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John Howard Miller, (1908-1980)

John Miller Howard was an African-American artist and arts educator who founded the Art Department and taught at Arkansas AM&N College (now the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff) from 1939 until his death in 1980. At AM&N he worked tirelessly to provide a top-quality arts education to his students, many of whom came from rural backgrounds lacking exposure to art. Howard was recognized as a gifted painter and brilliant teacher. His life and work form an important chapter in the history of art in Arkansas.

Howard was born in Alcorn, Mississippi on September 22, 1908 to Lillie Howard, a young single mother who nurtured his early talent for drawing. He grew up in Brookhaven, Mississippi, attending segregated schools. He graduated from Alcorn College in 1934. Although the school had no art department, Howard developed his natural talent by painting murals and signs and drawing for the school newspaper. An excellent baseball player, he played for the Alcorn College team and also played minor league baseball around the US and in Mexico. Howard’s first professional job was as principal of the segregated school in Toomsuba, Mississippi. In 1936, he was hired at T.J. Harris High School in Meridian, Mississippi. There, he was given a scholarship for summer study at Atlanta University.

In Atlanta, Howard studied under the well-known artist Hale Woodruff. This was a watershed opportunity for the gifted young painter. Woodruff became a lifelong friend and mentor. He recognized Howard’s talent and invited him back to Atlanta in 1937 to study with a scholarship and a job teaching at the Laboratory High School affiliated with the university. Howard thrived there. He developed his painting and teaching skills and became part of a network of talented young artists mentored by Woodruff. He assisted in creating Woodruff’s historic mural “The Amistad.” In 1939, AM&N president John Brown Watson recruited him to found an art department at the school. Howard moved to Pine Bluff in 1939, and except for a year of study in New York during 1948-49, where he received a master’s degree in art education, he spent the rest of his life in Arkansas. Many of his students developed successful careers in art. Nationally-known artists Jeff Donaldson and Kevin Cole graduated from his program. Chicago muralist Mitchell Caton also studied with Howard at AM&N. For many years Howard was also Director of Public Relations at AM&N. He created imaginative floats and decorations for student parades. In 1967 he convinced the Arkansas Higher Education Commission to fully fund a $1.4 million Fine Arts Center at AM&N – then the costliest structure in AM&N history.

Howard’s career as an exhibiting painter continued. In 1946, he was awarded first place in the Arkansas Artist Exhibition for his painting “The Old Lady with a Letter and a Picasso.” Controversy ensued over the prize being won by an African American, and a second first prize was created to quiet the protest. He won the John Hope Award in the National Negro Artists Exhibition in 1950 for his work “Arkansas Landscape.” Throughout his life he continued exhibiting in Arkansas and national art shows.

Many fellow Arkansans recognized Howard’s significance as a cultural figure. He was a friend and correspondent of the poet John Gould Fletcher and the painter Louis Freund. From 1950-1956, he taught summer courses in art education at the University of Arkansas Graduate Center in Little Rock, where somewhat contorted arrangements had to be made for an African American without a doctorate to teach a graduate class. Among numerous honors and appointments, Howard served on the Arkansas Arts, Culture and Humanities Council and the Arkansas Advisory Council on Secondary Education. He was listed in the 1970-1971 Edition of Outstanding Educators of America, and was chosen as one of 16 Distinguished Artists in Arkansas in 1974. In 1978, he was listed in Who’s Who in American Art. Howard married Julia Palmer, a librarian at AM&N, in 1941. They had a long and happy marriage, raising two daughters, Roselily and Marinelle. On June 3, 1971, Julia Palmer Howard died. Despite having a stroke himself in 1971, Howard returned to AM&N in 1974, where he continued to work until his death on October 10, 1980.

A retrospective of Howard’s work, curated by his friend June Freeman, was presented in 1981 at the Arts and Science Center for Southeast Arkansas. The exhibit traveled to the Winthrop Rockefeller Institute in 1982. Today, most of Howard’s work is on permanent loan to the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff.

Bibliography

Albin, Edgar A. “AM&N Artist’s Work Marked by Power, Versatility.” Arkansas Gazette, July 8, 	1962.

Howard, John Miller. The Autobiography of John Howard Miller (unpublished). The John Miller 	Howard Papers, The University Museum and Cultural Center, The University of Arkansas 	at Pine Bluff.

John Miller Howard, 1908-1980. Morrilton, AR: Winthrop Rockefeller Institute, [2010?]. I believe that the actual publication date was 1982. This catalog is held in the Arkansas Collections at Mullins Library at the U of Arkansas in Fayetteville, and in the uncatalogued archives at the Museum and Cultural Center at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff.