The Children of Oliver Miller White
Attributed to William Henry Baker (1825–1875)
c. 1853
  Originally from New York, William H. Baker was in Nashville, Tennessee, by the mid-1840s. Baker came to New Orleans initially to work as a merchant. After a stint in a local art studio in 1848, he decided to pursue a career as a portrait painter, enrolling in art classes with Enoch Wood Perry. The New Orleans Daily Crescent of November 26, 1855, included a rave review of Baker’s work:

Baker’s portraits of many of our citizens are among the finest ever painted in this country. Under the magical influence of his pencil, the "counterfeit presentment" almost assumes reality. All of his works are disguised for correctness, delicacy, breadth of coloring and exquisite finish.

Baker left New Orleans periodically to go up North; in the summer of 1955, he toured the celebrated galleries of France and England. By 1865 he had permanently settled in New York City, where he exhibited portraits and genre paintings at the National Academy of Design and the Brooklyn Art Association. In affiliation with the latter institution, he became the principal of the Free School of Design in 1869.

Oliver Miller White, a prosperous merchant and steamboat agent, commissioned Baker to paint this large portrait of his four children and their dog around 1853. White had moved to New Orleans in the mid-1840s from Maine with his Canadian wife, Elizabeth Mary Garvey. A relatively early example of Baker’s work, this ambitious painting has a naive quality in the handling of the figure. The Louisiana State Museum has three other Baker paintings, including a portrait of famed Louisiana actress and poet Adah Isaacs Menken.