William Kay Hagerman (Kent Hagerman, 1893-1978) enjoyed a distinguished career as a 20th-Century intaglio artist, recieving formal training at the Cleveland School of Art (1913-15). Hagerman’s commercial art and studio art are of equally high artistic quality, blurring the boundary-line, if any existed, between the two. His DeSoto Oak - Tampa University Façade engraving, commissioned by Warren-Henderson Co., Tampa, Florida, 1939, demonstrated the transformation of a tree fronting an architectural structure into an artistically powerful image; the iconic Trackside - Chicago being another. The DeSoto Oak print included the in-plate signature “Will Kay Hagerman,” but it was probably from a later edition because it was signed in pencil “Kent Hagerman,” the signature he settled on for the latter stage of his career. During the mid-1930s he used the sobrique "Will Kay".
Notably, what distinguished Hagerman from many other mid-20th-Century print-artists was his steadfast adherence to traditional engraving (employing cross-hatching) at a time when lithography, etching and screen printing increasingly dominated the U.S. print world. In common with other engraver-artists of his time, he commonly referred to his engravings as etchings, however technically incorrect that was. Also, he preferred the designation printer instead of artist; he eschewed exhibition and gallery promotion of his art; collectors and art dealers were inconvenienced because he usually didn’t record the size and number of editions, nor did he number his prints. While rightfully proud of his commissioned professional engraving, Hagerman was obviously too modest when it came to the consideration of his prints as serious art. After considering the excellent dog portraits and DeSoto Oak prints as examples of artistic merit, Kent Hagerman’s legacy as an outstanding intaglio artist remains secure.

excerpted from Journal of the Print World, llc 2015, ISSN: 0737-7436, Page 16, Vol. 38 #3, July, 2015