Portrait of Dr. Dudley Peter Allen

The Allen Memorial Art Museum was named after Dr. Dudley Peter Allen, an Oberlin resident who graduated from the College in 1875. Later he became a widely respected Cleveland surgeon who was an influential educator at what is now University Hospital. After Dr. Allen became a Trustee of Oberlin College in 1898, the needs of the newly formed art department were always among his primary concerns. This is undoubtedly due to the inspiration of his friend and former professor, Adelia Field Johnston, who was the first to teach the history of art at Oberlin College. Dr. Allen was energetic in raising support for the funding of a building for the arts and worked closely with the architect, Cass Gilbert, on the plans. When he died in 1915, his widow Elizabeth assumed the cost of the building as a memorial to her husband. The daughter of Louis Severance, one of the early partners in Standard Oil, Elizabeth later became Mrs. F. F. Prentiss and remained a generous benefactor to the museum which bears her first husband's name.