Ernest Hamlin Baker (1889-1975)
Ernest Hamlin Baker, said TIME publisher Ralph Ingersoll, was an artist who could "do anything." He was already a well-established commercial illustrator when he completed his first TIME cover in February 1939, a portrait of Polish musician Ignace Jan Paderewski. Working closely with TIME picture editor Dana Tasker, Baker crafted the TIME formula for newsmaker covers: a detailed portrait shadowed by backgrounds that explained the subject's newsworthiness. Baker began each cover by poring over photographs, then filling in a drawing with thin layers of color. The painstaking process made for stark realism. Baker stayed at TIME for 17 years, supplying the "B" in the famous "ABCs" of TIME artists (Artzybasheff, Baker, Chaliapin), and nearly 300 covers for the magazine.
PHOTO BY ERIC SCHAAL