Cyrus Leroy Baldridge

As a boy, Baldridge studied at Frank Holme's Chicago School of Illustration. He graduated from the University of Chicago in 1911, and worked as a war correspondent and illustrator in Belgium and France during World War I. After the United States entered the war, he worked on the military newspaper Stars and Stripes. HIs battlefield drawings appeared in mainstream magazines and as a book, gaining him attention. Baldridge married writer Caroline Singer, and they traveled and collaborated on books, including White Africans and Black, based on a 19-month trip through Africa.