Portrait of Charles Avery

Object number86.1.132

Date1830

MediumOil on masonite; Wood; Paint

Credit LineGift of Wilbur C. Douglas

DescriptionFramed oil painting. Portrait of a middle-aged man sitting in a wooden chair. He is wearing a black jacket, black vest, white shirt and bow tie.Dimensions40.4999 x 33.4999 in. (102.9 x 85.1 cm)
Signednone
Marksgold plaque: Charles Avery/Humanitarian/1784-1858
Historical NotesCharles Avery was a Pittsburgh industrialist who was an active antislavery proponent. Most notably he constructed on his property the Allegheny Institute and Mission Church, a building that housed a college for African Americans and a meeting space for what eventually became the Avery Memorial African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church.Label TextCharles Avery moved to Pittsburgh in 1812 and worked as a merchant, apothecary, mine owner, and textile mill owner. His travels through the south to inspect the plantations that supplied his Pittsburgh mills with cotton inspired him to consider the plight of the enslaved. In the late 1820s he became a member of the American Colonization Society; in the 1830s he joined the Western Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society, and in the 1840s he began to help establish churches and schools for African Americans. In 1849 he established the Allegheny Institute and Mission Church in Allegheny City. The three story brick building served as a safe house for freedom seekers on the Underground Railroad. Avery participated in public meetings advocating for abolition. Upon his death his wealthy estate, originally built on commerce with cotton plantations, provided scholarships for African Americans at Oberlin College, the Avery Institute in Charleston, South Carolina, and African Methodist churches.

Related person Charles Avery (1784 - 1858)

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