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♪ >> T.C.

Steele was really the person who invented Indiana landscapes.

His joy of living and his joy in nature is reflected in his canvases.

>> Even the simple things can be quite beautiful.

He decided that that was paintable.

He wanted to capture those subtle beauties of nature.

>> People, I think, really want to connect to nature.

Steele's paintings were part of that, in that there were these views that he was painting that were striking those mystic chords.

>> He charted a path for himself from a very early age and overcame tremendous obstacles.

It's hard not to look at that and just be in awe of what he accomplished.

>> We're still experiencing his paintings, not only what he saw, but also how it makes us feel, and that's why his work continues to be popular to this day.

♪ [Horn sounds] >> NARRATOR: In May 1885, a Norwegian passenger vessel, the S.S. Noordland, pulled into a bustling New York City harbor, packed with new immigrants, seeking new opportunities in a New World.

For one passenger, however, stepping foot on U.S. soil was a homecoming.

Five years earlier, he and his family left his home in Indiana, and embraced the sights and sounds of some of Europe's great cities.

It was an adventure to a place his wife once called "the land of art, the Mecca of our dreams."

Now, back in America, the 37-year-old husband and father of three was home.

But in many ways, he shared the exact same uncertainty as the hundreds of immigrants aboard the Noordland.

He had a family of five to support, no home in which to reside, and faced thousands of dollars in debt with no promise of a job waiting for him.

Faced with all this, Theodore Clement "T.C."

Steele, with little more than his family and his dreams in tow, turned west and headed to the rolling farms of Indiana.

♪ >> Rural Indiana at this time, it would have required probably a full family effort to get the work done.

So while education was important, I'm sure a priority was placed on, you know, feeding the family and raising the crops, and taking care of the cows and so forth.

>> NARRATOR: He was a man who possessed both a gentle spirit, and a bold vision.

He was from a quiet outpost on the western edge of Indiana, far from the cultural centers of the world.

And yet, he dreamed of becoming an artist, a painter, a dream so outlandish in the 1870s, none of his rural neighbors could even understand what type of occupation it was.

T.C.

Steele envisioned himself as a poet on canvas, one who used paint and palette to look past a man's complexion to see into his soul, and who used easel and canvas to embrace the natural cathedrals of beauty that resonate within each of us.

>> He noticed nature even from an early age.

He was appreciative of the sunset.

He was very appreciative of nature.

And that, of course, was inculcated in him because of his upbringing.

>> NARRATOR: Theodore Clement Steele was born on September 11th, 1847, in the tiny southwestern Indiana town of Gosport.

He was the eldest of eight children born to Harriet and Samuel Steele, a local farmer and saddle maker.

Theo, as he was called, was expected to do as any young kid on the wooded farmlands, feed the livestock, gather firewood, and help plant and harvest crops.

Despite the time-consuming and often difficult chores, however, Theo Steele had some advantages most youngsters living in a Midwestern log cabin could never imagine.

>> He was very fortunate.

His ancestors were very educated, comparatively speaking, and his grandparents on his mother's side had a library and a piano, and things that a lot of Indiana natives wouldn't have had at that time.

>> Steele relayed the story of sitting on the front porch of that little log cabin in an orchard, looking at the sunset and the effect of the light.

Steele also recalled that while he was working on the family farm, that he would tie ribbons on the handles of the plow, and during planting would watch the effect of light and color as he was working.

>> NARRATOR: He was not a stereotypical strapping farmer from Indiana.

He was lanky, soft-spoken, and studious, with piercing gray eyes that seemed to soak up every experience.

His parents and grandparents taught him to read poetry and music, and an uncle gave him his first paint set.

>> He was the oldest of five boys, and he would have been expected to be the man of the family and assume that role, but fortunately, his mother was very supportive.

She knew that he had an interest in the arts.

>> NARRATOR: In order to find stronger educational opportunities for the children, the Steeles decided to move to a larger town.

50 miles north of their home sat Waveland, Indiana.

They bought a small white cottage just a couple blocks from the local shops.

But the new home and the local amenities were not the primary attraction for the Steeles.

>> It did have the advantage of an academy called the Waveland Collegiate Academy, which was basically a college prep school.

And his parents must have been attuned to his education.

>> Steele's early training there had to do with classes in form and color and drawing.

So, you know, he did receive early formal training.

♪ >> NARRATOR: It was a hardscrabble existence.

Theo had four younger brothers and three younger sisters, and then watched in sorrow as each of his baby sisters died of various maladies in their infancy.

Steele saw his mother in tears on many occasions, but probably none more dramatic than when his father died in August 1861, when the family patriarch was only 38 years old.

The country had just been thrown into a vicious Civil War, and food and resources were scarce.

Theo was nearly 14 years old when his father died.

For most Indiana teenagers, this meant a future of strife on the family farm, but Harriet Steele vowed she would not let her eldest boy spend the rest of his days behind a plow.

>> Education was very important to Steele's mother.

And after the death of his father when he was 14 years old, she had him continue with his education.

♪ >> NARRATOR: Art, music, and culture were not the only alluring subjects that caught the eye of T.C.

Steele at the Waveland Academy.

Mary Elizabeth "Libbie" Lakin enrolled at the school just a few years after Steele began his studies there.

>> Mary Elizabeth Lakin was delightfully energetic, and maybe more spontaneous than Steele.

I think T.C.

Steele, even from an early age, was pretty deliberate about and very focused about what he wanted to be and what he wanted to do.

And Libbie was able to bring out, perhaps, more spontaneity and joy in seeing nature.

>> Libbie is a greater lover of nature than he is.

He believes she's more sensitive to it than he is.

Maybe that's also a part of, you know, that looking every day; that he's in the presence of someone who never sees the same world over and over again.

And he's trying to keep up with her.

"She is my most helpful critic.

She brings to me a clearer eye, a more poetic vision, a sense of the dignity of nature.

The painter must paint more than what the physical eye can see.

The picture is a means to an end.

The end of that, the beholder might dream his own dreams."

- T.C.

Steele >> NARRATOR: The two married on Valentine's Day 1870.

They moved to Battle Creek, Michigan, where Steele learned of possible portrait commissions.

>> Portrait painting was really the best way to make a living as a painter at that point in time.

Landscape painting was kind of a modern art, and there wasn't as much of a market for it the way there was portraiture.

>> NARRATOR: While Steele embarked on his new career, it wasn't long before Libbie announced her own major premiere.

The couple was pregnant with their first son, a boy Steele named Rembrandt, or Brandt for short, after one of his favorite painters.

Within two years, Libbie was pregnant again, this time with a daughter, Margaret, whom everyone called Daisy.

Theodore was overjoyed with the two newest family members, but also felt increasing financial pressure to support his growing clan.

By 1873, the couple returned to Indianapolis, where they gained more family support, while Steele attempted to ignite a fire under a career that was only just beginning.

Most in the Midwestern United States were only just waking up to the virtues of the fine arts.

Meanwhile, major urban centers in Europe were playing host to the world's most spectacular display of virtuosic color, pageantry, and mythic storytelling.

>> If you were a serious artist, you wished to study abroad, because there was no adequate training anywhere in the United States for a truly aspiring artist.

>> Steele always had this idea that he wanted to study in Europe, many, many years before he was actually able to do that.

He felt that he would need to go to Europe and get his training there.

♪ >> NARRATOR: Steele was attempting to make a name for himself as a portrait painter.

The jobs came slowly, and he often had to accept out-of-town commissions, where the work was hard and the hours so demanding that he was seldom home for Libbie and the children, which now included a third child, son Shirley, in 1878.

>> Portrait painting was really the only way to make a living as an artist, and Steele kept journals, and was very aware of the challenges he was facing.

He knew that it was going to be a hard row to hoe.

>> NARRATOR: Steele understood that in order to elevate his abilities, he needed training, real training.

The world's top two art schools were the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, and the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Munich.

He consulted with a handful of the region's most successful artists who had trained at the two celebrated academies, including Frank Duveneck, a Midwesterner who had made a career for himself as a painter in nearby Cincinnati.

>> An artist, for example, from the United States might look to pursue training in Europe to gain access to excellent teachers and techniques that they might not be able to connect with where they lived in the US.

>> NARRATOR: With a cheaper cost of living and an easier enrollment process, Steele chose to train in Munich, and signed-up for a two-year stay.

The problem, most art students traveling overseas were much younger and had fewer commitments.

Steele, by contrast, was nearly 33 years old, and a father of three.

He had no real savings with which to travel or pay tuition.

Upon the advice of several friends, he visited the Herman Lieber Art Emporium in Indianapolis.

>> Mr. Lieber must have seen something in T.C.

Steele.

He knew what Steele wanted to do, and came up with a plan to help Steele finance his trip.

>> There were 13 donors.

Each gave $100 for Steele to take his young family -- he now had three children -- to Europe.

And in return, when he came back, he would agree to paint their portrait.

>> I mean, this is the Cinderella story.

This is the -- you know, this is the fairy godmother arrives with the gown and the coach.

When Herman Lieber spearheads an effort to send T.C.

Steele to the Royal Academy of Munich, this is his ticket, and he's going to take it.

[Horn sounds] >> NARRATOR: On July 24th, 1880, Theodore, Libbie and their three children -- ranging from ages 9 to 2 -- boarded a ship and set sail for Germany.

>> The family's travel to Europe and time in Europe was a real adventure for them, whether it was being in a new environment, being surrounded by art and music, but also being a part of an arts community.

♪ >> NARRATOR: The Steeles were not alone in their journey.

A group of fellow Hoosier artists, including friends J. Ottis Adams and William Forsyth, joined the artistic troubadours on their exotic European odyssey.

♪ "I am delighted clear through to the core.

You know what Munich is?

You can read of its public squares and bronze statues, its 1,400 Old Masters and pictures that are numbered in the thousands."

- T.C.

Steele.

>> NARRATOR: In order to paint effective portraits, an artist needed a strong understanding of human anatomy.

And for this, Steele could not have come to a more appropriate and demanding place than the Royal Academy.

Under the steely eyes of many of the world's top figure painting teachers, Steele and other students endured rigorous drills, strict criticisms, and ponderous studies into the minute aspects of the human body.

>> Essentially, you would do the same things.

It was one study head after another.

I mean, there was no training in landscape.

There was no training in still life painting.

It was all figure work.

>> T.C.

Steele doesn't speak German, and neither did his family.

You know, you can't follow every word, but you're doing your best to get the most out of the lectures.

His professors will limit his palette so that the colors that are going to be used are going to be consistent with that German Realist style.

♪ >> NARRATOR: To feed Steele's active imagination, he followed some valuable advice from his colleague Frank Duveneck, the Cincinnati artist who strongly encouraged him to travel to Munich.

Duveneck told Steele that during his off hours he should visit an American ex-pat and fellow painter J. Frank Currier, an artist unlike anyone Steele had ever encountered.

Most classical painting at that time was a big task with weighty canvases and ponderous subject matter.

It required an artist months, if not years, of studio work to blend and refine colors, shapes, and shadows.

None of this existed in J. Frank Currier's world.

The gregarious American painter possessed a bigger-than-life personality.

He dressed like a field hand, with a large-brimmed, weather-beaten black hat that shaded his wooly face.

Currier and a small group of followers had embraced a notion known as plein air painting, painting directly out-of-doors.

Steele was immediately enchanted by the artist and his methods.

He soon joined Currier and the group on their frequent outdoor excursions.

>> Currier was, you know, a madman with the paintbrush and the subject matter.

I think Steele saw, you know, the emotion that could be expressed on the canvas.

Currier was working very quickly with color, with lush brushstrokes, you know, sometimes completing a painting in one day, and the enjoyment that would have come from that activity.

>> He's on the cusp of really deciding that in spite of the fact that he had come to Munich to learn how to draw the figure so he could paint portraits, that maybe landscape was in his future.

"There are times when there seems to be a spiritual illumination for the artist, a time when his spirit springs to the beautiful to accomplish all things so easily that his work is the pleasant exercise of his power."

T.C.

Steele >> NARRATOR: After two years in Munich, the biggest lesson T.C.

Steele learned was that he needed more lessons.

He wrote Herman Lieber on several occasions asking for additional time and extensions on his loans.

Fortunately, Lieber obliged.

He renegotiated Steele's contracts, which allowed the artist and his family to remain in Europe for a total of five years.

Steele earned two noteworthy achievements during his time as a student at the Academy.

The Road to Schleissheim was one of his most memorable works from the time he spent painting in plein air with J. Frank Currier.

The second honor was a submission called The Boatman, which won a Silver Medal at the Royal Academy's 1884 annual student exhibit.

>> That was really a remarkable achievement for an artist who five years before had come to Munich with almost no training, but diligence, hard work, and a commitment led to that achievement.

>> NARRATOR: By the summer of 1885, Steele had attended five years' worth of classroom study with some of Europe's most exacting instructors.

He had explored the world of plein air painting through his association with J. Frank Currier.

And he had spent time in several European museums and social centers, enjoying operas, plays, fine restaurants and cultural exhibits.

Now, at the age of 37, he had decided that it was time to put his education and experience to the test.

T.C.

Steele and his family were heading home.

♪ >> NARRATOR: As the world entered the final years of the 19th century, the speed of life was changing rapidly.

Coast-to-coast railroads and the rise of the Industrial Revolution meant that time was becoming an ever more present reality in daily life.

And new developments in Europe were about to turn the art world on its head.

Starting in 1874, a group of painters in France grew frustrated by limits placed upon them to be able to show their works at the International Salon in Paris.

So they staged their own showcase of works at a studio across town, a show of pieces that seemingly shattered all the rules of academic painting with a new type of Modernist style, Impressionism.

>> It's come to be characterized by a subject matter emphasis on scenes of everyday life, and also by some stylistic features, visible brushstrokes, loose brushstrokes, a sort of vibrant color palette.

>> They went outside and painted what they saw immediately without having lots of preliminary sketches.

>> NARRATOR: Far from the controversies surrounding the art world in Paris, T.C.

Steele set up shop at a home studio called Tinker Place on 16th Street, just north of downtown Indianapolis.

There he got to work right away on the portrait paintings he owed to the many benefactors who had financed his trip to Europe.

His training served him well, and he soon gained a reputation as the top portrait painter in the city.

His subjects included President Benjamin Harrison, poet James Whitcomb Riley, and Indiana University President William Lowe Bryan.

He required each to commit to 12 two-hour sittings, while Steele carefully crafted works that revealed their character, as well as their complexion.

>> He painted portraits of family members, many prominent families in Indianapolis.

And I think if you look at that, it really kind of created a vogue for his work.

>> Steele was a master at capturing the character of these people that he was painting.

But he was also a master at making these people feel comfortable.

♪ >> NARRATOR: Steele's work life and family life harmonized at Tinker Place.

Together, he and Libbie encouraged Brandt, Daisy, and Shirley to explore the arts as a critical part of their education.

>> The three children and T.C.

and Libbie, by all accounts, had a wonderful family life.

T.C.

was a doting father.

Libbie was a loving and wonderful mother to the children.

>> Libbie would go to the studio and look at Steele's work from the morning.

And I think she would provide him advice.

And the children would also spend time in the afternoon in the studio as Steele worked away.

After dinners, the family would read in the living room and play music.

>> NARRATOR: Steele never forgot the spark that plein air artists had ignited in him to head outdoors and paint the beauty of the landscapes.

>> He would look at the patterns of light.

He would look at the clouds.

He would look at the hills.

And so he would see compositions in his head.

He was looking all the time with his artist's eye.

♪ >> NARRATOR: Two years after Steele's return from Europe, he was reunited with two Hoosier colleagues from Munich, J. Ottis Adams and William Forsyth.

Together, the Indiana artists began to schedule excursions to the rural corners of Indiana in search of natural settings that inspired them.

>> It spurred the idea in these artists that, well, perhaps we can create an American idiom in painting, which didn't exist before.

So they said, Well, if it can be done in America, why not in Indiana?

When painters paint what they know best, they really capture the spirit of the place.

"There is a whole world over here in the American artists' native land, and a world with which he should be most familiar, that has been comparatively untouched.

I do not refer to the figure alone, but landscape, as well, for characteristic American landscape has been but little painted."

- T.C.

Steele >> NARRATOR: None of the Indiana artists ever imagined that his landscape paintings would earn him fame or fortune.

Out in the wilderness, however, they painted to fill their souls.

>> He was able to find beauty and joy in much more intimate landscapes.

He knew the landscape quite well, and he was able to present his poetic interpretation of it.

>> NARRATOR: In a world that seemed ever in need of speeding up, T.C.

Steele was finding ways to slow it down.

In remote regions of Indiana, such as Vernon along the Muscatatuck River, or Brookville, which sat on the Whitewater River, Steele found not only solace for his soul, but also a growing market for his landscape work, with continued patronage from Herman Lieber and other Midwestern benefactors.

"A modern landscape painter must bring into the house all the flow and radiance of the out-of-doors, not be transposed into a lower key, but up to the full brilliancy of nature."

T.C.

Steele >> You're not only giving an interpretation of what you're seeing, but you're also immersed in the senses, the atmosphere of that particular place, and Steele talked about this later on life.

It was that complete immersion.

>> NARRATOR: It was a rare sight for Americans to see such commonplace scenery presented in such uncommon ways.

The poet James Whitcomb Riley -- a longtime friend of Steele's -- once called his works "mirages of memory."

>> Steele's paintings were always well composed, which is a way of sort of inviting the viewer into the distance.

There's usually a stream or a road that sort of runs down the center.

I mean, it's a motif that occurs again and again and again.

It takes you into the painting.

And it sort of invites you to immerse yourself into a painting.

"I am beholden to the man who can take the common things of life: the haystack, the hovel, the cabbage patch, and the village street, and by the magic of his art discovers to us its wealth of beauty, until I exclaim I once was blind, but now I see."

- T.C.

Steele >> NARRATOR: In the summer of 1893, the World's Fair opened in Chicago.

The expansive campus featured opulent buildings constructed in a classical style reminiscent of many of the ancient European capitals.

A Fine Arts Building showcased 126 works of the French Impressionists, and more than 1,000 American paintings, including pieces from T.C.

Steele and his friend William Forsyth.

That summer, the two Indiana artists boarded a train to Chicago to see the exhibit.

>> It was their opportunity to sort of gauge -- their first opportunity to gauge what they were doing against what the world was doing.

You know, being in the Midwest, you really saw very little actual painting by other people from other places.

The Fair was a great opportunity to see what was really happening.

>> NARRATOR: The works of the Impressionists seemed to grant Steele permission to brighten his palette, apply more vivid colors to his canvases, and enhance his technique with looser, broader brushstrokes.

>> You see this progressive evolution in Steele's landscape painting toward a more Indiana palette.

There's a sort of -- almost a white period, where everything is fairly high-keyed.

And so as with any really fine artist, you continue to evolve and change as your life goes on.

>> In so many of the Steeles that I've worked on, it was always a glorious moment to, from time to time, to see a brushstroke that from a distance looked green or looked red, but under a microscope, it was 8 to 10 colors in that one stroke.

He was so sophisticated with his palette.

"A characteristic of Impressionists is the habit of painting in a mosaic or patches of pure color, which is practiced by many.

It is an expression of art today.

It allows for individuality that will doubtless secure a long life for it."

- T.C.

Steele >> NARRATOR: In the fall of 1894, The Chicago Art Association invited a small group of Indiana artists to assemble their works for a new exhibit of regional American Impressionism.

Steele, William Forsyth, and J. Ottis Adams, joined two other Hoosiers, Otto Stark and Richard Gruelle, to showcase their paintings in an exhibit simply called "Five Hoosier Painters."

>> It all sort of comes out of the same sort of philosophy of painting in a natural way, of painting in the true character of a place that may not have the attributes of beauty that one would normally ascribe to nature, but that there can be beauty in even the quiet things.

>> NARRATOR: Steele, Forsyth, Adams, Stark, and Gruelle would be linked forever in national art circles as "The Hoosier Group."

>> The notion stuck.

It had been sort of a conscious decision on the part of Steele and Adams and Forsyth to create an American idiom, or do their best to create an American idiom, by painting what they do best, which was the landscape of Indiana.

♪ >> NARRATOR: By the turn of the century, T.C.

Steele appeared to be on top of the world, but life was not easy for the American Impressionist.

His hardscrabble upbringing cast shadows of doubt.

His work ethic was tireless.

He arose every day at 4:00 a.m, and would be out the door and into the wilderness before dawn.

And even with all his success, various unexpected events would knock him into a ravine of despair.

Perhaps the greatest heartbreak for Steele came in 1899, when he noticed that Libbie was labored in her breathing, a condition that worsened week after week.

Doctors confirmed the couple's fears.

She had contracted tuberculosis.

Libbie struggled for nearly a year before succumbing to the disease in November.

>> After Libbie dies in 1899, there is a certain dourness that you find frequently in Steele's paintings, almost a sort of morose, sad color scheme.

I think he was affected deeply by Libbie's passing.

♪ >> NARRATOR: Steele was despondent and dark.

For years, he had been a prolific painter, often taking up to four blank canvases into the woods each day, and creating hundreds of landscape paintings.

But for six years after Libbie died, virtually no new works ever found their way from Steele's easel to the galleries.

♪ It was his daughter Daisy who ultimately came to his rescue in 1902.

She scheduled a working vacation for her father, traveling with him by train to the West Coast.

They planned to visit family along the Oregon coastline and into northern California.

>> With her death, we have a painter who goes to pieces, and who recovers on the trip West.

And in California and in Oregon, we'll see T.C.

Steele revert to the wonder of the natural world.

"I had gone to the coast unwillingly, but fell under the spell of its charm at once, and every day I felt more and more the eternal challenge of the ocean, like the atmosphere, which gives the painter and the poet a voice and interpretation."

- T.C.

Steele >> NARRATOR: The trip energized Steele and encouraged him to reengage with his art.

Still, his outlook was ambivalent.

His two sons, Brandt and Shirley, had left home to start their own families, and soon Daisy would be married and would also leave.

Never in his adult life had Steele been alone without his family nearby.

Once again, uncertainty cast doubt over T.C.

Steele.

♪ By the early 1900s, T.C.

Steele had achieved much.

He won national acclaim for works and exhibits from New York City to San Francisco.

He served on international art juries.

An Indiana artist, Wayman Adams, celebrated the inspiration of Steele and the other Hoosier Group painters in his work, "The Art Jury."

>> I think Steele is the father of Indiana art because he was a leader.

He was an extreme professional, exhibited widely, served on juries for other competitions, and that's giving back to the community.

♪ >> NARRATOR: Despite his success, Steele was anxious to discover new opportunities and new scenery that would challenge his artistic sensibilities.

Fortunately, he found new horizons to explore in the rolling hills 60 miles south of Indianapolis.

Adolph Shulz, a colleague of Steele's from Wisconsin, came across an old Chicago newspaper clipping that extolled the virtues of a wilderness paradise in the hills of Brown County, Indiana, a place that came to be known as Peaceful Valley.

In 1906, Steele rented a team of horses and a wagon, determined to check out the land for himself.

"I was stunned by the dramatic spectacle spread out before me.

There was a sweep of great distances.

It was all so wonderfully appealing in its bigness, so full of meanings, and so alive."

- T.C.

Steele >> He was looking for real wilderness, and this really offered that.

It was also very inexpensive.

He could buy property, you know, for not a lot of money.

In fact, the joke was farmers selling their property would actually add a couple acres to the deed just to get rid of it.

And so this offered him that kind of remoteness.

♪ >> The hills were impassable.

They could not farm.

Most of the people who came to Brown County intended to settle there and farm, and the trees made that very difficult.

The early settlers in Brown County saw the forest, at least in part, as an enemy or at least something to be overcome, but it was also full of large, dangerous wild critters.

There were panthers still in Indiana, at least in Brown County, at that time.

It was a scary place.

>> Brown County in 1900 was Indiana 1840.

It was very primitive.

People were very poor.

They lived in log cabins.

The town had no running water, no electricity, not for years really.

>> NARRATOR: Eight miles west of the Brown County seat of Nashville was a property in tiny Belmont, Indiana, that sat high on a hill with views over the entire county for nearly 10 miles.

Steele began to purchase large tracts of land high above town and set out to build a wilderness dream home.

>> It was that idea of untamed wilderness that he could go out and find so many subjects that he could paint.

He had a very romantic idea of what Brown County would be like.

>> NARRATOR: Steele's rush to build a mountain paradise was motivated by more than simply finding new landscapes to paint.

For almost two years, he had been courting a young art teacher from Indianapolis, Selma Neubacher.

Selma trained at the Pratt Institute in New York City.

She was 23 years younger than Steele, and was a friend of his daughter Daisy, who had met and married Selma's brother two years earlier.

Selma had sophisticated artistic tastes.

Her companionship helped heal Steele's broken heart.

The two secretly planned to wed in the fall of 1907, as soon as Steele could finish his new hilltop home.

Selma's youth and energy helped her overcome her fears of moving away from the comforts of city life to live deep in the wilderness.

"In coming to the hills, the change for me had been very great.

I had gone from one extreme to another; from the close-up life of a city, to a wilderness that seemed boundless in scope; a home in the wilderness... what an adventure!"

- Selma Neubacher Steele >> They trudged up the road, up to this property, and she's wearing her silk shoes, probably wondering what she'd gotten herself into.

The mule ran out of steam or they got stuck, and they had to get out and kind of help push their way up.

But once they got up there, she saw this beautiful view, and that's where they made their home.

>> NARRATOR: In her diary and letters, Selma simply referred to her new husband as "The Painter."

Each day, Steele continued his habit of waking at 4:00 a.m. and heading into his new wilderness sanctuary to paint until the sun set.

Meanwhile, Selma negotiated the challenges of their wilderness cottage.

She had to work with the local citizens of Brown County, most of whom were subsistence farmers who had never heard of a professional painter before.

>> The world that Theodore and Selma came from was night and day from what they found here.

The idea of someone coming here and creating artwork seemed ridiculous.

It just was beyond belief.

>> NARRATOR: Compared to the small log cabins with dirt floors that dotted the county, the mountaintop home of T.C.

and Selma Steele seemed like a turn-of-the-century palace.

An expansive living room with a large fireplace and stone hearth.

A full kitchen, featuring a wood stove, and cabinets filled with canned foods and modern appliances.

A player piano.

A Victrola phonograph.

There was a stuffed peacock in one corner.

It was like nothing the residents of Brown County had ever seen in their lives.

>> Selma really ran the household, and then she began to entertain people from the town.

She would have something called, "Sundays at the Steeles," where the people from the town would come and they would just enjoy Steele's paintings, and she would serve them tea and so forth.

>> NARRATOR: In a nod to Steele's love of nature, the couple hired a famed Chicago engraver to carve into their fireplace mantle a quote from one of Selma's favorite writers, "Every morning I take off my hat to the beauty of the world."

One of Steele's favorite amenities at the home was the construction of large, wrap-around porches that surrounded three sides of the structure.

In order to keep out pests, they installed screens around the porches.

As the winds whipped along the hillside, the sounds would whistle and hum about the place, a phenomenon that inspired Steele to dub the home "The House of the Singing Winds."

"The old way of painting sunlight and shadow by contrasts of brilliant light and deep shadow is discarded, and even shadows are painted luminous and full of color as they really are in nature.

The sunlight diffuses the color, the atmosphere trembles with it, and the Impressionist tries to paint its vibrations."

- T.C.

Steele "The Painter" and I felt and believed that here in this hill country was evidence of a character in the outdoors that would command of us our best and finest in spirit."

- Selma Steele >> Selma did everything she could to be accommodating, as far as keeping body and soul together.

She also wanted to create this environment at the House of the Singing Winds that would have pleasing views and things to paint around the house.

So she planted these flower gardens that were very aesthetically pleasing.

>> NARRATOR: Within a couple years, Selma's gardens were the envy of the town, and often as visually intoxicating as Steele's paintings.

"Along with the birds' songs came the soft winds of the morning singing their way, from low in the ravines, to the trees standing above us.

I thought of God sending us heaven on earth."

- Selma Steele ♪ >> NARRATOR: By the time Selma and T.C.

Steele moved to the House of the Singing Winds, timber had been harvested from most of the land that surrounded their home.

Steele watched as his favorite subject matter was literally being stripped away.

In order to combat the timber interests, Steele bought more and more property around his Belmont home.

Within 10 years, he would own 211 acres of land, in which he planted more trees and helped to cultivate the return of wildlife.

He also added several structures to his property, first building a small studio, and finally a large, barn-like studio from which to paint bigger and more elaborate landscapes.

>> At the House of the Singing Winds, you would think that he would ease up a bit.

But in fact, he didn't -- and I think part of that had to do with just his own quest and his passion for what he was doing.

♪ "I always marveled at his capacity for work.

I marveled at "the Painter's" skill.

I came to realize how rare was the gift with which he had been born.

It was like an inner flame that kept his whole being, mind, body and soul, ever alive to the shifting scenes about him."

- Selma Steele >> NARRATOR: Inspired by Steele, other artists from the Midwest began to make the pilgrimage to south central Indiana.

By 1926, a group established the Brown County Art Association, one of the largest and most prestigious art colonies from New York to New Mexico.

Nestled deep in his Brown County sanctuary, Indiana's original American Impressionist found himself completely consumed in the tree-lined temples that surrounded the House of the Singing Winds.

>> T.C.

Steele was probably the first to really recognize Brown County as something other than this underdeveloped part of Indiana.

He saw it through his eyes as an artist.

He saw the long views and the beautiful hills and the changing seasons as real subject matter for him.

♪ >> NARRATOR: By 1922, T.C.

Steele was 75-years old.

His eyes and mind were as sharp as ever, and his hands just as steady.

But he was growing older and more tired.

No longer did he rise at 4 a.m. to paint three and four canvases a day.

He needed more breaks in his schedule, even as more and more institutions asked him to give speeches or lead jury exhibitions.

With improving roadways in Brown County, he splurged and bought a Model T Ford to help him get around.

At 25 miles per hour, however, the speed of the vehicle frightened him, and he always insisted that Selma drive.

Despite the challenges, "The Painter" still had one more production in which to showcase his talents, a partnership dreamed up by Indiana University President William Lowe Bryan.

>> Well, he had been at the helm of IU for many years, and he was looking for ways to increase its visibility and expand the curriculum, having chances for students to actually interact with distinguished people in other areas.

One of the local talents was T.C.

Steele, who had a national reputation at that point.

Bryan had this idea that maybe we could have him come as an honorary professor of painting.

>> NARRATOR: For an annual fee of $2500, Steele painted various campus landscapes during the winter, pausing from time to time to chat with curious students, faculty, and admiring citizens.

President Bryan explained his decision, "I believe that the university needs artists as much as it needs scholars."

>> Steele rendered his mission to the students in simple terms, to see the beautiful in nature and in life.

And so I think in that way, it was very -- you know, sort of part of the spiritual aspect of the university.

♪ >> NARRATOR: In December 1925, Selma was behind the wheel of the couple's Model T, driving "The Painter" home from yet another engagement.

Suddenly, Steele collapsed with a massive heart attack.

Luckily for Selma, the couple was in the company of a friend, Dr. Weinstein, who helped usher Steele to the doctor's home in Terre Haute for treatment.

Steele was told by physicians from Bloomington, Terre Haute, and Indianapolis, that there was nothing that could be done for him, other than to cut back on cigars and coffee, two staples in Steele's daily routine.

Abiding by Steele's constant requests, Selma eventually moved "The Painter" back home to the House of the Singing Winds on July 4th, 1926.

Now at peace, T.C.

Steele was back home in the Brown County wilderness that had been his sanctuary for years.

Ultimately, the soul could no longer nourish the body.

T.C.

Steele passed away at 8:00 p.m. on July 24th, 1926.

Hundreds of people attended a simple ceremony at the base of his hilltop home in Belmont.

His ashes were scattered about the forest, swirling and dancing among the Singing Winds.

>> I almost think of him as a transcendentalist with his love of nature.

This idea of the sublime, and the great respect for the beauty around him.

>> There's a simplicity of life that he's trying to convey, I think.

People began to look around and see nature with different eyes, through seeing his paintings.

>> As an Impressionist, Steele wasn't telling people exactly what to see.

The artist is giving you enough information to then respond to it with your own experience and your own memories.

And I think that's true today as well.

>> He wanted to engulf himself in the Indiana landscape.

And that's where he found his greatest thrust as an Indiana artist.

He is really an American treasure and an American icon.

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