Eda Nemoede Casterton

Eda Nemoede Casterton was described as a “naughty” child, because she would draw pictures on the classroom walls instead of paying attention to the teacher. After she finished school, her family discouraged her from pursuing a career in art, and she elected to study shorthand. While working as a stenographer, however, Casterton took lessons during her lunch hour at the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts and soon began helping her teacher with commissions. She became a full-time miniaturist and won several awards, including a silver medal at the Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco in 1915, and a bronze at the Philadelphia Sesquicentennial Exposition in 1926.