Who painted The Spirit of '76, an American patriotic painting associated with the 1876 Centennial?

Archibald Willard painted The Spirit of '76, an American patriotic painting associated with the 1876 Centennial.

Willard created the work in 1875 for the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, which commemorated 100 years since the Declaration of Independence. The painting was originally titled Yankee Doodle and depicts three Revolutionary War-era figures: an older drummer, a fife player, and a younger drummer.

Willard based the central figure on his father, Samuel Willard, and used Hugh Mosher as the model for the fifer and Henry Devereaux for the boy. The death of his father influenced the painting's more serious emotional tone, even though the original commission was intended to be semi-humorous.

The painting became widely known through exhibitions and inexpensive chromolithographs. Its current home is Abbot Hall in Marblehead, Massachusetts. It is sometimes confused with Revolutionary War paintings by John Trumbull, but The Spirit of '76 is specifically Willard's work.