Joseph William Blanchard (1835-1889) of Cumberland and Portland posed alongside a dog with a basket of berries in its mouth for renowned portrait painter Charles Octavius Cole. During the 1840s, people associated humane treatment of animals with a moral society, and artists sometimes used animals as symbols to reinforce the shared innocence and vulnerability of children and pets.

Cole painted several portraits featuring animals during his short but prolific career, when pet ownership in Maine was rising.