Thomas Shields Clarke (April 25, 1860November 15, 1920) was an American painter and sculptor. He is best known for his bronze sculpture The Cider Press, in San Francisco. Education Named for his grandfather, he was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the eldest of the six children of Charles John Clarke, a Pennsylvania Railroad executive, and Louisa Semple. He was a cartoonist for a student newspaper at Princeton University, from which he graduated in 1882. He studied for a year at the Art Students League of New York, then worked as an illustrator in New York City. He moved to Paris to study at the Académie Julian—painting under William-Adolphe Bouguereau and Jules Joseph Lefebvre; and sculpture under Henri Chapu. He was admitted to the École des Beaux-Arts, where he studied in the atelier of Jean-Léon Gérôme. Clarke left the École after less than 3 years, and became the special pupil of Pascal Dagnan-Bouveret. Early works Clarke exhibited his first painting at the Paris Salon of 1885, and had his first success with the wryly humorous A Fool's Fool, exhibited at the Salon of 1887. The Night Market in Morocco, an exotic scene by firelight, earned him a diploma of honor at the 1891 International Art Exhibition of Berlin, and was exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1892. Clarke exhibited paintings at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Illinois—A Fool's Fool, The Night Market in Morocco, Portrait of Madame d' E, A Gondola Girl, and the full-size cartoon for a 3-part lunette stained glass window: Morning, Noon and Night. He was awarded a medal for his paintings. The Cider Press Clarke debuted a plaster sculpture group, The Cider Press, at the Paris Salon of 1892. It depicts a muscular father pressing apples while his young son samples the juice. Clarke designed it to be a public drinking fountain, with water to flow out of the press and into a bucket at its base. The Cider Press was exhibited at the 1892 Historical American Exposition in Madrid, at which King Alfonso presented Clarke with a medal (the only one awarded to a foreign sculptor). A larger-than-life-size bronze version was cast in Paris by Jaboeuf & Bezout Fondeurs, and exhibited at the 1893 World's Fair. The following year, it was exhibited at the California Midwinter International Exposition of 1894, in San Francisco. The Exposition's Executive Committee purchased the sculpture and presented it to the