Robert J. Aldern, “an artist and a gentleman,” was born in Sioux Falls, SD. He graduated from Washington High School in 1947 and from Augustana College in 1951 with a major in art where he was influenced by professors Palmer Eide and Ogden Dalrymple to work in liturgical art. After a term in the U.S. Air Force, Robert attended Hartford Art School at the University of Hartford in Connecticut, where he earned his Bachelor of Fine Arts. He returned to Sioux Falls and opened Aldern Art Studios in 1957 as an architectural and liturgical artist and consultant with more than 70 regional church commissions to his credit and others too numerous to mention.