Louis John Rhead was the son of George W. Rhead, an influential British ceramic artist and teacher of art and design. Recognizing his son's talent, the senior Rhead sent him to Paris to study with Gustave Boulanger in 1872. In 1879, Louis John Rhead undertook study at the National Art Training School in South Kensington, London. In 1883, Rhead emigrated to the United States to accept the position of Art Director for the publishing firm of D. Appleton in New York City. During the so-called Poster Craze of the 1890s, Rhead designed numerous posters in the Art Nouveau style of Eugene Grasset. His posters appeared regularly in leading magazines; he won a gold medal for Best American Poster Design at the first International Poster Show in Boston. After the Poster Craze waned, Rhead turned to book illustration. Between 1902 and his death in 1926, he illustrated many of Harper's children's books, including James Fenimore Cooper's The Deerslayer and Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island and Kidnapped.
