PART 4 - JUNE 14-17, 2019 FLIGHT FROM THE CITY: THE MAY 31, 1919 LITERARY DIGEST ARTICLE

ROCKWELL KENT WILDERNESS CENTENNIAL JOURNAL

100 YEARS LATER

Part 4 - Vermont: Flight from the City
The May 31, 1919 Literary Digest Article

June 15-17, 2019

ABOVE – The cover of the May 31, 1919 Literary Digest – the issue that contained the article and reprint of the May 11, 1919 Henry McBride review of Rockwell Kent’s Knoedler Gallery Drawings Exhibition in The Sun (New York).

By this time, Rockwell may still be searching for the perfect place to settle in Vermont. He finally does find his rural refuge. In a June 20, 1919 letter to Carl Zigrosser he writes: “It’s more beautiful than any place I’ve ever seen! There are fertile fields, orchards young and old, high hillside pastures, noble groves of maple, hickory and pine. The verdant valley lies like a map below us.” But he can’t afford the $3000 price. Fortunately, a recent friend and supporter, writer Dorothy Canfield Fisher, loans him the money.

The critics, like Henry McBride and Dr. Christian Brinton, are enthusiastic about his work. One of his Alaska sponsors, Ferdinand Howald, has bought another painting. He’s getting investors for his incorporation. Suffragette Caroline O’Day becomes a shareholder. Juliana Force, connected with the Whitney Studio, invests $1000.

ABOVE – Julia Force later in life. Wikipedia photo. BELOW – Caroline O’Day later in life. Wikipedia photo.

Kathleen had met with Julia Force several times while Kent was in Alaska. In fact, Kathleen is meeting with many prominent activists and socialists. On Jan. 17, 1919 she writes to Rockwell: Mrs.{Margaret}Sanger is to be tried tomorrow, for an article she published in the Birth Control Review, “Birth Control or Abortion?” I learned this at the post office when I stopped in a few days ago to see her. I did not see her for she was out of town.

BELOW – Margaret Sanger, 1922. Photo from Wikipedia.

Kathleen’s Jan. 17, 1919 letter continues: That same day I went to call on Mrs. Force. I couldn’t find her house, so I went to Mrs. Whitney’s studio and learned there that she had gone home sick, so I did not try to see her. I haven’t called on Mrs. Davidson and I don’t know whether I want to. She, as well as Mrs. Force, are too high and mighty intellectually to come down to me and I cannot attain their heights. Quiet and shy, Kathleen didn’t have the confidence to associate with the elite intellectual world or that of the wealthy. But she did it anyway for Rockwell’s sake. While her husband is in Alaska, she has been doing much to promote his career, find buyers for his painting, and seek sponsors. She has much to do in getting Dr. Theodore Wagner to sponsor Rockwell for $2000, allowing him to remain in Alaska through the summer of 1919. Kent refuses to accept it and returns home early -- jealous, angry and ashamed – feeling he has failed, and that all his work may be rejected as had the Newfoundland art.

Rockwell had been concerned that Mrs. Force will not associate with him anymore. On March 8, 1919 he writes to Zigrosser: “She compelled me…to offend her in a way that we are told a woman never forgives.” We learn more about that cryptic comment – as well as Kent’s other concerns regarding the politics of art world -- from a Feb. 13 letter to Kathleen: I’ve written Marie Sterner three times and may write again. Last time – last November – I hesitated about it but thought I’d do my part to keep my Knoedlers connection. Darn it I hate to have wasted on Marie such a good letter as I sent her. What do you think of Marie Sterner. I have always been somewhat confused about her and I don’t put much stock.

BELOW – Mrs. Marie Sterner with her son, Harold. Photo from the Frick Collection webpage.

If Mrs. Force fails me I’ll be disappointed. She’s entertaining but I think she was glad I left and will not be a patron any longer. Let me tell you a secret. While the sale of my picture was pending there I told Carl who was interested that it looked mighty doubtful to me as things were shaping and I told him no reason. But here it is, read it and forget it. Mrs. Force’s interest in me progressed at a greater rate than Mrs. Whiting’s return. I was as dignified and blind as I could be but at last Mrs. Force asked me to lunch at a quiet restaurant, (for which I did manage to pay) and asked me point blank if I’d ever thought of kissing her. (Gee!) and there hung my picture and Alaska in the balance! But I said “No, I haven’t.” She looked at me curiously and said “Why?” “Because I’m not in love with you,” I answered. Well, there was the (climax) and I thought it was all up. But the picture was bought and the subject was not again alluded to. Isn’t this funny? I don’t know whether or not Mrs. Force even likes me. I like her. I think she’s really a good soul and can be good friend – but that other stuff has to stay out of it. So I’ve written her nice occasional letters about the life here etc. I guess however she just doesn’t write letters often. Won’t it be too bad if I have to lose that “patronage” there for such silliness. This must be forever a secret, dear wife. What a lot of gossip. Are you entertained? Kent was learning the art of what he called playing the rotten game. In that June 20, 1919 letter to Zigrosser he wrote: I’ve no use for newspaper criticism, one way or the other, except as publicity to sell my pictures…when I can suppress my feelings…I know I’m doing the right thing. Wagner’s autobiography is a lesson in how not to act. {Composer Wilhelm Richard Wagner}

Back in Seward, Alaska in June 1919 Kent hasn’t been forgotten, but with spring comes intensive railroad constructions and the politics associated with it. The tracks from Seward to Anchorage are complete, but there’s still the coal issue. Seward wants the coal mined from north of Anchorage shipped to Resurrection Bay for transport Outside. Anchorage wants it shipped out of their port in Cook Inlet – even though, as Seward reminds those in charge—Cook Inlet freezes up in the winter and the government must spend thousands of dollars to dredge all the glacial silt out of the port area each summer. Resurrection Bay, on the other hand, is a 1000 foot deep, ice-free fjord with a working port. The original $35 million budget for the railroad has already been spent. Workers aren’t being paid. Congress appropriates more money. As the tracks move north toward Nenana and Fairbanks, Alaska promotes homesteading and business investments. By the time it is finished in 1923, the new railroad has cost of $70 million.

BELOW – Gandy Dancers laying track during construction of the Government Railroad, later called the Alaska Railroad. Photo from the Frank Carpenter Collection, Library of Congress.

Olson remains on Fox Island but he and the financier, Thomas W. Hawkins, are having second thoughts about the venture. The old Swede is tired, lonely and not in good health. He and Kent correspond. Rockwell knows of Olson’s situation and encourages the old man to join him in Vermont. Olson considers the plan. With railroad construction back in full force, Hawkins knows he’ll have a difficult time finding another caretaker for the Fox Island experiment. The enterprise shows promise, but the big demand for Alaska furs doesn’t begin until the 1920’s. Hawkins is too far ahead of the fur boom. The salmon begin to run in Resurrection Bay and Prince William Sound – Reds (Sockeye); Kings (Chinook); Silver (Coho); Pink (Humpy); Chum (Dog or Keta). Olson usually gets his Pink Salmon in Humpy Bay (called Humpy Cove today). He stores the fish in bags and drops them into the Fox Island lake, later mixing fish with his fox feed.

On May 31, 1919 the Literary Digest (LD) reprints sections of the Henry McBride review from The Sun of the Knoedler Gallery Drawings Exhibition as well as Kent’s letter in the catalogue to one of his patrons, Christian Brenton. The LD provides its own introduction: Painters are expected to be shy of such melodramatic things as auroras…so Alaska with all its effort hasn’t drawn the devotee of the brush and pigment. It has drawn writers like Jack London, Frank Norris and Robert Service. These writers have brought the public verbal images of that great white silence. Though artists have illustrated those stories, and others have photographed the villages, towns, people and animals – few have tackled the mountains, glaciers and seas in both representational and symbolic styles. But a young American who seems to have turned to the frozen North, after a course in Socialism and other radicalisms, emerges a full-fledged mystic – something after the William Blake pattern, tho in his profession of faith he doesn’t literally say so. He says other things. McBride praises Kent, though with the saving grains of salt – yet still he begs us not to miss the flowering of this new artistic talent. Excerpts from McBride’s review follow, then the letter to Christian Brinton. The LD then introduces the Brenton letter, which …shows the artist’s courageous spirit. Taken in connection with the titles of the show, it is a direct challenge to the Freudian, who is likely to dog the footsteps of all but the most impersonal of the artists in the future.

It took a while for Seward to learn of the LD article, but it was only a matter of time. As a thriving port town, the terminus of the new Government Railroad under construction, Seward was much more cosmopolitan than the mythos of the Alaskan frontier suggests. Subscribers to the LD, and there were some, did wait weeks for the current issue. But with all the steamship traffic in and out of port it is possible someone brought north the May 31, 1919 issue soon after it came out. It may have been passed around town. Among the artist’s friends – old timers like Olson, Brownell, Hawkins, Root, Graef, Sexton, Thwaites, Bohem, and many others – most likely enjoyed the piece. Rockwell Kent’s star was rising and these pioneers had a chance to know him. Regardless of what people thought of Kent, here was an artist now receiving national attention in a prestigious magazine. That was positive publicity for both Seward and the territory as a whole.

But there were still small factions in town left over from 1915-16 when political issues had split the town. One group established the Alaska Evening Post to compete with the Seward Gateway. The town was growing rapidly and with change comes a battle between those who want to move forward quickly and others who want to advance slowly or not at all. Many newcomers were arriving in Seward and they tended to be more progressive. A major theme in Alaska history is the conflict between those who come to Alaska to get away from what’s Outside, and those who want to bring the Outside north with them. The Seward Gateway represented one position while the Alaska Evening Post another. The two papers had merged by 1917 keeping the Seward Gateway name but allowing the Alaska Evening Post title for the Saturday issue. It was the Seward Gateway in late March 1919 that had waged that front-page battle with Rockwell Kent about a local teacher’s accusation that Rockie had said he liked the German flag and hated he English flag on a visit to the school during one of Kent’s trips to Seward.

When the Seward Gateway editor got hold of that May 31^st issue of the Literary Digest, it ignited his ire. The article confirmed Kent’s connection with socialism. Ah, hah – we knew it all along, he thought. As a confirmed socialist, that made him a heretic among Seward’s staunch capitalists. Did the editor see the irony? Seward now experienced an economic boom because of a U.S. Government funded railroad that would be the first to ever operated by the federal government. Further north, Anchorage was a government financed town. It would not incorporate itself until 1920, and then under federal pressure. Why institute taxes and start paying many of their own expenses when they could live off of Uncle Sam. Many privately funded railroads had tried to make it from tidewater into Alaska’s interior. Two had gone bankrupt attempting the feat from Resurrection Bay. Now the deep pocket of the federal government would take over – and after its recent success in completing the Panama Canal, everyone knew they would finally get this daunting job done.

But the fact that Kent was a socialist wasn’t really the big issue. Though more cautious in Alaska than he was in Newfoundland, Kent was not one to hide his politics. Those who met in him Seward probably knew of his leftist leanings. It was something else embedded within the letter to his patron, Christian Brinton, that caught the Seward Gateway editor’s eye.

Can you locate that sentence?

BELOW -- The May 31, 1919 Literary Digest article.