Frederic Soldwedel, a marine painter, was born in New York City in 1886 and lived there until 1941. He studied in England, Italy, Greece and France and also spent time in California, indicated by a 1922 painting titled "California Yuccas". By the same reasoning, he likely traveled to Hawaii in 1930 as indicated by the painting titled Surfboat Riders, Honolulu. He exhibited this painting in 1930 at the Art Institute of Chicago.