Florence Elizabeth Riefle’s talents proved fruitful by her willingness to think creatively and to continually adopt higher values for herself. After her death in 1998, she was inducted into the 1999 “Maryland Women’s Hall of Fame” as its first visual artist, and the Maryland State Archives received 350 to 400 of her sketch books of Maryland, Maine, Germany and France to be preserved for future generations. Her work is in private and corporate collections in the U.S. and Japan.

That was not all she accomplished. Florence had the caring heart of a reconciler, recorder, collector, and preservationist — and demonstrations in those areas came in many forms. Being the eldest Riefle daughter, the Riefle family maintained certain expectations she was dutiful to their wishes, but her artistic bent set her apart from their patterns. From her youth, Florence showed an independent indomitable “air,” and graduated from the Maryland Institute in 1931 and in 1933 with honors and a traveling stipend to Europe. In 1934, she married painter Leonard Bahr. Throughout their life they loved the fine arts, museums, hikes, bicycles, canoes and music.

In 1936, they were quoted by the Baltimore Sunpaper as saying they would “rather paint than eat,” and in that year, they had their first of many artistic exhibitions. By 1947 after the war, she, Leonard, and their three children moved from Baltimore to “Edgewood Cottage” on Old Lawyers Hill Rd.

By the 1960’s, social activism became the vehicle for her artistic expression. Two of the many authors that helped shape her consciousness were Thomas Merton and Alan Paton, carrying the understanding that the steps to “peace” were viable actions to undertake and not political or philosophical concepts. She became a member of the Howard Co. Peace Action Committee (“HoCoPAC”). In her family, everyone had an opinion – yet she set her course. Florence pursued non-retaliatory anti-war, anti-bomb, and civil rights marches with her sketchbook in tow. She attended the March on Washington and was temporarily arrested in a Pentagon protest on May Day in D.C. She also helped feed children of low-income families in breakfast programs initiated by the Black Panthers.

Too sensitive to sketch outright violence, she mirrored the times in her art with worthwhile images of day-to-day life, symbols of hope and truth, designs of nature, and significant Maryland events like the trials of the Catonsville Nine and the trial of Gov. Mandel’s indictment. After the martyrdom of Martin Luther King, Jr., she created a burnt wood relief in his honor and gave it to the NAACP for its national headquarters.

In 1967, Florence earned her MFA degree in Education and Printmaking from MICA. Within twenty years, she also studied both Biology and German at the Catonsville Community College. She illustrated children’s books and poems, had numerous one-woman and group traveling exhibitions of her paintings and prints, and won prizes throughout her life. For a time, she was a secretary for the Elkridge Heritage Soc’y. and she had memberships in the National Association of Women Painters & Sculptors, the Pen Women, and the League of Women Voters, ss well as winning a “Peace and Freedom” award in 1970 for her artistic achievement and commitment to peace from the Women’s League for Peace and Freedom.

Florence was also a collector. She opened the “Humpty Dumpty” doll museum in Ellicott City, by which she became the subject of a Maryland TV news documentary “Maryland By George” in 1983. She also was an antiques dealer in Fells Point and at the Ellicott City Antique Depot. After the death of Leonard, she remained active with her watercolors and printmaking, including designing an historic designation marker of the Elkridge Assembly Rooms posted at the entrance of Lawyers Hill Road in Elkridge, which sign was later stolen. In 1996, she had a retrospective exhibition at the Peabody Conservatory’s Galleria Piccola.

Florence’s strengths of character came from having joy in little things, a curious eye, an empathetic heart, a dogged determination — and though not winning all the time — a trust for ultimate victory. These developed the qualities that are remembered by those who value her. Her legacy remains.

Accession F.3. b. and E. 4.a.ii. Riefle / Bahr