Albert Coombs Barnes (January 2, 1872 – July 24, 1951) was an American inventor and art collector. With his fortune made from the development of the antiseptic drug Argyrol, he founded the Barnes Foundation, a museum created from his private collection of art. It has strengths in paintings by Impressionist and Modernist masters, as well as furniture and crafted objects. It is located near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Barnes was known as an eccentr...
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Albert Coombs Barnes (January 2, 1872 – July 24, 1951) was an American inventor and art collector. With his fortune made from the development of the antiseptic drug Argyrol, he founded the Barnes Foundation, a museum created from his private collection of art. It has strengths in paintings by Impressionist and Modernist masters, as well as furniture and crafted objects. It is located near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Barnes was known as an eccentric, larger-than-life figure who had a passion for educating the underprivileged. He created a special relationship with Lincoln University, a historically black college in the area, and gave the university a strong role in administration of his foundation.
Barnes was born in Philadelphia to working-class parents and was the son of a butcher.
He attended the public academic Central High School in Philadelphia. Then he financed his own education in chemistry at the University of Pennsylvania and in Germany.
In 1899 with a German student named...
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