Marge Luttrell Encaustic

I am sorry I didn't get to speak to the artist at the Central Pennsylvania Art Festival because Ms. Luttrell's works looked great. I noticed that she incorporated old photographs in her work. He art made me think of another artist from Tennessee, Beverly Hayden, who we met here.

I overheard Ms. Luttrell talking with another admirer about her process - encaustic - and the fact that she teaches the process - this August in Peter's Valley School of Crafts in New Jersey. I found this definition of encaustic at the Encaustic Art Institute.

Encaustic is a Greek word meaning “to heat or burn in” (enkaustikos). Heat is used throughout the process, from melting the beeswax and varnish to fusing the layers of wax. Encaustic consists of natural bees wax and dammar resin (crystallized tree sap). The medium can be used alone for its transparency or adhesive qualities or used pigmented. Pigments may be added to the medium, or purchased colored with traditional artist pigments. The medium is melted and applied with a brush or any tool the artist wishes to create from. Each layer is then reheated to fuse it to the previous layer.

Ms. Luttrell explains her process as such:

Featuring torn letters, maps, bits of script and old ephemera from bygones past, Margie Luttrell’s encaustic collages tease the viewer by awakening a desire for the rest of the story. Fascinated by language, symbols and the textures of all things aged, Luttrell builds levels of meaning and information into each piece.
The goal is to take images from one time period in order to construct another, then exploring how the mind jumps back and forth between the two and transcends interpretation.
Marge Luttrell hails from Tennessee by way of New Jersey. A collage artist for over forty years she discovered the inherent joys of wax painting (encaustic) seven years ago.
She is the recipient of a Fulbright, a National Endowment for the Arts Grant and A National Endowment for the Humanities Grant. Last year she lived and worked as an artist/teacher in Switzerland.

I took this image from her web site:


It turns out Ms. Luttrell was at Jazz Fest in NOLA this year with another artist we talked about earlier. I am sorry I didn't get the chance to see her work when I was there. Also, interestingly, she was in Turkey earlier this year as well, according to her promotional card.

Making a Difference (Thru Wikitree)

I inadvertently played a tiny but instrumental role in a very fun story.

My friend has loaned me his big book on family genealogy and I have been entering some of it on to Wikitree. I am trying to find a connection between his family and my family - so far no direct connection, unfortunately.

In doing so, I entered in the birth information for a Curtis Banford Hebb - his mother was a Newcomb. The book was published in 1902 or something, so Curtis was a boy at the time of publishing; he had no children or spouse.

Well, I didn't think much about it. I love the mission of Wikitree - to make one human tree, that's why I would enter in information about people not related to me.

My inquirer sent me an email many weeks ago but his email got caught up in my endless in-box. I finally saw it the other day and finally wrote back. I am the 'manager' of Mr. Hebb's family's profiles, so the logical person for anyone to contact. I had to tell him that I was not a direct descendant, but I told him where I got the information. I fortunately included Mr. Hebb's birth location in the Wikitree profile, as according to the tome.

Here is the email I received back from my inquirer:

Pretty fun, huh?! I didn't promote it to the press, a friend of mom's did...the one mentioned in the article as having asked if we'd ever tried to track down any relatives. She was pretty excited.

I was able to print the family tree available from wikitree and share it with Pauline Hebb, also made me sound less clueless on the phone. I hope the whole episode inspires her to follow through on plans to share the family history with children and grandkids...something she said had long been in the back of her mind. I think it will.

I found them in part through a google search, which turned up a Curtis Hebb Rd a short distance from the town(Bridgewater, Nova Scotia) where he enlisted. That gave me hope he'd returned from the war. Then, narrowing down the Hebbs in the phone book(there are a lot)based on that town where the road was located, I picked up the phone book. I hit Pauline on the first try, as alphabetically she's still under her husband Arnold...of the Hebbs listed in Newcombville. VOILA...not too hard at all.

She was completely stunned and very sweet and appreciative. I think the reporters were probably an additional shock later. Anyway, it felt great to return it to her.

The two resulting Canadian News articles can be found here and here, though I have cut and pasted the texts from each below.


One Article:

A beautifully matted and framed First World War enlistment photo is now back at home with the Hebb family in Newcombville.

Decades ago, the 15" x 28" enlistment piece somehow found its way home in Kingsburg alongside photos of royals. It hung in the home of Judith Varney Burch for 20 to 30 years until her son, Palmer Burch, decided to try and locate the person's family. All he knew was the enlistment photograph was of Pte. Curtis Bamford Hebb, who enlisted in Bridgewater in 1918 for the war in Europe. The matte surrounding the photo has the script "on active service ... for King and Empire."

The Burch family isn't sure when it was acquired, but after being prompted by a friend, Mr. Burch decided to try to find relatives of the young man in the photo.

It wasn't a difficult task. He found Curtis Hebb Road in Newcombville and decided to call the first Hebb listed. Who he found was the widow of Curtis Hebb's nephew, Pauline. Her husband, Albert, died nine years ago.

"He didn't know anything about that, I'm sure," said Ms Hebb pointing to the photo. "I don't have a clue where it came from. We never knew that existed."

According to research, Pte. Hebb, a 21 year-old Newcombville farmer, was drafted under the Military Service Act of 1917. His service record is dated May 25, 1918. He returned uninjured after the war.

Pte. Hebb never married and lived with his brother, Clarence. Years later, after suffering a stoke, he moved in with his brother. At the same time, Mr. and Ms Hebb lived in the house. It was during this time that Ms Hebb helped him rehabilitate.

"I got him back walking and got him back in the car and driving again," said Ms Hebb.

After a few years, Pte. Hebb moved to Waterloo, where he lived with his sister, Suzie Weagle. She died, but Pte. Hebb stayed with her daughter, Jeannie, until he went into a seniors' home in Chester. Pte. Hebb died there 30 years ago at 87 years old.

And the other:

In a small room in a 200-year-old Kingsburg farmhouse overlooking the ocean hung a black and white picture of a young man in uniform, a bare hint of a smile on his young face, about to head off to war.

The matte surrounding the picture bears the coloured flags of Britain, Scotland, Ireland and Canada.

The young man in the photo is Pte. Curtis Bamford Hebb. It is his First World War enlistment picture, dated in Bridgewater in 1918.

Pauline Hebb will never know how her husband’s uncle’s picture ended up on the wall of Inuit art expert Judith Varney Burch’s home, but she’s grateful to have the ornately framed picture back in the family.

She said she’s looking forward to cleaning it up a bit and showing it to Hebb’s descendants.

For 25 years, the photograph hung in Varney Burch’s home among pictures of royalty — Queen Victoria, King George VI, King Edward VII, The Queen Mother, Queen Elizabeth II and her wedding photo to Prince Philip the Duke of Edinburgh.

“That piece ended up hanging with them due to its Canadian and British flags and mention of service ‘For King and Country,’” Varney Burch’s son, Palmer, said in an email.

A visiting friend asked recently if they’d ever attempted to track down the young man’s family. Palmer decided to do just that.

It didn’t prove too difficult.

He found a Curtis Hebb Road in Newcombville, just outside Bridgewater, and some of the family’s genealogy online. It looked like Curtis had survived the war, so “from there I simply picked up the phone book and called.”

Arnold Hebb was the first person on the list.

His widow, Pauline, picked up the phone and was taken aback to learn Burch had the framed enlistment picture.

“I can’t see how that ever got out of the house,” she said, and Varney Burch cannot remember which antique store or auction she got it from those many years ago.

It turns out Curtis did make it home uninjured to Lunenburg County, where he took up farming.

He never married, lived with his brother Clarence for a time then lived with Pauline and Arnold during his later years. Pauline taught him how to drive again after he suffered a stroke.

Today, a red granite headstone set just beyond the shade offered by the branches of a maple tree marks Curtis’s final resting spot. It’s in the community cemetery down the road from where he was born and lived his life.

He died in a seniors home in Chester two weeks before Christmas 30 years ago, at the age of 87.

As he was in life, he is surrounded by family.

His nephew Arnold, Pauline’s husband, is buried two rows over. He died nine years ago this week.

Beverly Hayden Art at the Cherry Creek Arts Festival, Denver, Co.

The Cherry Creek Arts Festival started today in Denver, CO; the festival continues through the 6th. It's a juried show and there are many excellent artists.

I met Beverly Hayden from Chattanooga, TN. She had some art pieces which jumped out at me because she uses vintage items, such as washboards and irons, etc. and creates shadow boxes with old photographs. The piece I admired today, called "Luck of the Draw" incorporates photographs of her mother as a child and some of her spinster - or shall we use childless? - aunts. It seems that I can not snag that image from her web site to show my readers. She seemed genuinely enthusiastic when I told her I was attempting to research and write the story of my childless female relatives.

Here, however, is how she describes her process for making these "Boxes":

Striving to explore dimension and layers, I assemble vintage found objects with objects of my own construction. At their heart, most of my pieces are deeply personal reflections on introspection, self-awareness and personal growth. I explore universal experiences such as “finding oneself,” the tricky art of family relations as well as love and loss. I express the underlying theme of time passages by using layers of beeswax, paint and even minute differences in depth in my placement of objects. I love to incorporate old objects that have their own “life experiences” to add to the sense of history and timeliness of each piece.

I call the boxes and drawers that house these objects and their ultimate stories/expressions “homes” because I view them not only as a final resting place for these unexpected groupings, but also because each piece ultimately is about finding one’s home – that place within where peace, calm, happiness, safety & sense of family exist in abundance. Through our shared life experiences, celebrations & struggles, I hope your spirit finds a home and sense of kinship within one of my “homes.”

I was intrigued with her pieces, too, because she gives me a place to begin when I start to assemble some family pieces with photographs. I was visiting with my brother and he has some of my father's toy lead WW1 soldiers. I had conceived of the idea while I was in New Orleans that I should make a shadow box with a portrait of my father and some of his soldiers to give to my brothers. Of the collection of soldiers my brother had in his possession, many were of nurses, wounded and stretcher bearers. The Ambulance Corps is not my father's experience, but I couldn't not take those soldiers because of where my head is with these letters from Herb. Hopefully my shadow boxes will turn out as beautiful as those of Ms. Hayden, though with perhaps a narrower appeal.

I was able to scan her card:

Nice as pie.... (and some cookies, too)

First group finally left Allentown for France in August. Camp started in June. We know that Herb hangs in PA for many more months....

Wednesday, August 8, 1917
Dear Mother,

We’re back in Allentown again – came in yesterday afternoon. We left Bath Monday morning and marched about 12 miles to a little village called Weaverville where we stayed overnight. That afternoon we were shot with one second dose of paratyphoid and in the evening it rained. The dampness got in to me and I was pretty stiff next morning what with the injection and all. We set out from Weaverville and pushed on to Catasauqua where the Red Cross Association gave us a fine lunch. We then came right on to Allentown and got in and settled down in our old barracks by five o’clock. I was pretty well worn out so I went to bed about eight o’clock and woke up this morning feeling fine.

The cookies arrived in good shape Monday afternoon and they certainly tasted good.

I am glad Harry has made up his mind to go to school in the fall. I think it will be a darned good thing. And so long as he has enough to pay most of his expenses in hand it will be a simple matter to get money for board, carfare lunches and the like. I know Charlie will be glad to help him out a bit. I’ll ask him about it if you like. If Harry needs any clothes he might better use mine than buy new ones.

I wouldn’t worry about the money from the firm. It will come along all right.

My Syracuse Lieutenant is fine and he treats me nice as pie.

The first thousand men left Allentown for France late Monday night. The second lot has been announced but Section 80 is not among them. I rather think we’ll be in the third group to leave around Labor Day.

Love to all,
Herbert


I had to laugh out loud yesterday. I screwed up the courage to finally go through a strong box brimming with old photos. I would suggest that they were Margaret's photographs, though I'll never know. There was no order, and many were not labelled, but look what I found:

These three photographs have only the name Olive on the back. The penciled in label explains nothing else.... But, maybe it is camp for Olive. In 1917 Olive would be about 13 years old. I would suggest she might be a little older than 13 here, but close.... As I look more closely at the photos now I see that the girls are not dressed for a theatrical production as I originally thought, they are just dressed of the time. Hahahaha. Oops. But they are up to summertime shenanigans, I would suggest.

I believe Olive is the young lady with the tie-like ribbon.

A break from Herb for some other WWI soldiers...

I have gotten a comment from my third cousin Chuck with whom I connected through Ancestry.com and now Facebook. He has realized through the first few letters that Charles is his grandfather, Charles Oliver Cornell. That makes Grace his grandmother. They were the ones living in Hasbrouk Heights, New Jersey. Aunt Ida is, therefore, Chuck's great grandmother.

Charles is working at Banker's Trust in New York. Case, Pomeroy & Co seems to have sold bonds. I now believe Herb was training to sell bonds on Wall Street when he decided to enlist.

I was consulting the weather channel web site and was interested in an article about what is found when the glaciers melt - they mention the mummy found in the Italian alps which we have already discussed. I had never heard about the White War - battles fought in the Alps during World War I. So, ten months after my grandfather is marching around Pennsylvania and sleeping under the stars harsh Spring battles are being fought and men are being buried in the snow. Pretty gruesome stuff. I hope the families of these men will now have some closure.

Funerals in the Italian alp town of Peio are on the rise, only those being interred aren't of this day and age. Melting glaciers near the small alpine village continue to unveil remains and artifacts from soldiers who fought in the often forgotten "White War" staged in the mountains during World War I. During those times, soldiers from the Austria-Hungary empire battled with Italian troops for supremacy over the mountainous terrain.

Hundreds of thousands of soldiers are estimated to have died during the White War, many of whom were claimed by the extreme weather. Temperatures plummeted to 22 below, and avalanches, dubbed the "white death" by soldiers, swallowed companies whole. Many of the soldiers went unaccounted for, the Telegraph notes, their disappearance a solemn reminder of the rigors of war.

But now, nearly a century later, the remains of the lost soldiers have risen to the surface. In recent years, some 80 mummified bodies have risen to the surface of the melting glacier, the Telegraph reports. For instance, in 2004, a mountain guide stumbled across a grisly sight: three soldiers sticking out of a wall of ice upside down. Those remains were found around 12,000 feet above sea level near San Matteo, likely a gruesome side-effect of one of the last battles for the mountain in 1918.

Again, this time in 2013, the remains of two soldiers (pictured below) who had fought in the May 1918 Battle of Presena, the Economist notes, were found in a interment pit that had melted away. So well-preserved were mummified remains, that hair, skin and other features still remained.

The melting glacier doesn't just produce remains, however. On a much more positive note, personal artifacts, such as a love note addressed to "Maria," have also been recovered in the glacier, the Telegraph reports.

Photographs - what do you do when inundated?

As perhaps I mentioned, I have found a ton of Lee/Kirkpatick photographs/memorabilia in my attic. I am ashamed that I have had it all along and am only now realizing it. What I recall from the time that I cleaned out Olive’s apartment in the late 90s is that there were a ton of tiny travel photographs - maybe 1 and a 1/2 inch square. I knew they were very cool, because they were Rome, Moscow, China, etc. – but they were so small and I couldn't deal with it at the time. It appears that I had more presence of mind than I realized – I seem to have saved some really good stuff. Thank you, God.
However, going through all the unlabeled photographs made me think about my own colletion of photographs. Mostly I make shutterfly.com books of my travel photographs. But, those books are more about what I see rather than the people. I know from this archival or historical process that it is the people who will be interesting years later, not the places – unless, of course it is someplace that eventually gets destroyed, like the Buddha statues in Afghanistan. Then you want to keep those photographs.
So, I have sorted through years of photographs. I had to wrestle with the question of outdated storage media, slides and negatives. My husband suggested that I keep all the negatives, and I suppose they don’t take up too much space. I didn’t even tackle the slides. I have a ton of black and white negatives from photography classes over the years, though they are already slipped in to sleeves and filed in a 3 ring binder. I did throw some photographs away, though. That feels like sacrilege. I tossed photos of a cousin’s wedding, but only because the quality of the photographs is so poor; it was a tough decision, though. I am sure, though, that I have photo albums somewhere with these photographs and these are the duplicates.
Of course I have come across miscellaneous photographs which are not people, but make me think about my family and my life. So, in that vein, I have scanned – and I will now toss – a photograph of the house my grandmother rented for a number of years in Kennebunkport, Maine. I will also write the memories I have of the house and my family's time there.

• This house was owned by the Pruitt Family
• The house is just down the road from the Walker (read President Bush’s) compound on Walker point. I remember when I heard Senior President George Bush make a speech when he was running against Reagan, before he became his running mate.
• I spent summers here reading Jane Austen while cousin was reading English literature; I think he was preparing for graduate school.
• This was where Gammy had a piece of spinach on her nose and another cousin and I were laughing about it. When Alex told Gammy about it, she answered with “well, I think it looks good there.” Santos came out to serve the next course and used her finger to wipe it off. I can picture that to this day.
• The my brothers and my cousins spent hours walking/playing on the rocks along the Maine coastline.
• Gammy bought us tennis, sailing and diving lessons and such to keep us out of the house and active.

Honestly, I am overwhelmed with all the photographs - and also the knowledge that being childless, none of these images will be of interest to another generation. I will hope that my nieces and my stepchildren with be happy for the images of their own parents amongst my collection.