Linton Park

Linton Park (16 November 1826, in Marion Center, Pennsylvania – 17 September 1906, in Erie, Pennsylvania) was an American painter in the Folk Art tradition and vegetarian union soldier.

Biography His father was a surveyor who helped lay out his hometown. He was honorably discharged in 1865 and received a thank you note from President Lincoln, which he reportedly had buried with him.

Apparently, he held some sort of government job until 1868, when he returned to his hometown. He would spend the rest of his life there. Later, he and a brother opened a planing mill, which was financially quite successful. At that time, the City Directory listed him as a painter and it is likely that he mostly painted signs, wagons and furniture. Known for his eccentric personality and odd behavior, he lived as something of a recluse and never married. He requested for vegetarian food as the US Army were given beef and pork rations. Linton stated that he could not eat any animal food or food that had been contaminated with meat as it was opposed to his digestive functions and all his senses. Park managed to obtain vegetarian food from a sutler but this was not always available to him so he requested "some special accommodation or to draw an extra allowance of bread or other vegetable elements in lieu of the animal food." Park remained a vegetarian throughout his life and his dietary restrictions during the civil war were cited in a newspaper article in 1906 which noted that "while he could assimilate everything connected with his answer to the call of duty from the stand of patriotism, he could not assimilate the army pork."