Born into a prominent Michigan family (her grandfather, Henry H. Crapo, was governor of the state from 1865 to 1869 and her father was a successful lumber baron), Crapo-Smith spent much of her childhood in Detroit society. In 1890, she traveled to Paris where she studied at the Académie Julian. She stayed in Europe for nearly two decades, living and working in France, Italy, and England. She exhibited extensively and was the first female from Detroit included in the Salon des Artistes Français in 1890.
The present work echoes Crapo-Smith's early subjects, especially from when she lived abroad. During this time, Crapo-Smith focused on genre scenes and wholesome peasant life, before rampant industrialization took hold in the United States and Europe. Crapo-Smith continued to seek these subjects out, spending the summers of 1901 and 1902 painting en plein air in Egmond, Holland with George Hitchcock, who helped establish a small art colony in the Dutch village.
Around 1906, Crapo-Smith returned to Detroit, becoming involved with the Detroit Society of Women Painters and serving as their President from 1907 to 1914, when she was diagnosed with tuberculosis and was forced to stop painting.
