Strangers to Us All
Lawyers and Poetry

Andrew Oliver

(1906-1981)
New York & Massachusetts

Andrew Oliver was born on March 14, 1906 in Morristown, New Jersey. His father, William Hutchinson Pynchon Oliver was a lawyer. Oliver obtained his A.B. and L.L. B. degress from Harvard, his law degree in 1931. He clerked for Judge Samuel Seabury (1873-1958), his uncle and then joined the firm, Alexander & Green in New York City where he became a partner in 1944, and retired in 1970.

Upon his retirement from law practice, Oliver returned to Boston where he involved himself in the Essex Institute, the Boston Athenaeum, John Carter Brown Library, Colonial Society of Massachusetts, the Massachusetts Historical Society, Walpole Society, and Tavern Club.

Before he left the practice of law, Oliver began his career as art historian. His catalog of ancestral portraits, Faces of a Family was published in 1960.

"Among his talents was the ability to write occasional poetry, and the annals of [the Walpole Society and the Tavern Club] contain many examples of Oliver's deft creations." [Source (bio and quote): American National Biography]

Poetry & Prose

Andrew Oliver, Special Occasions (Boston: privately printed, 1990)

Writings

Andrew Oliver, Portraits of John and Abigail Adams (Cambridge, Massaschusetts: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1967)

___________, Portraits of John Quincy Adams and His Wife ((Cambridge, Massaschusetts: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1970)

___________, Auguste Edouart's Silhouettes of Eminent Americans, 1839-1844 (Charlottesville: Published for the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, by the University Press of Virginia, 1977)

___________, The Portraits of Chief Justice John Marshall (1977)

Bibliography

Andrew Oliver 1906-1981 (Mattapoisett, Massachusetts: The Parsonage 1983)

Research Resources

Andrew Oliver Papers
Massachusetts Historical Society