Working to support his mother, two brothers and sister after his father died (when he was 16), Wilbur attended night classes at Boston Normal School (now Massachusetts School of Art). Growing his oeuvre, he worked as an engraver at the “Los Angeles Times” before relocating to New York City in 1925. He immediately enrolled in the Grand Central Art School, studying under Harvey Dunn, N.C. Wyeth and Pruett Carter, achieving notoriety in watercolor, oil, dry point and lithograph.