Mary Blood Mellen, the wife of a Gloucester minister, was a beneficiary of Fitz Henry Lane’s tutelage and, upon his death, of his estate. Her husband was Rev. Charles W. Mellen, of the Universalist Church. She worked from the master’s canvases and sometimes Lane would “touch upon” her canvases. The paintings that bear the teacher’s work were at least sometimes noted in inscription, and Mellen would routinely sign works, “Painted by M. B. Mellen after F. H. Lane.” [as in View of Gloucester Harbor and Dolliver’s Neck, 1870, private collection] But both painters were sporadic signators. Lane signed his full name on only a handful of canvases (Lane expert John Wilmerding speculates he did this only on canvases in New York, where his name was less well-known), giving rise to nearly two centuries of confusion over the painter’s real name. Mellen, in his step, also left a definitely incomplete inscription record. Given the degree to which Mellen worked with Lane, Wilmerding has also mused, “One wonders how many of [the paintings] now attributed to his hand may in fact be his pupil’s.” Clearly among the most gifted of Lane’s pupils, Mellen produced a significant number of works that are certainly entirely her own. Among these are full departures from marine genre, including a painting of the Blood family home.