Herbert Morford Mott, Jr. was born in 1923 in Ridgewood, New Jersey. His father was also named Herbert Morford Mott. His mother was Grace Mott. He was the oldest of two sons. They lived at 26 Circle Avenue. His father was a cashier at Outwater & Wells Bond House, at 15 Exchange Place in Jersey City.
After completing four years of high school he entered the U.S.Air Force during WWII on January 4, 1943. He was recorded at the time of his enlistment to be five-foot-eight and weigh 120 pounds. He was always interested in art and he was fortunately assigned to a graphic art department to produce visual aids for training, where he learned the basic skills of art training.
When the war was over he was determined to become an artist. He joined a graphic art studio in New York City and began to sell freelance illustrations. He sold work to book publishers and commercial advertisers. His pen and inl drawings illustrated stories in Fifteen Western Tales and Western Story Round-Up. He was most successful at painting covers for Railroad Magazine for Popular Publication's pulp magazine, for which he painted fifty-two covers from 1949 until 1954.
During the 1950s he also painted interior story illustrations for many men's adventure magazines, such as Adventure, Argosy, Bluebook, Bluebook For Men, Climax, Male, Men, Men Annual, Men's Pictorial, Real, Saga, See For Men, and Stag.
He illustrated books, such as The Fur Lodge by Beverly Butler for Dodd, Mead, & Co., and Great Trains of All Time by Freeman Hubbard for Grosset & Dunlap.
In 1956 he was commissioned to create a series of paintings for the U.S. Air Force.
In the 1960s he produced a series of paintings about the Civil War for the Vicksburg Battlefield Museum.
In the 1980s he began to produce a similar series of paintings for the U. S. Coast Guard.
In 1993 he moved to New Mexico and began to create a series of paintings about the railroad depots of the Old West. He created many cover illustrations for Vintage Rails.
According to the artist, "I put together my learning porcess in every piece I did."
Herb Mott is currently working in Taos, New Mexico, at age 86.
© David Saunders 2009 |
