A friend with a huge SUV agreed to go with me to Peninsula and Akron OH yesterday (24th March) to retrieve three paintings old friends decided to give back to me. I had given them the canvases way back in the early to mid 1970s when my first wife and I lived in Peninsula. She still owns the homestead and is an accomplished well-known fiber and enamels artist. Peninsula is sometimes called a "New England-like" art colony, a village nestled in what is now the Cuyahoga Valley National Park. The park did not exist when I lived there for almost eight years and taught down at the University of Akron, about 15 miles away.

My thanks to Randy, who drove his SUV and got to meet Vicki and Bruce Armstrong in Akron. Bruce was a professor of art and taught illustration. He suffers now from several maladies and my heart is with him and Vicki.
They gave me back a giant 'diptych' that I painted in 1972. It is a scene on two canvases meant to go together. The image is a squadron of Rough Rider cavalrymen gathered around a table with a truncated horse on the far right. The truncation is 'art,' could be a tree, a post, or a whim. Whatever. It is how I worked those days, through a fog of smoke and experimentation.


BEFORE THE BATTLE (Left panel, 48" x 48" acrylic on canvas, 1972)

Instead of what I do today, I should light one up and start experimenting again. Those were my halcyon days. I was happy. Had no money problems, owned ten acres of great land, a vineyard, a forest a superb garden and a lawn that took an entire day to mow on a riding mower. I had a job I loved and I painted all the time that I wasn't working, teaching or riding that red Simplicity mower.


BEFORE THE BATTLE (Right panel, 48" x 48", acrylic on canvas, 1972)

We drove up to Herip Design in Peninsula, where I introduced Randy to my long-time close friend, Walter Herip, Graphic Design guru to the Great Lakes region. Walt's company is located in one of the grand Victorian architectural jems of the village, a huge old house that began life as a hotel along the route of the Ohio Canal that went through from Lake Erie to the Ohio River.

Walt had saved another period painting of mine that I had originally given to another family. They returned it a few years ago to him and he asked if I would like to have it. It is a painting I can remember doing, stroke by stroke, in the basement studio of my old home just up Route 303.


ROUGH RIDERS (58" x 40", acrylic on canvas, 1974)

We had a fantastic burger down at the Winkin' Lizard and drove the paintings to Tiffin. They are now hanging on walls in the artist's home, back in his eyes every day.

It is a warm touch to say the least. I am so pleased.