Thomas F. Ryan

Thomas Ryan (1851-1928) was a member of the stock exchange in his early twenties and subsequently a very successful businessman with coal mines, railroad companies, tobacco interests, and insurance. He became a multimillionaire. He was almost certainly introduced to Rodin by the Duchesse de Choiseul (Museum nos. A.45 and A.46-1914) in 1908 and played a major role in promoting his work in the USA. In 1910 he financed the purchase of ten of Rodin's works for the Metropolitan Museum, New York, which became the core of their Rodin collection, displayed in the new Rodin Gallery there in 1912 alongside small plasters and a bronze cast of the bust of Ryan which Rodin had presented to the Museum the previous year.