Margaret Lesley Bush-Brown

Margaret White Lesley Bush-Brown (May 19, 1857 – November 16, 1944) was an American painter and etcher.

Biography Margaret White Lesley was a native of Philadelphia, the daughter of geologist Peter Lesley and social reformer Susan Inches (Lyman) Lesley; her first job was creating geological models for her father. Her first professor was Thomas Eakins, with whom she studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts before moving to Paris, in 1880, for further instruction; in the intervening years she also took lessons at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women. The Bush-Browns had three surviving children, two sons, Harold and James, who became architects and a daughter, Lydia, who achieved some renown as an artist herself. She won a number of prizes for her work during her career, Her portrait of mechanical engineer and philanthropist Worcester Reed Warner is displayed in the Warner Library in Tarrytown, New York. A self-portrait, dated 1914 and currently in the collection of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, was included in the inaugural exhibition of the National Museum of Women in the Arts, American Women Artists 1830-1930, in 1987.

Bush-Brown's papers, together with those of other members of her family, are today held at Smith College.