others appearing in the mural.

Portelli will also discuss who Brackett was and his background including his teaching career.