Jack Banham Coggins was born in his father’s barracks during World War I in London, England on July 10, 1911. He was the only child of Ethel May (née Dobby) and Sydney George Coggins. The family emigrated to Long Island, New York in 1923.
Coggins’s interest in sailing and maritime subjects began in London when he would sail model yachts on Round Pond in Kensington Gardens. This interest developed into a lifelong passion during his teens when he sailed small craft on Hempstead Harbor, near his new home on Long Island.
Between 1941 and 1983, Coggins wrote or illustrated 44 books on a wide range of marine, military, historical and educational themes. His Yachting magazine covers and articles appeared during the 1940s and early 1950s.
As of 2001 his paintings were owned by the Philadelphia Maritime Museum, the National Air and Space Museum of the Smithsonian Institution, the U.S. Navy, and the United States Coast Guard, among many other institutions, corporations, and private collectors. His original manuscripts and illustrations are part of The University of Southern Mississippi’s Permanent Collection of outstanding authors and artists.
Coggins received a number of awards and accolades during his career, including the American Revolution Round Table Award in 1969, the Daniel Boone National Foundation’s Americanism Award in 1985, the Mystic Maritime Gallery’s Purchase Award in 1989, the International Maritime Exhibition’s Rudolph Shaeffer Award from 1987 to 1990, and Berks Art Council’s Pagoda Award in 1995. In 2000, he was inducted to the International Association of Astronomical Artists Hall of Fame as a Living Legend and celebrated master of the genre of Space Art.
