Augustus Edwin John, O.M., R.A. (1878-1961)

The American financier, Sam A. Lewisohn (1884-1951) was the son of Adolph Lewisohn (c. 1849-1938), an important industrialist with interests in mining and banking, who had become an avid art collector and patron. Sam followed in the family business and also inherited his father's philanthropic interests. He attended Princeton University and Columbia Law School, later serving as a trustee to a number of important US museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Museum of Art, and the Museum of Modern Art. In 1918, Sam married Margaret Seligman of New York, and they had four daughters. Parts of the Lewisohn art collection, including important paintings by Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Paul Gauguin, were donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. on his death in 1951.