James G. Blaine’s Speaker portrait was commissioned by private contributors and given to the House of Representatives in 1908. Freeman Thorp appears to have based this posthumous portrait on a carte-de-visite of Blaine that dates from around 1880. Thorp received a number of portrait commissions from the House, including Speaker Schuyler Colfax and several chairmen from the Appropriations and Ways and Means Committees.
History, Art & Archives, U.S. House of Representatives, “James Gillespie Blaine,” https://history.house.gov/Collection/Detail/29595 (December 24, 2018)
Office of the Historian
Office of Art and Archives
Attic, Thomas Jefferson Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
(202) 226-1300
