Mary DeNeale Morgan was known for her pastel paintings and etching and as a longtime California artist, left a great legacy as a teacher and organizer as well as painter. In addition to pastel, she worked in tempera, oil, and watercolor, and painted sand dunes, adobes, landscapes, and the wind-swept cypresses of the Monterey Peninsula.

She was born in San Francisco, California on May 24, 1868, and as a child of two years, moved to Oakland where her father was the city engineer. She was a favorite pupil of William Keith from her youth until the time of his death. Morgan also studied at the School of Design under Virgil Williams, Soren Carlsen, and Amedee Joullin.

Source: "Artists in California 1786 to 1940" by Edan Milton Hughes

In 1896, she opened a studio in Oakland and, for a brief time, taught art at Oakland High School. In 1909, she settled in Carmel, where she bought from watercolorist Sydney Yard his studio home located on Lincoln near Seventh Street.

She was a pupil in William Merritt Chase's summer classes there in 1914, and from 1917 to 1925 was director of the Carmel School of Art. She was also a founder of the Carmel Art Association.

In 1928, the editors of "Scribner's" magazine named her as one of the nation's foremost women artists. During World War Two she made weekly visits to nearby Fort Ord to sketch the servicemen.

Unmarried, Morgan died in Carmel on October 10, 1948.

Among her affiliations were the National Association of Women Painters & Sculptors, the San Francisco Art Association, the California Watercolor Society, the Laguna Beach Art Association, the American Federation of Artists, and the Carmel Art Association. In addition to numerous museums, her works are in the collection of Union High School at Monterey, the Monterey City Hall and Presidio, Sunset School at Carmel, Salinas High School, Harrison Library at Carmel and the Society of California Pioneers.