Donald G. Mitchell’s Home

James David Smillie

Alternative titles for this piece are "The Home of Donald G. Mitchell" and "House in which Donald Gr. Mitchell wrote 'Dream Life'". The image was comissioned by Charles Scribner's Sons, NY, in 1883 to illustrate Mitchell's noted 'Dream Life, A Fable of the Seasons'. It was published in 1884.

Here, Smillie depicts Edgewood Farm in New Haven, Connecticut, which Mitchell purchased in 1855 after his return from a tour of England with the American consulate. The farm is where Mitchell wrote 'Dream Life' and other essays. The farm included four residences which still stand today.

In addition to essayist, Donald Grant Mitchell was an art critic, an architect, and landscape architect, designing several parks throughout New Haven. He was also a cartographer and practical farmer, and he wrote about his life in rural Connecticut in a book titled "My Farm of Edgewood" which, despite his distaste for limelight, was one of the best selling books of its day.