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Artist unknown
American
Portrait of Joshua Fry Speed (1814 – 1882), about 1842
Watercolor on ivory, mounted on paper
2 1/8 × 1 3/4 in. (5.4 × 4.4 cm.)
5 7/8 × 4 3/16 × 3/4 in. (14.9 × 10.6 × 1.9 cm.) (Frame)
Gift of Joshua F. Speed by his daughter Miss Susan T. Speed 1938.48
A Lasting Friendship
These portrait miniatures show father and son, Judge John Speed and Joshua Fry Speed. The elder Speed owned a hemp plantation in Louisville and built an elegant Federal-style home, called Farmington, located off Bardstown Road. Abraham Lincoln traveled to Farmington in 1841 to visit his closest friend, Joshua Fry Speed. The two met in Springfield, Illinois, in 1837, when Speed offered an impoverished young Lincoln a place to stay, a generous act that laid the foundation for a life-long friendship.
