A rare archive created by Bronx student Joan Meredith Legg between 1943–1947, featuring 102 original artworks, a period photograph, and family papers, is heading to auction.
ASTORIA, Ore. – A striking and historically rich archive of World War II–era children’s artwork originally from the Bronx has resurfaced after more than 75 years and will be offered at auction for the first time. The collection, created by Bronx native Joan Meredith Legg between 1943 and 1947, includes over 102 original drawings and school projects, along with a period photograph of the young artist and handwritten family ephemera from the same household.
The artwork—rendered in crayon, pencil, ink, and watercolor—captures an unusually vivid portrait of mid-century childhood and early creative development. Subjects range from Mother Goose illustrations, fashion drawings, and domestic scenes to industrial landscapes, early advertising parodies (“Fitch Shampoo”), geometry and color-theory charts, international themes, and graded school assignments still bearing mid-1940s teacher marks.
The archive is anchored by a handwritten family note listing the Legg residence at 34 Metropolitan Avenue, Bronx, NY, providing rare provenance and contextual grounding. A school essay titled “Jazz,” signed by a likely sibling, Adrienne Winkelhoff, adds a deeper familial and cultural layer to the material.
“This archive feels like opening a window directly into the Bronx of the 1940s,” said a representative from Grandview Art & Auctions, the Astoria, Oregon–based auction house offering the lot. “To find over a hundred original works preserved from a single child—complete with a photograph, school papers, and a documented Bronx address—is extraordinary. It’s not just artwork; it’s a full narrative of mid-century youth, creativity, and education.”
The lot is expected to appeal to collectors and institutions focusing on:
- Americana & folk art
- Outsider/self-taught art
- NYC cultural history
With themes touching on wartime culture, early advertising, classroom pedagogy, children’s design aesthetics, and everyday Bronx life, the archive represents a rare primary-source record of American childhood.
The collection will be offered as a single lot through LiveAuctioneers. Bidding is now open for public preview:
https://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/220971517_large-1940…
“It’s the survival of the archive—all of it together—that makes this so meaningful,” Grandview Art & Auctions added. “This is the kind of material that rarely surfaces intact, and it tells a powerful story about a young girl’s world in a rapidly changing New York.”
ABOUT GRANDVIEW ART & AUCTIONS
Grandview Art & Auctions is a boutique auction house based in Astoria, Oregon, specializing in estates, fine art, Americana, rare ephemera, and book collections.
