On May 22, 1912, The News reported the death of an artist whose “paintings show a deep inspiration.” This artist was Gertrude M. Steiner, and she made a career painting portraits, landscapes, and sacred images in the late-19th and early-20th centuries. Her artwork has recently gained new appreciation through research conducted by Heritage Frederick staff after two of her paintings and a collection of family photographs were acquired by the museum and archives in 2023.
Born near Petersville in 1854, Gertrude was the second of four children born to Francis Jacob and Margaret Wissel Steiner. Francis was born in Baden, Germany, and Margaret was from Bern, Switzerland. After immigrating to the United States, the Steiner’s settled along the Ridge Road (today’s MD Route 180) between Jefferson and Petersville. Francis operated the Eagle Mill, a merchant grist and saw mill along Catoctin Creek in a place still known as Steiner’s Hill.
Gertrude first garnered attention for her work as an artist in her mid-thirties. Described in 1889 as “an amateur artist,” Steiner was apparently self taught as no record of her receiving instruction or attending an institution to study art has been identified. The earliest mentions of Steiner’s artwork in local newspapers relate to two paintings she completed for Saint Joseph’s Catholic Church on Carrollton Manor near Buckeystown.
The first of these large works, measuring 4′ in width and 6′ in height, depicts a story from the Gospel of Luke of a twelve-year-old Jesus teaching the elders and priests in the temple at Jerusalem. The work is entitled “Christ before the Learned Doctors” and was completed by Steiner in 1889 on commission from the Jesuit Brotherhood of the Frederick Novitiate. A second work of equal scale was completed in the same year and depicts the death of Saint Joseph. Both works demonstrate Steiner’s talent for capturing emotion in the many figures featured in each scene. These paintings have been lovingly preserved by Saint Joseph’s Church and are now displayed in the new church building after having hung in the original church for over a century.
Steiner’s works of religious themes were the most celebrated during her lifetime. According to an obituary from Steiner’s death in 1912 printed in The Baltimore Sun, James Cardinal Gibbons, the Archbishop of Baltimore from 1877 to 1921, admired her sacred paintings which were presented to several Catholic Churches throughout his archdiocese. He visited her on one occasion at her home near Jefferson in Frederick County.
Apart from works of religious themes, Steiner was an accomplished portrait painter. Newspaper accounts record her trips to Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York to visit art exhibitions and occasionally submit her own works for review and/or sale. During these trips, she took commissions for portraits. In a collection of photographs from Steiner’s family acquired last year by Heritage Frederick is a cabinet card portrait made in Baltimore. On the reverse of this cabinet card are notes for Gertrude indicating that the subject of the photograph was having her portrait painted by the artist.
Gertrude Steiner died in May 1912 after battling stomach cancer at the age of 58. For the last several years of her life, she lived with her sister Emma and her husband, Eugene Etchison, at their home in Buckeystown. Gertrude was buried in the graveyard of St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Petersville with her parents and siblings. Her obituary in The News recorded “Miss Steiner will be remembered in Frederick by the many beautiful paintings she has exhibited year after year at the Frederick Fair…her pictures were as dear to her as her family and for years they had almost been her life.”
Heritage Frederick would like to thank St. Joseph’s Catholic Church for allowing us to photograph and feature Gertrude Steiner’s paintings displayed in their church as part of this article.
September 11, 2024 by Jody Brumage, Heritage Frederick Archivist.