John B. Fairbanks was born on 27 December 1855, in Payson, Utah, Utah, to John Boylston Fairbanks and Sarah H. VanWagoner. He married Lillie Annetta Huish on 28 November 1877, in St. George, Utah. In 1890, he was one of a group of artists who studied in Paris under the sponsorship of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), in preparation for painting murals at the nearly completed Salt Lake Temple. He painted murals in the Salt Lake Temple and the Mesa Arizona Temple that still exist today. Fairbanks was the official photographer for the South American expeditions of Benjamin Cluff. Fairbanks was the first artist to live and paint in Zion National Park. He was an early art instructor at Brigham Young Academy and was one of the founding members of the Utah Art Institute. He died on 15 June 1940, in Salt Lake City, Utah.
Citations:
Brigham Young University (n.d.).
The John B. Fairbanks papers consist of original and photocopied correspondence; photocopied typescript of diary, 1877-1922; original and typescript of autobiography, 1910; typescript of funeral service, 1940.
Twenty-four hour advanced notice encouraged. Materials must be used on-site. Access to parts of this collection may be restricted under provisions of state or federal law.
The library does not claim to control copyright for all materials in the collection. An individual depicted in a reproduction has privacy rights as outlined in Title 45 CFR, part 46 (Protection of Human Subjects). For further information, please review the J. Willard Marriott Library's
Collection Name, Collection Number, Box Number, Folder Number. Special Collections, J. Willard Marriott Library, The University of Utah.
Gift of Lydia Yates Burroughs in 1992.
Processed by Manuscripts Division staff in 1992.
Photographs transferred to the Multimedia Division of Special Collections (P0446).
The transcript was copied in 1948 by Brigham Young University with the permission of Juanita Brooks.
This photocopied album was composed by Lydia Yates Burrows for the John B. Fairbanks Family Organization.
This autobiographical sketch was originally written on 1910 April 25 as a letter to Alice Merrill Horne. It was copied and then typed written by Mary Burrows in 1963. Both the handwritten letter and the typescript are located in folder 1.
The photocopied correspondence covers the years 1881-1892.