Mary Thompson Carriel (1884?-1950) -- student

A native of Jacksonville, Illinois, Mary Ruddick Thompson was the daughter of Morgan County (IL) court judge, Owen P. Thompson, a prominent, local politician. Thompson attended Illinois Female College, now known as MacMurray College, completing her studies in 1903. While studying literature and art, Mary was active in the campus Phi Nu Society. Thompson’s advanced art studies came at the Corcoran School of Art (Washington, D.C, 1908) and while living abroad in Brussels, Belgium (1909). Excelling in sculpture, Thompson exhibited in Des Moines and Dubuque (IA) galleries, winning prizes for her small, portrait-quality busts. Most notably, Thompson worked in the Chicago studio of Lorado Taft, arguably Illinois’ greatest sculptor of historic subjects.

Thompson’s future husband, Charles Arthur (C.A.) Carriel, graduated from Illinois College in 1906; he later completed his Presbyterian minister education (Union Theological Seminary) and married Mary Thompson in 1911. Charles Carriel was both a pastor and missionary; the couple briefly resided in Jacksonville and soon moved to Sao Paulo, Brazil for missionary work (1911-1916). The Carriel family then relocated to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where Charles served as pastor for Bethany Presbyterian Church (1918-1923) and as the minister for Shorewood Presbyterian Church (1923-1928). The family eventually settled in Dubuque, Iowa for roughly two decades. While living in eastern Iowa, Mary Carriel attended the Stone City art colony (1932-1933), and her husband served as a pastor at Westminster Presbyterian Church (1928-1943). The pair later moved to Florida, where Mary died in 1950.