January 31, 1941

Iowa City, Iowa

Jan 31, 1941

Dear Mama, Papa, “kernel of the nut,” “triple dimples” & “tall & slim”

I had intended to write sooner but as I had not found out about a lot of things I thought I would wait awhile till I found out some more. Well, I haven’t found out much but if you are to get this letter on Saturday I will have to get this letter written and posted sometime this morning. So I will do this and if anything out of the ordinary occurs I will let you know in a special communication.

I cannot quite understand how my body is working these days. First I feel real punk for awhile and then it passes for awhile. At any rate I felt better during my tests than I thought I would about Thursday or Friday of last week. Of that I was naturally very thankful but I don’t know if it helped a terrible lot. The only doctoring I did was in the shape of some Vicks cough drops, used mainly on the days when I woke up with the swallowy sore throat.

How I got along or think I got along in my tests.

1. Industrial Stoichiometry — The final test in this nemesis of mine was the hardest thing I have have yet run across. As I look back over this course it reminds me of a ton of nitroglycerin attached to a semester long fuse. Last fall I saw the fuse lit but didn’t know then what it led to. Last Saturday morning the last of the fuse burned and the ton of nitroglycerin went off in my face. There were five problems in the test and each of them was pretty much of a stickler. However, I managed to get finished except for the second part of part C of problem five. I was talking to a fellow last night and I found out that I had expressed the answer to one of the problems in the wrong kind of units. So far that is the only mistake I can think of altho there are no doubt more of them. I really wonder what I got in that test. I asked the teacher and he said the papers would not be corrected until sometime next week so I guess I will have to wait until then to find out how I did.

2. Chemical Industries — In this course also there was been no official communique yet. There were 13 questions in the test and that was an unlucky number for me since one of them was about something I had forgotten all about. Last fall sometime we had to read a report in a magazine on sulfuric acid production and use during 1939. I read it and took notes on it, but promptly forgot about it since it was sort of a dry article. Well, it popped up in the test, so that means I missed 1/13 right off the bast. The rest of the test, however, was quite easy except for a part of another question which I was not sure about. I got my revised notebook back and this time I had gotten a B on it so that if I get a B in the test I will get B in the course. I think that perhaps I will but I am making no promises of any sort whatsoever.

3. Mechanics of Solids — The thing that I did in this test gives me terrible griping sensations in the region of my stomach. In one of the six problems I made a mistake in figuring a moment of inertia of a body with the result that my answer was off. This was enough to give me B in the test and therefor B as a grade. That makes me sort of angry at myself. However, it is over so I guess that is that (So that’s “that”)

4. German — the test in this was rather easy as I suspected it would be. I missed 2 things in it, which entitled me to an A, any way that is what I got.

5. Drawing — this too was a very easy test, easier (it seemed to me) than almost any of the rpevious tests so that I got an A in the course. I do not know what I got in the test, since only the final grades were posted. The way the grades in this test were rather queer, about 10 A’s, 10 B’s, a whole slug of C’s and D’s and some Cond and Fd’s. What seemed funny to me I that there should be so few B’s in relation to the rest of the grades. Well, that’s not my worry so I will forget about it.

I do not know exactly what I should do about my schedule. I have not registered yet but I will either this afternoon or sometime to-morrow. My adviser (the one with the round, pig-like, placid, fat face) has figured out a way to get thru in 2 years from now but it has some very undesirable features. Feature no. 1 is that it depends on my petitioning my way out of second semester drawing which is a very dumb thing to do in my opinion. Feature no. 2 is that I would take the second semester of Phys. Chem before the first which is not such a good ideas.

I cannot make up my mind just what I should do. I think I will let it rest like this. If I can get drawing on Tues and Thu which I will have to in order to get it included at all (and which is problematical since I would have to switch sections and the sections already almost filled) I will take what I had originally planned of Mech of Materials, Ch Eng Principles I, Ger, Econ and of course drawing. If I do not, I am in a quandary as to what I should do.

Another undesirable feature of the 2 year plan is that I could not take German this next semester. I am sort of inclined to stretch it out to 2½ years and therefore get some sort of continuity in what I take. Besides there is the possibility of my never coming back to this lousy place in which event taking a lot of hard stuff next semester would be cutting off my nose to spite my face. I made some inquiries about the art course but it didn’t impress me particularly. I think I could do just about as much by fooling around by myself. That is of course, with pencil and ink. They mentioned charcoal and conte crayon (whatever that is) which sounded rather interesting but they also mentioned watercolor work which immediately put me on the defensive. I can still recall what a mess watercolor cork was in the grades. So I do not think I will try to take an art courses.

I was downtown yesterday browsing thru the books stores to see if they had any textbooks that were required for fundamental drawing courses, but there were none, that is officially. I ran across a book on perspective that looked pretty good but I believe that that is taken up in my Eng. Drawing book someplace so that it would be rather useless to get it. I think I will continue my old habit of drawing for recreation and get my training in it that way. After all, I am beginning to think (hear! hear!) that the best training is the training that you get doing the stuff you like to do. In that case training to be a chemical engineer has in my case about a X2562 rating.

My scholarship check for $50 will not be here until sometime next week so that I am going to pay my tuition with a check and using the $50 + another check for $13.50 pay for my room. That way there will be a minimum of red tape I think.

There should be some money up at the Supt of Schools office in Ft. Dodge for one of my Eur. History books now. Only one of them was sold last fall.

I almost think that unless I write and tell you differently I will take the 2½ years to finish. Maybe I am doing an unwise thing but as I said before, it probably will never make any difference what I take no anyway. At any rate, if I can get the drawing I am going to take it.

With love

Carl

[Marginal addenda]

The geranium sort of perished for lack of sunshine or something but the other plant you sent and my two cactuses are doing quite well.

One of my shirts needs some shortening in the sleeve. I will endeavor to make it clear by pins.

I will send some laundry home sometime soon as I see my stock of shirts is falling down.

I was invited to go on a bobsled ride last night but I didn’t go. I thought I would probably freeze.

I think that I will have a couple of books to buy this semester, depending on what I take.

Post-Retirement Art Classes

After I retired and moved to Ashland I used the educational opportunities offered by Southern Oregon College (as it was known at the time — it has since first become Southern Oregon State College and then Southern Oregon University). As a senior citizen I could by Oregon law audit courses at the college at no charge and under this regulation I audited several political science courses, coursed in history (including hagiography [sic — I think he meant to say historiography], literally the study of history making) and last but not least a course in the philosophy of religion. The latter was really a seminal experience and did much to influence my thinking on religion and philosophy.

Of importance also were the courses I enrolled in for credit concerning art subjects, or later on auditedf under the senior citizen regulation. The first course I took was a beginning watercolor class, the stimulus being that I decided I wanted to render in color various sketches of old cars that I had started to draw in my spare time as a retiree. This was followed by a more advanced watercolor class, several two-week watercolor seminars (held during the summer sessions at the college) at which established watercolor artists were the instructors. I look back on these courses with nostalgia and appreciation for what they opened up for me.

Later on I took some drawing classes and these led in time to figure drawing and figure painting classes. Some of the earlier classes here were taken for credit but the later ones were audited. The instructor for more of these was Margaret Sjogren and she was an excellent teacher and certainly influential in my development of drawing and painting skills. I have also taken drawing and watercolor classes offered by the Rogue Galley in Medford and following these have participated in the non-instructional sessions in figure drawing of painting there. However this activity ceased shortly before my heart attach and subsequent bypass surgery and since then I have not participated in any further classes of any kind.

The beginning watercolor class was given by Jim Doerter, and was an excellent class, giving the students an exposure to various techniques. The next more advanced class was by Cliff Sowell who was nominally the instructor usually assigned to watercolor classes. Sowell was also the motivating force behind the summer two-week seminars (four each summer). These ceased when he died as the result of chasing errant cattle on his ranch near Cave Junction.

Of the artist/instructors at the seminars I participated in the most effective were Judi Betts and secondly Phil Austin. Betts was an art instructor in the Baton Rouge schools and her experience as a teacher made her better than Phil Austin. Jean and I have a small watercolor by Betts and I had a print of one of Austin’s watercolors but disposed of it when we down-sized on moving to Mountain View Retirement residence.

The other instructors I had were Margaret Sjogren and Robert Alston in various drawing and oil painting classes. It was with these two teachers that I began drawing and painting the nude figure, principally female. It has been an area in drawing and painting that has fascinated me ever since.

[My dad's handwritten autobiographical notebooks end here. Next, I will begin transcribing family letters he wrote, beginning in 1944.]

Designs

In recent years I have been attracted to a class of art which I have called “designs.” Mostly these are geometric constructions, involving both curved and straight lines, combinations of geometric figures such as squares, circles, rectangles, sometimes connected in various ways, sometimes not. Sometimes they bear a resemblance, or are based on real objects (as the driftwood pictures done this winter [1992]).

The design of course is enhanced in effect by the choice and combination of colors. I think my interest in this approach (essentially abstract art) started when I first really became aware of Northwest Indian art. This occurred on the trip Jean and I made to Vancouver Island and British Columbia when we visited some museums in Vancouver displaying this art form. The Northwest Indian art depicts real animals etc., but it is semi-abstract in character and it is only a small step away from complete abstraction. In fact the first few attempts I made along this line used Indian designs as a basis, modified in some cases but in others following fairly closely the original Indian work.

I find that the work I have done along this line pleases me quite a bit and I find it emotionally satisfying. Perhaps some of the satisfaction in it comes from my engineering background — I always liked mechanical drawing and drafting and these are certainly related to the “designs” as I term them.

Presently the picture Jean has chose to hang over the fireplace is one of the designs which I have named “Roman Candles.” I submitted this watercolor in one of the two shows that the Oregon Watercolor Society has each year (I think it was a year or so ago) but like my other entries on other occasions in OWS shows it was not selected for their traveling exhibition. I also did a semi-abstract design based on the Britt pavilion design; in this case I was prevailed on to submit it for the annual poster design the Festival selects but it also was not selected. I like the painting although I prefer some other of my designs, but Jean say it is her favorite.

Recently I have been considering a variation, or you might term it a development of my design art. This development would be in the direction of a step back toward “realism” although the product would still be distorted in character. One of the ideas I have would be a work entitled “Sam Picasso” picturing a misshapen paperhanger messily putting up wallpaper on which the design was a parody of P. Picasso’s cubist art. The whole idea would be to lampoon what, to me, is pretentious nonsense that has been foisted on the general world of art by equally pretentious and artistically vulgar art critics. I have a few ideas in addition along th same line — “Gun Boy” on the typical NRA member; “The Deer Stalker” on the hunting community and “The Space-Filler” on the typical state, local and national legislator or administrator. I’m sure I could come up with similar themes for other elements of the population that are low in my opinion — such as the hierarchy in the Catholic church. When I will get started on this, if ever, is a question. My current liking for works of the naked female and the design constructions leaves little time available for new projects.

This is particularly the case since there is a third area in which I currently spend some time and that is black-and-white drawings based on the various sketches I have done in the past of trees, buildings, scenic spots, the Oregon coast etc. This is an area in which I have done a number of works over the past three or four years, but it has been slow in developing because I haven’t been able to find the right tool to use. I would like to use a common ordinary ballpoint pen, but the ink in such pens fades with time and while a ballpoint pen is excellent for on-the-site sketching it isn’t a suitable tool for a finished drawing.

I have tried various pens, including those described as India ink pens, that are on the market but without exception they are less than satisfactory. Until now I have simply used a small brush with either India ink or diluted black acrylic and this works well except where relatively straight lines of some length are desired when my technique in using the small brush does not produce the kind of straightness of line and orientation that I want. I have been driven to use a common ordinary nib pen with India ink and this, in combination with a small brush/ink or acrylic may be the answer. However I shall have to extend the nib pen to the type of pen that holds more ink so that the repeated recharging of the pen is reduced.

At any rate this is a type of drawing that also appeals to me and places a demand on my drawing/painting time which would be impinged on by developing the lampooning works.

It is now about eight months [this would set the time as early 1992—LS] since my heart attack and surgery and I am still in the stage of recovering from it.

Art Education

But I should stop digressing on these figures from days at Shell; though they bring back very nostalgic memories, they are only names to anyone who is likely to read this and thus have no particular significance except to me. When I digressed I was about to start writing about the drawing and watercolor hobby that developed after we retired here in Ashland. As I mentioned I had for a long time composed Christmas and greeting cards and had participated in a figure drawing class during Elderhostel class at Eastern Oregon State College, after retirement of course and about 1985 I’d guess.

My development in drawing in retirement actually started considerably before that. The year 1975 saw no development along this line as I spent a good part of the year in Houston “consulting.” In the next year or so I started what I would call the mechanical-subject period. One winter I started to make some drawings of antique trucks and while I was doing this I had the thought that it would be interesting and add to the effect of the drawings if they would be in color. This led me to take my first art class at the college, a beginning watercolor class under Jim Doerter.

Doerter was an interesting individual, and a good teacher. The class not only exposed the students to watercolor paraphernalia, but went on to explore the various techniques that artists have employed in the medium, cost-saving practices for amateurs, the cutting of mats ad some exposure to watercolor art. Doerter was interested in Oriental art and I recall seeing some of the Japanese items he brought to class. In connection with the class he had the students come to his house to see his collection of paintings etc., also his collection of headgear; I believe Jean went along with me to this. It was I think on the basis of what I learned in Doerter’s class that I went on to make quite a number of antique truck watercolors. Somewhere along the line Jean was instrumental in bringing these to the attention of Judy Howard who at the time was just starting her art gallery in Ashland.

She arranged to have a joint show of these with the paintings of another local artist Robert Devoe. Devoe at the time was a teacher (English I believe, not in the art department) whose paintings were in the super-realistic school of painting. Such paintings have a current vogue and he was successful enough subsequently to retire from his college teaching and to devote all his time to painting.

I can’t say I like Devoe’s paintings, which sell for rather high price and I gather quite handily. To me they are little more than large color photographs, high on technique but low on intrinsic artistry. Included in the show, as to my part, were two India ink drawings of two antique cars — a Stutz Bearcat and an ornate town car (Rolls Royce? Pierce Arrow?). These were not listed for sale as were the truck pictures, and now adorn the wall near the dining area window here. I still like them though they are a technique and a style that I would no longer attempt.

As a result of the show I sold, I seem to recall, one fire truck picture for maybe $100 or so. Later I turned to pictures of old tractors and from these I have given one to Vincent (of the old Hart Parrs that Uncle Carl used for threshing — that is the large ones) and one to Ray, time a Rumely Oil-Pull which he knew from his days on the ranch in the Napa valley as a boy. I have several, framed, myself as well as an assortment of framed truck pictures, left over from the show at Hanson Howard that never sold.

After the introductory class in watercolor with Mr. Doerter I took a more advanced class from Cliff Sowell. He was really the watercolor specialist on the college faculty, and was quite a good watercolorist, but he wasn’t the teacher that Doerter was and I didn’t get as much out of his class.

Through his class however I did become aware of the watercolor seminars each summer at the college, of which he was the guiding light. Each year there would be four of these seminars each lasting two weeks and with an established figure in the watercolor field as teacher. For a number of years in the late 1970s and early 1980s I would take one or perhaps a couple of these seminars each year. I recall such names as Millard Sheets (perhaps the most prestigious of the seminar teachers, and an instructor that Fern, Jean’s sister, had when she was in school at the California School of Fine Arts in Berkeley), Morris Shubin, Phil Austin and Judi Betts.

For all his renown I wasn’t really impressed by Sheets, Austin was more to my liking both as an artist and teacher, but the best insofar as teaching was concerned was Judi Betts. She was actually a public school teacher until she retired several years ago so she was really a teacher, whereas the others teaching was more or less incidental.

In the seminars, the mornings would often by conducted at the college and the sessions would formally conclude about noon, but the paining etc. would continue well into the afternoon. Then there would be onsite sessions as in Lithia Park, Howard Prairie and the Nichols Ranch. While I don’t recall much specifically of what was said and done in these seminars, I think that the contributed substantially to my development.

Sowell eventually came to feel that the college did not appreciate the time and effort he put into arranging the seminars and decided to set up the programs on the ranch near Cave Junction that he co-owned with his sister. The year the first program was to be held he was chasing some cattle on the ranch, had a heart attack and expired. With his death the seminars at the college became a thing of the past.

Since then I have taken further classes at the college, general drawing, oil painting, figure drawing and figure painting. Except for the oil painting class these have all been taught by a relatively new instruction at the college, Margaret Sjogren. Actually she was a replacement on the faculty occasioned by Cliff Sowell’s death.

Like Judi Betts, she is an excellent teacher. She came into teaching late, after having decided that her earlier work (I think in the business field) was unproductive and unsatisfying. Like Betts she is also a working artist, though I regard her work as less interesting than the watercolors of Betts. I feel that much of my interest and development can be ascribed to her classes. Some of the college classes, including the earlier seminars etc. were taken for credit, some were only audited and few were taken simply as a participant (no record kept) since Oregon law has the provision that persons over 65 may attend classes, free of charge, provided there is room in the classes.

The Rogue Gallery in Medford also has sponsored classes in the past and I have taken a couple of week-long watercolor classes, and a drawing class (also for one week) plus a couple of shorter classes. In the past couple of years there have been figure drawing or painting classes at the gallery, with no instruction, and I have participated in two of them. Although I still find it interesting drawing from a live model, attending classes represents an effort and furthermore at this stage of my development as an artist I find that I do not need a model for any drawing or painting I might wish to do. Newspapers and magazines provide a good source of what I would call the basic pose situations which is all that is really required. The anatomical features can easily be provided.

Actually a model is not needed for these as pictures in magazines, newspapers, books provided all of these in graphic detail, and indeed library references provide information on the few anatomical features that as customarily proscribed in newspapers etc.