Thomas Hart Benton An American Original by Henry Adams. Thomas Hart Benton (1889-1975) was an artist whose images express his deepest feelings about American Life and History, about love family and religion. This lavishly illustrated volume brilliantly reproduces hundreds of his works, ranging from the most informal, initimate sketches to monumental mural cycles and noble nudes - works that reveal him as a major recorder and inerpreter of American scene.