Submitted photo The Winslow Homer painting "Snap the Whip" is back on display at the Butler Institute of American Art in Youngstown after being included in a touring exhibition.

YOUNGSTOWN — The boys are back playing at the Butler.

Winslow Homer’s painting “Snap the Whip,” arguably the best-known piece of art in the permanent collection of the Butler Institute of American Art, is back on the wall at the Youngstown museum after being included in a touring exhibition.

“Natural Forces: Winslow Homer and Frederic Remington” opened in June at the Denver Art Museum before traveling to the Portland Museum of Art in Maine and the Amon Carter Museum of American Art in Fort Worth, Texas.

“It was great to share this art masterpiece with the rest of America but equally wonderful to welcome it back home,” Louis A. Zona, executive director and chief curator of the Butler, said.

“Snap the Whip,” which depicts a group of boys playing the popular game, was painted in 1872 by Homer (1836-1910) and first gained wide acclaim at the 1876 Centennial International Exhibition in Philadelphia.

It was acquired by Joseph G. Butler, founder of the Butler, in 1919, the same year the museum opened. According to the museum’s staff, he acquired the painting due to the sentimental value he felt it had, and Butler associated it with his boyhood friend, future President William McKinley.

The painting recently was featured in an episode of the television game show “Jeopardy!” On the Feb. 25 episode, contestants were told, “Though perhaps better known for his sea subjects, in 1872 he painted a group of boys playing Snap the Whip.” The answer / question was, “Who is Winslow Homer?”

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