Leonard Borman

Leonard Borman (28 April 1894 – 15 August 1995) was a British-born Canadian war veteran and artist. Borman studied art at the Art Institute of Chicago and under Joseph Pennell and George Bellows. He arrived in Sierra Madre, CA in 1920 and was active in the Los Angeles area into the 1950s. He died in Canyonville, OR on Aug. 15, 1995.

His mother played violin until her hand was injured in a train door accident, she then took up painting and was teaching young Leonard to draw and paint. Unfortunately she died when he was 3 years old. Leonard and his younger sister went to live with their grandmother. He also attended a boys school and was an apprentice gardener at Kelways Nursery in the United Kingdom 1907 - 1913.

In 1914 he went to Manitoba, Canada where he was also an apprentice at the Stephens Nursery. One year later he entered the Canadian Army and fought in France World War I - 1915-1918. After suffering a severe injury to his arm, and while recovering in hospital, he found easy money by coloring black & white photos for the nurses. After recovery he came to the US and studied art at the Art Institute of Chicago under Pennell and Bellows 1919 -1921. He and a fellow artist came to California in 1921 where they visited most of California's Parks, the Grand Canyon and Oregon to draw and paint from nature. In 1921 they built a large studio and Leonard Borman produced some large, beautiful paintings, placed them in massive gold frames and traveled to New York hoping for a successful art sale. The year was 1929 the Wall Street Stock Market Crash sent him home with different plans for his future in art. He decided to paint and sell his works to people of the working class at a price they could afford.

In 1932 he gave up the big studio, met and married a young girl from Brighton, England. They opened a picture frame shop and art gallery-studio in Pasadena, CA. It was located next to a very popular restaurant where at night people standing in line to enter became very interested in the fine oil paintings Leonard displayed in his front window. One prominent lady introduced him to the group that would commission hundreds of animal paintings over the next 20 some years. Some of these prominent collectors were: Harold S. Chase of Santa Barbara, Firestone Tire, Singer Sewing Machine, Conard Ship Lines, Pillsbury Co., W.E.Boeing, DuPont, Sebastian Cabot actor, Mae West actress. The air quality in Pasadena CA in the 1920s, 30s & 40s was extremely poor due to smog and was causing Leonard great discomfort so they closed the store in 1955 and moved to the desert.

Years earlier the Bormans bought 20 acres with a cabin in the desert, near Joshua Tree, CA. Over the years they turned it into a comfortable home, studio, and art gallery. Leonard Borman painted, while his wife May framed pictures, and his patrons came to buy and place orders for the next 45 years. In 1975 his wife, May, died.