In this lesson, students will do a close look at a 1910 double portrait of Henry Frick.  Students should closely examine the portrait using the See-Think-Wonder Learning to Look Strategy.

Students may also use the hotspots to closely examine the portrait and answer the T/F questions about the portrait.

Then, students should watch the video excerpt from the History Channel series The Men Who Built America and decide how this video acts as a portrait of the  turn-of-the-century businessman.

What is the same in the two?

What is different?

To extend the lesson, students may complete the sorting activity.  Have them think about how each image or video portrays the robber barrons.  Is each more negative or positive?Why?

To further extend this lesson, students could also redraw the portrait as a political cartoon from a negative point of view.  They may want to be a resident of Johnstown after the flood or one of the Homestead Strikers.

This collection was created in conjunction with the National Portrait Gallery’s 2017 Learning to Look Summer Teacher Institute.

TAGS: #NPGteach, portrait, learning to look, National Portrait Gallery