Posterity (14 page)

All the contractors did that way.

“Old Steffins” kept three teams hauling oats, 100 lbs. to a load, for a month. The oats were unloaded into a feed room 12 x 16 and after they had hauled for a month, there were only a few oats in the room. Manly was one of the teamsters. I don't know where feed was hauled to sell. Perhaps sold to the R.R. to furnish another contractor. Must have been there was no other market.

The letter from Grace came. She said—“flowers that used to grow here, some are here yet, but lots of kinds we don't see any more. The crocus came first in the spring”—and the prairie used to be white with the blossoms of wild onions in the spring.

“Then there were violets, purple and yellow and such a lot of sheep sorrel with its pinkish blossoms.

There were no sunflowers, golden rod nor dandelions until much later. “There were yellow buttercups and white anemone, common name is wind flower.” “There were two kinds of wild peas blue and purple and wild parsley and wild clover bean. There were tiger lillies in low places.”

“Forty years ago there were wild geraniums (white + red) around Manchester. Never saw them around DeSmet.”

To think that I could have forgotten all this which comes back to me now. That's why the sooner I write my stuff the better.

You remember the roses of course and have heard us tell about them.

Well my dear I must get to work. It is nearly dinner time.

Every year, I think, I will remember Valentine's day and be nice to people, but every year I forget until it is too late.

Christmas and birthdays seem to be all I can manage. But it was delightful to have you remember us.

Don't you love the styles this spring? Had a cat. from Bellas Hess Kas. City and the Oh all the clothes are the prettiest for years and years. The only fault is that most of them have short sleeves. Likely I am predjudiced because my arms are not pretty any more, but there should be more long sleeves. I think they are beautiful, princess and swing skirts

I am re-reading Tross of Samathrace and Manly is reading it. Whoever gets it first in the evening reads it. The other has to put up with something else.

I can't work on my book in the evening, because, if I do, I can't sleep. My brain goes right on remembering and it's H——

Lots and lots of love my dear

Mama Bess

N
.
C
.
W
YETH TO
A
NDREW
W
YETH

“How stimulating is the company
of generous minds . . .”

An exceptional letter writer, N. C. Wyeth had a great range of interests and broad enthusiasm for the creative mind. Consistently guiding and challenging his five children, Wyeth made certain that life for them was full of wonder, imagination, principle, and productivity.

Here he writes to his son, the distinguished artist Andrew Wyeth. N. C. Wyeth educated his youngest child at home and was the only teacher Andrew Wyeth ever had.

Studio
Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania
February 16, 1944

Dear Andy,

There's a slow billowy wind coming down the valley. It comes in great round intermittent puffs and piles up about the studio ever so like some engulfing and invisible surf. One can almost hear it pouring off the back roof, cascades of spume spending itself in foamy eddies among the orchard trees and tangled grass.

The day is somber and gray, and I am reminded of Thoreau who found the drab days of winter so inspiring. These dreary winter colors which depressed other people suggested to him the high spiritual traits that constituted his concept of beauty.

The week has been, to me, a singular mix of ineffable sadness and inspiration—two moods that often happen together. But there is a persistent melancholy which I seem unable to shake off.

To circumvent these feelings I have devoted most of my spare time to reading, especially at night when sleep eludes me.—Thoreau, Goethe, Emerson, Tolstoy—all have struck me, as always, with incisive vitality and freshness. My ruminations have again been vividly stirred.

These great men forever radiate a sharp sense of that profound requirement of the artist, to fully understand that
consequences
of what he creates are unimportant. “Let the motive for action be in the action itself and not in the event.”

I know from my own experience that when I create with any degree of strength and beauty I have had no thought of consequences. Anyone who creates for
effect
—to score a hit—does not know what he is missing!

This period of unprecedented distractions and overstimulation constitutes a fierce antagonist to the accomplishments of the spirit. Whatever is worth discovery in one's heart and mind can only rise to the surface among quiet conditions, in which one thought grows beside another and one has time to compare and reflect. Periods of bleak thinking and austere feeling, that kind that cuts to the bone, are imperative. Experiences which so often masquerade for cultural influences are so often merely cozy and sociable.

I was struck with a quotation from Michelangelo: “It is only well with me when I have a chisel in my hand.”

How stimulating is the company of generous minds (I am thinking of the four masters named above) who overlook trifles and keep their minds instinctively fixed on whatever is good and positive in the world about them. Truly magnanimous people have no vanity, no jealousy; they have no reserves and they feed on the true and solid wherever they find it. What is more, they find it everywhere.

There is little doubt that the modern mind is opposed to the romantic mind. The modern mind is mainly content to ask and seek causes and consequences—whereas the romantic mind seeks the
significance
of things. The romantic mind must be restored to its necessary place of leadership. If things have no
significance
things are hollow!

The greats in all the arts have been primarily romanticists and realists (the two canot be separated). They interpreted life as they saw it, but, “through every line's being” soaked in the consciousness of an object, one is bound to feel, beside life as it is, the life that ought to be, and it is
that
that captivates us! All great painting is something that enriches and enhances life, something that makes it higher, wider, and deeper.

“A great painter is a great man painting.”

Sound feeling can only exist in a man who is living on all sides the life that is natural to man. Only through this experience can he sense his times and avoid that ever-lurking pitfall of egocentricism. Someone, uncommonly wise, said, “Nothing is so poor and melancholy as art that is interested in itself and not its subject.”

To live, to keep one's eyes wide open in wonder, to be surprised by things!

Here's a quote which I think will interest you—“Great painting like Bach's music, in texture closely woven, subdued like the early Gobelin tapestries, no emphasis, no climaxes, no beginnings or endings, merely resumptions and transitions, a design so sustained that there is no effort in starting and every casual statement is equally great.”

But of course such depth presupposes another mode of feeling. One has to be a Bach before one can paint in his power and richness. Depth of style can only spring from a deepening of our emotional life.
That
is what we really demand and look for!

There's a real task on our hands, Andy. Modern art critics and their supine followers
like
the flat and the shallow. They like it as they like soft drinks and factory-made bread.

Intensity, distinction, fire
—those elements of mature sincerity, these they loathe. They fear disturbance!

Ma's very well; we all are. Remember me to everybody, warmly—and give little Nicholas a special pat for me.

Monday, 7:30 a.m.

P.S. In reading this over I am impressed by the fact that none of the thoughts expressed are new to you. We have, together, gone over these matters again and again. But it is good, I think, to repeat fundamental truths and, if possible, bring them into new and fresh focus.

A great truth is like a mountain that one walks around, and the changes of its contour as one moves his position only emphasize and revivify its majesty.

G
EORGE
P
ATTON,
J
R., TO
G
EORGE
P
ATTON,
III

“I am sure that if every leader who goes into battle
will promise himself that he will come out either
a conqueror or a corpse he is sure to win.”

On the morning of June 6, 1944, American troops landed on the beach at Normandy, France. The invasion had been planned for the day before but was delayed by bad weather. General George Patton, like the rest of the world, learned of the invasion from a radio announcer. A controversial man but a brilliant military tactician, he would have loved to lead troops into the battle himself, but instead he remained in England, training the United States Third Army for the battle that would follow the initial invasion.

In 1944, Patton's only son, George, was a twenty-year-old cadet at West Point. Here, on D-day itself, the general writes to his son.

APO 403, N.Y.
“D” Day

Dear George:

At 0700 this morning the BBC announced that the German radio had just come out with an announcement of the landing of Allied paratroops and of large numbers of assault craft near shore. So that is it.

This group of unconquerable heroes whom I command are not in yet but we will be soon—I wish I was there now as it is a lovley sunny day for a battle and I am fed up with just sitting.

I have no immediate idea of being killed but one can never tell and none of us can live for ever so if I should go don't worry but set yourself to do better than I have.

All men are timid on entering any fight whether it is the first fight or the last fight all of us are timid. Cowards are those who let their timidity get the better of their manhood. You will never do that because of your blood lines on both sides. I think I have told you the story of Marshal Touraine who fought under Louis XIV. On the morning of one of his last battles—he had been fighting for forty years—he was mounting his horse when a young ADC who had just come from the court and had never missed a meal or heard a hostile shot said: “M. de Touraine it amazes me that a man of your supposed courage should permit his knees to tremble as he walks out to mount.” Touraine replied, “My lord duke I admit that my knees do tremble but should they know where I shall this day take them they would shake even more.” That is it. Your knees may shake but they will always take you toward the enemy. Well so much for that.

There are apparently two types of successful soldiers. Those who get on by being unobtrusive and those who get on by being obtrusive. I am of the latter type and seem to be rare and unpopular: but it is my method. One has to choose a system and stick to it. People who are not themselves are nobody.

To be a successful soldier you must know history. Read it objectively, dates and even the minute details of tactics are useless. What you must know is how man reacts. Weapons change but man who uses them changes not at all. To win battles you do not beat weapons, you beat the soul of man of the enemy man. To do that you have to destroy his weapons but that is only incidental. You must read biography and especially autobiography. If you will do it you will find that war is simple. Decide what will hurt the enemy most within the limits of your capabilities to harm him and do it. TAKE CALCULATED RISKS. That is quite different from being rash. My personal belief is that if you have a 50% chance take it because the superior fighting qualities of American soldiers lead by me will surely give you the extra 1% necessary.

In Sicily I decided as a result of my information, observations, and a sixth sense that I have, that the enemy did not have another large scale attack in his system. I bet my shirt on that and I was right. You cannot make war safely but no dead general has ever been criticised so you have that way out always.

I am sure that if every leader who goes into battle will promise himself that he will come out either a conqueror or a corpse he is sure to win. There is no doubt of that. Defeat is not due to losses but to the destruction of the soul of the leaders. The “Live to fight another day” doctrine.

The most vital quality a soldier can possess is SELF CONFIDENCE, utter, complete and bumptious. You can have doubts about your good looks, about your intelligence, about your selfcontrol but to win in a war you must have NO doubts about your ability as a soldier.

What success I have had results from the fact that I have always been certain that my military reactions were correct. Many people do not agree with me; they are wrong. The unerring jury of history written long after both of us are dead will prove me correct.

Note that I speak of “Military reactions” no one is borne with them any more than any one is borne with muscles. You can be borne with the soul capable of correct military reactions or the body capable of having big muscles but both qualities must be developed by hard work.

The intensity of your desire to acquire any special ability depends on character, on ambition. I think that your decision to study this summer instead of enjoying yourself shows that you have character and ambition—they are wonderful possessions.

Soldiers, all men in fact, are natural hero worshippers. Officers with a flare for command realize this and emphasize in their conduct, dress and deportment the qualities they seek to produce in their men. When I was a second lieutenant I had a captain who was very sloppy and usually late, yet he got after the men for just those faults; he was a failure.

The troops I have commanded have always been well dressed, been smart saluters, been prompt and bold in action because I have personally set the example in these qualities. The influence one man can have on thousands is a never ending source of wonder to me. You are always on parade. Officers who through lazyness or a foolish desire to be popular fail to enforce discipline and the proper wearing of uniforms and equipment not in the presence of the enemy will also fail in battle and if they fail in battle they are potential murderers. There is no such thing as: “A good field soldier” you are either a good soldier or a bad soldier.