Florence M. Montgomery

Florence Mellowes Montgomery (July 22, 1914 – January 20, 1998) was an American museologist, art historian, and curator, specializing in textiles. She authored two influential books and worked as a curator at Winterthur Museum, Garden and Library. She was married to Charles F. Montgomery, a fellow curator and art historian who was Winterthur Museum's first director.[1]

For the British novelist, see Florence Montgomery.
Florence M. Montgomery
Montgomery in 1936
Born
Florence Elizabeth Mellowes

(1914-07-22)July 22, 1914
Fort Wayne, Indiana, US
DiedJanuary 20, 1998(1998-01-20) (aged 83)
Hamden, Connecticut, US
Alma materUniversity of Wisconsin–Madison (BA), Radcliffe College (MFA)
Occupation(s)Museologist, art historian, curator
EmployerWinterthur Museum
SpouseCharles F. Montgomery

Life and career

Born Florence Elizabeth Mellowes in Fort Wayne, Indiana, she earned her BA in art history from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1936. She traveled and studied in Europe and worked as a library secretary at the Art Institute of Chicago before receiving an MFA from Radcliffe College in 1943. She also completed the Fogg Art Museum course at Harvard University.[2] She went on to become an assistant to the director of the Rhode Island School of Design Museum. She subsequently moved to New York to work at the Metropolitan Museum of Art with Joseph Downs, curator of the American Wing.[1][3]

In 1946, she married Charles F. Montgomery (1910–1978), with whom she had two children: William Phelps, who went on to become a digital fine artist, and Agnes Nisbet, who died at the age of five.[4] She and her husband moved to Delaware in 1949 and to Connecticut in 1970. When Yale University published a posthumous tribute to Charles's career (originally intended to celebrate his retirement), the volume underscored the professional contributions of his wife and collaborator.[5]

At the Winterthur Museum in Delaware, where her husband became the museum's inaugural director in 1954, Montgomery organized the training of the museum's docents. She also taught art history in the influential Winterthur Program in Early American Culture. For ten years, she served as the assistant curator of textiles at the museum.[6]

Montgomery continued to write, teach, volunteer, and work as a museum consultant until her death.[7] Her first book, Printed Textiles: English and American Cottons and Linens 1700–1850 (Viking, 1970), remains a "standard reference in the field."[1] The publication of her monumental historical dictionary of fabrics, Textiles in America 1650–1870 (Norton, 1984), was an "event much anticipated" by scholars.[8] Both continue to appear on syllabi for courses in material culture and the decorative arts.[9]

Montgomery died in Hamden, Connecticut, at the age of 83.[1] Her papers are held in the archives of the Winterthur Library.[10]

References
  1. Kane, Patricia E. (1997). "Florence Mellowes Montgomery 1914–1998". Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin: 16–17. ISSN 0084-3539. JSTOR 40514512 – via JSTOR.
  2. Whalen, Catherine L. (2001). "American Decorative Arts Studies at Yale and Winterthur: The Politics of Gender, Gentility, and Academia". Studies in the Decorative Arts. 9 (1): 108–144. doi:10.1086/studdecoarts.9.1.40662801. ISSN 1069-8825. JSTOR 40662801. S2CID 155303327.
  3. Montgomery, Florence M. (2007). Textiles in America, 1650-1870: A Dictionary Based on Original Documents, Prints and Paintings, Commercial Records, American Merchant's Papers, Shopkeepers' Advertisements, and Pattern Books with Original Swatches of Cloth. W. W. Norton & Company. pp. ix. ISBN 978-0-393-73224-5.
  4. Wendell D. Garrett, "Charles Franklin Montgomery," Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society Vol. 8, Pt. 1, April 1978, http://www.americanantiquarian.org/proceedings/44517602.pdf (accessed 15 January 2015), 27; Maureen Milford, "Delaware Spaces: Built-ins appealing in mid-century home," Delaware Online, August 26, 2014, http://www.delawareonline.com/story/life/home-garden/2014/07/02/shipley-road-house-hones-mid-century-modern-feel/12086187/ (accessed 19 February 2015).
  5. "Charles F. Montgomery and Florence M. Montgomery: A Tribute". Yale University Art Gallery. Retrieved 2022-09-16.
  6. Eaton, ix-x.
  7. Eaton, x.
  8. Scranton, Philip B. (1987). "Review of Textiles in America 1650-1870". Technology and Culture. 28 (2): 363–364. doi:10.2307/3105588. ISSN 0040-165X. JSTOR 3105588.
  9. See for example Laura Auricchio, "Visualizing Revolution," Fall 2007, https://enfilade18thc.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/visualizing-revolution-syllabus.pdf (accessed 19 February 2015); Debra A. Reid, "Historic Domestic Interiors," Spring 2002, http://www.ux1.eiu.edu/~dareid/his_5360_2002_syllabus.pdf (accessed 19 February 2015); Dell Upton, "Introduction to Material Culture Studies," Spring 2003, http://www.vernaculararchitectureforum.org/Resources/Documents/Syllabi/upton4.pdf (accessed 19 February 2015); Philip Zimmerman and Eliza Reilly, "Museum Mysteries," Fall 2012, http://museum-mysteries.weebly.com/class-schedule.html (accessed 19 February 2015).
  10. "Finding aid to the Florence M. Montgomery Collection". Winterthur Library. Retrieved 2022-09-16.
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