Ivan Albright. Portrait of Marie Walsh Sharpe, 1921
Oil on canvas, h. 25" x w 17"
Photograph by W. L. Bowers
© Marie Walsh Sharpe Foundation

About Marie Walsh Sharpe

July 1, 1890 - September 21, 1985

Youngest of 14 children of Irish immigrants who met and married in America, Marie Walsh Sharpe spent her early years attending a country school near Sac City, Iowa.

Her death September 21, 1985, in a Colorado Springs hospital at the age of 95, ended a life replete with world travel, real estate and other business successes, philanthropy on a huge scale, and patronage of the arts in many of its forms. She was married in 1921 to a wealthy Oak Park, Illinois, attorney, Nathan M. Sharpe, who died in 1963. There were no children.

Marie was nine months old when Edward and Honore Donovan Walsh and their large family moved from near Decatur, Illinois, to make their home in Sac City. Her father was a homesteader, rancher and banker who dealt in real estate and insurance. Marie attended rural elementary schools and showed early leadership potential.

There was a teacher shortage then, so, at age 13, she was asked to consider entering the field; and, although she qualified through a test for a teaching certificate, she never actually taught. After attending St. Joseph's Academy, then located on Grand Avenue in Des Moines, she enrolled in one of New York's finest finishing schools, the Scoville School for Girls on Fifth Avenue at 90th Street. A beautiful lady, Marie was asked to pose as a Gibson "Calendar Girl", donating the fee to charity.

In 1920, Marie traveled alone around the world. Her numerous overseas trips began in the company of her mother, making 16 trips on oceangoing vessels.

After their 1921 marriage in Oak Park, Illinois, Marie and Nathan Sharpe moved to Florida where she established an interior decorating shop and a gift shop in Miami Beach. She became a heavy investor in real estate in Florida, Illinois and Colorado, and in stocks and bonds of major corporations.

The Sharpes spent their winters in Miami Beach and their summers in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, and later in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

A million dollar gift she made in November, 1983, to the American Bar Association Fund for Public Education to establish a "legal awareness of older Americans program", brought her national recognition.

Despite a battle with cancer in her later years, Mrs. Sharpe devoted her last months toward launching The Marie Walsh Sharpe Art Foundation to carry out her long-held dream of assisting struggling artists "awaiting recognition", as well as developing talent in younger artists.

THE MARIE WALSH SHARPE ART FOUNDATION   830 North Tejon Street, Suite 120
Colorado Springs, CO 80903   (719) 635-3220   sharpeartfdn@qwest.net

Home | The Space Program | The Space Program Application Guidelines | The Richard Florsheim Art Fund Merger | Summer Seminar | Summer Seminar 2008 Application | Teacher-Artist Program | A Visual Artist's Guide To Estate Planning | 2008 Supplement to A Visual Artist's Guide to Estate Planning | Visual Artists Information Hotline | Artists to Artists Exhibition Catalog | On The Needs Of Visual Artists: A Roundtable 2001 | Arts Business Education Consortium - History