The subject, a native of West Nottingham, Pennsylvania, was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1768, and with his close friend Benjamin Franklin he conducted numerous scientific investigations. He was a delegate to the Continental Congresses of 1782 and 1787, and in 1789 he was elected to the First Congress, where he served until 1793. He was an active member of The New-York Historical Society.

This plaster bust was cast from the original located in Stratford Church (George Daniel collection).

After graduation from Harvard College in 1821 Emerson studied for the ministry and became the pastor of the Second (Unitarian) Church of Boston. When he could not follow the doctrine he was expected to preach, he resigned in 1832 and went to Europe where acquaintanceship with Carlyle, Wordsworth and Coleridge awakened his interest in literary pursuits. Upon his return he settled in Concord, Massachusetts, in the colony of authors gathered there, and became the close friend of the Alcotts, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry Thoreau, Margaret Fuller, and others. A leading member of the Transcendentalist movement, he presented many of its philosophic concepts in his first major publication, Nature (1836). His platform lectures, published as the famous Essays (1841-44), attracted much attention. He contributed to The Dial and was one of its editors for two years. Like many of his New England friends, he was an ardent abolitionist and delivered frequent antislavery lectures. He died in Concord, an author and philosopher of international acclaim. Emerson was among the distinguished guests present when young French's Minuteman - his first attempt at a life-size, full-length figure - was unveiled at its wooded site beside the North Bridge outside Concord on April 19, 1875. The sculptor was then on his way to Florence for further study. It was not until his return that he modeled the likeness of the elderly author, whom he had known since his boyhood in Concord. Emerson, upon looking at the finished bust, said that it was indeed the very face he shaved. French later recalled, "When the bust was approaching completion [Emerson] looked at it after one of the sittings and said, 'The trouble is, the more it resembles me, the worse it gets.'" (Cabot, A Memoir of Ralph Waldo Emerson, 2, 1887, 679). One of the poet's friends commented that it represented him "as he now is, touched with age yet youthful in his manly features and expression. It is the form in which we wish to perpetuate our friend." (Journals of Bronson Alcott, 1938, p. 501).

The profile medallion of Franklin by sculptor Jean-Baptiste Nini was one of the first and most popular French likenesses put into mass circulation. Based on a drawing by English artist Thomas Walpole, the Nini portrait was well-regarded by Franklin. He enthused about the medallion in a 1779 letter to his daughter: "The clay medallion of me you say you gave to Mr. Hopkinson was the first of its kind made in France. A variety of others have been made since of different sizes; some to be set in the lids of snuffboxes, and some so small as to be worn in rings; and the numbers sold are incredible. These, with the pictures, busts and prints, (of which copies upon copies are spread everywhere,) have made your father's face as well known as that of the moon…"

Jarvis apparently used as a model for this bust the death mask he made in 1809. The bust is unique in that it is Jarvis's only known original work in sculpture.

Scriba Collection was given to Library in 1982. See page 717 N-YHS portrait catalogue for duplicate bas-relief 1891.6; possibly a later copy of 1891.6