Frank H. Shapleigh was born in Boston in 1842 and died in Jackson, New Hampshire in 1906. He maintained a Boston studio from 1866 and wintered in St. Augustine, Florida after 1886. In 1866, he first visited the White Mountains, where he spent most of his summers and built a home studio in Jackson.

Shapleigh studied at the Lowell Institute Drawing School in Boston and in Paris with E. Lambinet between 1866 and 1869. In 1876, he became a member of the Boston Art Club. His work is represented in the Farnsworth Art Museum, Maine; New Britain Museum of Art, Connecticut; Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College; Portland Museum of Art, Maine; University of New Hampshire; New Hampshire Historical Society and many more.

Who Was Who in American Art states: "One of the best known artists of New Hampshire's White Mountains, he had a summer studio there throughout the last quarter of the 19th century, located in the Crawford House, an upscale hotel in Mount Washington Valley and attracted the tourists who were his clientele. Shapleigh also served in the Civil War from 1863 and then established a portrait studio in Boston. After studying in Paris, he shared a studio in Boston with John Appleton Brown and in 1870 painted in Yosemite….He appears to have stopped painting in 1898. He generally indicated the place and date on each of his paintings."

He was a close friend of John J. Enneking and Benjamin Champney and often painted with them en plein aire on location. He is one of the most sought after and popular turn-of-the-century White Mountain painters.