Harry Sternberg’s family emigrated from Russia to Brooklyn, New York in 1910. He studied art at the Brooklyn Museum of Art and the Art Students League of New York before beginning his career as a printmaker and painter.His work was shown at The Whitney Museum of American Art in 1931 for the first time. Two years later he joined the staff of the Art Students League of New York where he taught for 35 years. In 1935 he was appointed a technical advisor to the Graphic Art Division, Federal Art Project (FAP). He was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1936 and spent the year studying the conditions of workers in coalmines and steel mills. His drawings, etchings and paintings depicting life in industrial America influenced the post office murals he did for the FAP including Chicago: Epoch of a Great City, at the Lakeview post office in Chicago.