A colorful Fortean, sensu stricto.
Faber Bernard Birren was born 21 September 1900 in Chicago to Joseph Pierre Birren and Crescentia Lang. He was the third of three children, with an elder sister and brother. His father, Joseph, was an artist, and obviously instilled some of that in Faber, starting with his name, which translates as craftsman. (His sister was Jeanette, his bother William.) The family was doing well enough in 1910 to also board a servant. Birren painted from an early age, including murals around the family home. He attended Mount Carmel Roman Catholic Elementary School before moving to Nichols Senn High School, where he studied art and ceramics while also taking courses at the Art Institute of Chicago his final two years, where he studied painting and drawing. His mother was a skilled pianist.
William was old enough to register for the draft during the Great War—he was living in Buffalo at the time—but apparently Faber just missed out; at least, there’s no draft card for him. He matriculated at the University of Chicago in 1919, where he initially planned to study education, but he was already being drawn to color theory. He pledged the fraternity Delate Sigma Phi and contributed art to the yearbook. At the time, he was living with his sister and her husband. He stayed at the University for only two years, and in 1921 went to work at the bookseller Charles T. Powner. Likely, he met Tiffany Thayer while at this job: several years younger, Thayer had left him early and was employed by Powner during this same period. While working in the business, Birren began collecting books on color, devising his own course of study in the subject. He talked with psychologists, physicists, and ophthalmologists and conducted experiments, such as painting his room vermillion to see if it would drive him mad.
Faber Bernard Birren was born 21 September 1900 in Chicago to Joseph Pierre Birren and Crescentia Lang. He was the third of three children, with an elder sister and brother. His father, Joseph, was an artist, and obviously instilled some of that in Faber, starting with his name, which translates as craftsman. (His sister was Jeanette, his bother William.) The family was doing well enough in 1910 to also board a servant. Birren painted from an early age, including murals around the family home. He attended Mount Carmel Roman Catholic Elementary School before moving to Nichols Senn High School, where he studied art and ceramics while also taking courses at the Art Institute of Chicago his final two years, where he studied painting and drawing. His mother was a skilled pianist.
William was old enough to register for the draft during the Great War—he was living in Buffalo at the time—but apparently Faber just missed out; at least, there’s no draft card for him. He matriculated at the University of Chicago in 1919, where he initially planned to study education, but he was already being drawn to color theory. He pledged the fraternity Delate Sigma Phi and contributed art to the yearbook. At the time, he was living with his sister and her husband. He stayed at the University for only two years, and in 1921 went to work at the bookseller Charles T. Powner. Likely, he met Tiffany Thayer while at this job: several years younger, Thayer had left him early and was employed by Powner during this same period. While working in the business, Birren began collecting books on color, devising his own course of study in the subject. He talked with psychologists, physicists, and ophthalmologists and conducted experiments, such as painting his room vermillion to see if it would drive him mad.