The subject, a New York merchant and author, was the third president of the American Art-Union (1847-50), an organization that dispersed works of art to its membership by means of a lottery. When courts charged the Art-Union with violating the New York State anti-lottery statutes and ordered it to cease its activities, a number of its paintings and most of its records came to the Society. The subject was a member of the Society's executive committee from 1842 to 1848.