Williams, Caroline

Caroline Williams (November 10, 1908 - 1988) was an artist from Cincinnati, Ohio renowned and celebrated for her ‘A Spot in Cincinnati’ series of sketches, which appeared in the Cincinnati Enquirer from 1932 until 1979. She was recognized for the incredible amount of research she did for each of the captions for her sketches, adding much to local knowledge of Cincinnati. She was born in Covington, Kentucky and grew up in Cincinnati, where her father found a job as a staff artist at the Cincinnati Enquirer. He would rise up through the ranks and eventually become the director of the Art Department of the Enquirer, until he died of pneumonia in 1928. Williams grew up in College Hill, a neighborhood in Cincinnati, and then attended the University of Cincinnati for a year, followed by two year at the Cincinnati Art Academy and another two years at the Art Student’s League in New York. She was hired by the Cincinnati Enquirer as a staff artist in 1932, following in her father’s footsteps. Williams gained notoriety, celebrity even, due to her acclaimed series ‘A Spot in Cincinnati’, which began in November 1932. Cincinnatians would eagerly await their Sunday paper to see what would be the next ‘nook’ featured by Williams in her sketches. Over the course of her career, Williams published several books of her sketches and drawing of Cincinnati, and she left her job at the Enquirer in 1945 to become a free-lance artist. From 1945 until her death in 1988, Williams self-published and printed a series of books and prints, having converted the hen house behind her cabin into her own printing studio. Williams is still fondly remembered in the Cincinnati area, and her works remain popular to this day.