Trip to a Secret Garden
The beautiful little watercolor painting is of John Dexter Flint’s garden gate. A winding path leads to the worn wooden door, topped with bright green foliage against a soft blue sky. Just beyond doorway are bright pink flowers against a stone wall backdrop. Flint’s property ran from Rock Street down to June Street (between Maple and Prospect St.), where the stone wall can still be seen today. This sweet painting is by Fall River artist Nancy Eveline Buck (1861-1944).
Miss Buck, originally born in Slatersville, RI, was one of six children born to Reverend Edwin Augustus Buck, minister of the Central Mission of the Central Congregational Church, and Elmira (Walker) Buck. She was an 1879 graduate of B.M.C. Durfee High School and an 1882 graduate of the Normal Art School in Boston.
From 1887 to 1938, Miss Buck was listed as an Artist in the city directories and for over twenty years, she maintained a studio in the Fall River National Bank building. N.E. Buck was not an artist struggling for recognition in Fall River’s art scene. Indeed, she was well known throughout the city for her various artistic classes.
Miss Buck taught classes for the city’s grammar school teachers in 1899, as well as hosting private lessons in her studio. Nearly100 students had enrolled in her Freehand Evening Drawing Class in 1914. Her paintings and sketches were exhibited in various places, such as the city library and C.E. Giffords & Co. jewelry store. N.E. Buck annually held exhibitions of her watercolor sketches from her studio; her 1909 exhibit focused on sketches of Massachusetts and Maine.
Other than the stone wall along the west side of the former Flint property, this watercolor painting is the only color depiction of the garden to have so far surfaced.