Frances B. Swanson

Photo:

Frances Beach Swanson

SOUTH PARIS — Frances Beach Swanson of South Paris departed this world Wednesday, February 23, 2011. Widowed in 1970 and raising the five youngest of her six children on her own in Merrimack, NH, she supported her family as a talented mix and multi-media artist for much of the 1970s and '80s. She was a juried member of the Copley Society of Boston, the Sharon Arts Center, the New Hampshire Artists Association, the Keyes Art Group, the NH League of Craftsmen, Arts and Science Center of Nashua and the Nashua Artist Association. "One Man Shows" frequently hung at the Chandler Memorial Library in Nashua, NH, hospitals, doctors’ offices and other public avenues throughout Southern New Hampshire. During the '70s Mrs. Swanson competed annually in the Greely Park Exhibit in Nashua, as well as the Merrimack, Milford and Amherst Art Shows, taking home countless ribbons and awards. She proudly studied under Phoebe Flory and Bill Childs, Ed Whitney and Carl Schmaltz. She was the co-founder and secretary of the Merrimack Art Society, Merrimack NH; as well as the Art Director of the Nashua Christian High School in its early years. She entertained private lessons briefly.

Much of Mrs. Swanson's vast body of works hang in public and private collections across the country.

She was born in Baileyville on April 5, 1923 and is a graduate of Canton High School Class of 1941. The daughter of Lemuel Harris and Marcia Gladys (Bryant) Beach, she was the fifth of nine children. The family moved frequently so she always considered her siblings to be her best friends. Her talent showed itself at an early age after losing most of her hearing due to scarlet fever. She illustrated school newspapers and the ’41 Canton High Year Book. She worked in a variety of occupations, but as a photo colorist doing “photo tinting,” now almost a lost art, she then easily mastered portraiture, worked in pastel, oil, acrylic, gouache, and pen and ink. She taught herself the arts of silkscreen and airbrush, block printing, mold making and casting, antique china restoration. Her passion and medium of choice was watercolor; her subjects were breathtaking florals, old Maine farms, lighthouses and the endless Maine seacoast.

She first married Ronald B. McGrath of Milford, NH and had two children, Marcia and Robert; she then married Henry E. Swanson of Brockton, MA and had four children, Kathryn, Henry, John and Signe. Moving back to Maine in 1988, she became a member of the Western Maine Art Group and continued to show her growing body of work. As the late '90s approached, even as Alzheimer’s slowly began to steal away her talent, she went on to Victorian silk ribbon embroidery, doll making and antique doll restoration, as well as Scandinavian tole painting. She spent the last few years in the company of her friends at Sarah Frye Nursing Home in Auburn.

Mrs. Swanson is pre-deceased by both of her husbands, Ronald and Henry and her two youngest children, John Swanson of South Paris and Signe Swanson Tamulonis of Manchester, NH. She is survived by her sisters, Barbara Gurney of Merrimack, NH and Beulah Tripp of Tilton, NH; her brother, Lemuel, Jr. of Crossville, TN; her children, Marcia Greene of South Paris, Robert and Alice McGrath of Tilton, NH, Kathryn and Rusty Gaynor of Hartford and Henry and Angela Swanson of Harrisburg, PA; special sons-in-law, T.J. Kelly of Natick, MA and Jack Tamulonis of Lincoln, NH; daughter-in-law, Julie Swanson of West Paris; 17 grandchildren and 16 great-grandchildren.

Funeral services were held on Monday at Chandler Funeral Homes & Cremation Service, 45 Main St., South Paris. Interment will be in the spring at Last Rest Cemetery in Merrimack, NH. On-line condolences may be shared with her family at www.chandlerfunerals.com.