Many colorful characters are perched on Family Tree, the famous Norman Rockwell painting depicting an American family’s descent from a pirate and a Spanish princess. Rockwell’s artwork, which graced the cover of the October 24, 1959, issue of The Saturday Evening Post, was completed within four months. Taking a closer look shows faces of mother and father atop the tree are repeated through the generations. “He’s got a good face,” said Rockwell of model Frank Dolson’s “strong jaw, mouth, nose—the broad bridge is a characteristic which will carry through from the pirate to the modern man very nicely.”
A friend of Rockwell’s questioned his portraying the family’s pirate pedigree, but ultimately the artist decided to keep the rogue relative, realizing everyone “had a horse thief or two in his family.”