Phoebe Appserson Hearst

American patroness of the arts and archaeology, Phoebe Hearst was born in the backwoods of Missouri but aimed to better herself through education and marriage. She succeeded by studying French at an early age, teaching school, and marrying a successful miner, George Hearst, who controlled the California Comstock Lode and later vast real estate holdings in the Western U.S. and Mexico. Mother of William Randolph Hearst, she instilled in her son a love of travel and of collecting art and antiquities. Together they spent years abroad, traveling in Europe and Egypt. One of the wealthiest of Americans after her husband died, Mrs. Hearst was the first patron of the archaeological artist Joseph Lindon Smith and the archaeologist George Andrew Reisner, whose Giza excavations sent many antiquities to the University of California. She had earlier funded excavations in North America for archaeologists on Berkeley's faculty and was the first woman on the University's Board of Regents. Today Berkeley's museum of anthropology and its ancient Egyptian medical papyrus are named for her.

Author of biography: Barbara S. Lesko
Includes bibliography? Yes

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Keywords: Missouri, Steelville Academy, Meramec Iron Works, California, George Hearst, Comstock Mine, William Randolph Hearst, Anaconda Copper Mine, San Francisco, kindergarten movement, National Congress of Mothers, Parent Teacher Association, National Cathedral School for Girls, Y.W.C.A., University of California, William Pepper, University of Pennsylvania, Frank Hamilton Cushing, Marco Island, Egypt, Peru, Philip Mills Jones, Alfred L. Kroeber, George Andrew Reisner, Deir el-Ballas, Arthur Mace, Albert Lythgoe, Naga ed-Deir, Giza, Great Pyramid, papyri, Hearst Medical Papyrus, Abu Simbel, Joseph Lindon Smith, Lowie, Hearst Museum of Anthropology, Julia Morgan, Pleasanton, Mount Vernon, Mills College, Traveler's Aid, Suffragette Movement, Panama and Pacific Exposition, Jane Addams, Selia Nuttall, Spanish Influenza