Born in Wichita, Kansas and raised in Ponca City, Oklahoma, she attended Chickasha, a liberal arts college, and then Central State University in Edmond, Oklahoma where she studied art. She took three years of private lessons from Richard Goetz, well known Oklahoma figure and still life painter, and he and his wife Edith, former New Yorkers, encouraged her to go to the Art Students League in New York. She took their advice and remained in the city for 15 years. She attended the Art Students League for two and a half years and there was a student of David Leffel with whom she developed a strong personal relationship. For her the time in New York was highly productive. She returned to the League to teach drawing and figure painting, found gall...