and set up a studio named after his close friend John Kensett. On October 31, 1872, Colyer's wife, Mary Lydia drowned in Long Island Sound after her horse bolted as she was crossing the bridge by buggy to Contentment Island. Kensett got in the water and tried to save her. Soon he became sick (one source said from pneumonia; another said it was "a cold.") Kensett died on December 14, 1872. After 1875, the artist concentrated on Connecticut scenes. In the summer of 1877, Colyer toured Indian reservations in the Northwest. Vincent Colyer died at Contentment Island on July 12, 1888. Appreciation of his art The Douglas Frazer Art gallery offers this assessment: "Vincent Colyer is an acknowledged master of American topographical watercolors. ... His small, painterly watercolor sketches of western forts, early settlements and Indian villages, from New Mexico to Alaska, are an important artistic and visual record. More than two hundred of those sketches, mostly accomplished in the field between 1868 and 1872 while working as a Special Indian Commissioner, are found in major institutional collections." Beinecke Library at Yale University owns 50 of his Alaskan views made in 1869. "During his travels in the southwest and Alaska, he painted remarkable scenes of the landscapes, animals, and people he encountered." Referring to works by both Colyer and another artist, the Gilcrease Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma noted, "What these images might lack in aesthetic merit is made up for in charm and expressiveness as quick impressions of the West." Some paintings and drawings Johnson Straits, British Columbia Columbia River (1875) Pueblo Passing Shower (1876) In Pursuit of Joseph, (appeared in Harper's Weekly, August 18, 1877) "Colyer here idealizes infantry power, order, and confidence in the vicinity of Fort Lapwai — probably before the White Bird defeat." Home of the Yackamas, Oregon (sold in 1968 for $16,500) Castle Rock, Entrance to the Cascade Mountains, Columbia River, (lost) "The subject alone gives marked interest to atmospheric effects," the catalogue for the 1873 Cincinnati Industrial Exposition said about the painting. Darien Shore, Connecticut Rainy Day on Connecticut Shore (1881) Winter on Connecticut Shore (1884) Spring Flowers (1885) French Waiter (1886) Public collections Royal British Columbia Museum and British Columbia Archives, Victoria, British Columbia Museum of Fine Arts, Boston Gilcrease Museum, Tulsa, Oklahoma Albuquerque Museum of Art Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut Public exhibitions United States Centennial