The Vaughan Library, Harrow School

The Vaughan Library, Harrow School

Image by pandrcutts
Harrow School was founded by John Lyon in 1572 to educate the sons of the yeomen of Harrow. But, by the time it's present library was built in the early 1860s, its net had long been cast much wider. In fact it had become one of the most prestigious – and expensive – schools in the England. Harrovians who have achieved fame are legion. There were a few monarchs including King Hussein of Jordan and King Faisal II of Iraq, several prime ministers including Spencer Perceval (the only British Prime Minister to have been assassinated), Robert Peel, Henry John Temple (3rd Viscount Palmerston), Stanley Baldwin, Winston Churchill and Jawaharlal Nehru. There were lesser parliamentarians including Leopold Amery, Sir Thomas Dyke Acland, Eric Lubbock and Keith Joseph. And there were writers such as Anthony Trollope, Lord Byron, John Galsworthy, Terence Rattigan, John Mortimer and William Deedes, (one-time Daily Telegraph editor and correspondent), the photographer Cecil Beaton and the actor Michael Denison.

The photo shows the school's library. It was designed by George Gilbert Scott and named after Charles John Vaughan, the headmaster of the school during the 1850s. It's located on the east side of the High Street, Harrow Hill, and has been designated a grade II listed building. A major refurbishment was carried out in the year 2000. A glance at Harrow School, the Vaughan Library shows that the facility is well funded and generously equipped so it's rather surprising to read elsewhere that it attracts an average of only 40 visitors per day from a school that lays claim to 820 pupils and 100 members of academic staff.

To quote from Harrow School, Yesterday and Today (1948) by Edward Dalrymple Laborde (1890-1962):

"On the resignation of Dr Vaughan in 1859 a resolution was passed at a meeting of Harrow Masters and his former Harrow pupils held at Spencer House, London, on March 13, 1860, that a fund should be raised to build as a memorial of his Headmastership a School Library to be known as the Vaughan Library. Difficulties were met in securing the chosen site, which was then occupied by three cottages and the stables of the Crown and Anchor Inn opposite ; but after some delay they were overcome by the energy of Dr. Vaughan's successor, Dr. H M Butler. Mr. George Gilbert Scott, RA, was selected as architect and Mr. Richard Chapman engaged as builder. The foundation stone was laid on Speech Day, July 4, 1861, by Lord Palmerston. The ceremony, which was performed in pouring rain after three and a half hours of" Speeches," began with a prayer by the Archbishop of Canterbury. The Headmaster then presented a silver trowel to Lord Palmerston, who spoke to the gathering, comparing , "honourable exertion to a fertilizing shower, which, though it may, as you all know at the present moment, not be agreeable to those exposed to it, yet creates an ample and abundant harvest. He then laid the stone, while the Headmaster held an umbrella over him."

The Rev Charles John Vaughan (1816-1897) was educated at Rugby School and Trinity College, Cambridge. While he was at Rugby Thomas Arnold was appointed headmaster and was beginning to bring in the revolutionary methods for which he is famous. Vaughan was impressed and, after Arnold left Rugby in 1841, Vaughan was in the running to succeed him as headmastership. In fact that post went to Archibald Tait who later became Archbishop of Canterbury. However, it was only three years after his unsuccessful bid for the Rugby job that Vaughan was appointed headmaster of the even more prestigious establishment at Harrow. During the five years he was there he introduced some of Arnold's methods, including his monitorial system. But, in 1859, he was forced to resign under a cloud the full extent of which didn't become known until the 1970s when the diaries of the Victorian poet John Addington Symonds were discovered. These revealed that Vaughan had been having an affair with a boy called Alfred Pretor, although it has been said that the relationship "had not involved coition but was limited to letters and caresses"*. Symonds was a friend of Pretor. He knew – and disapproved – of the affair, but kept silent for a year. Finally he informed the Latin master John Connington of what was going on. Ironically Connington condoned such relationships. Nevertheless he encouraged Symonds to tell his father about Vaughan's affair with Pretor and and it was Dr Symonds who forced Vaughan to resign. Furthermore he stipulated that Vaughan should not accept any high clerical post in the future. On that basis, the whole thing was covered up and Vaughan became vicar of Doncaster. However, in1863, he accepted Palmerston's offer of the Bishopric of Rochester. On hearing this, Symonds telegrammed Vaughan threatening public exposure unless he resigned immediately. Vaughan promptly informed Palmerston that, on further consideration, he would withdraw. Meanwhile, the recipient of Vaughan's attentions, Alfred Pretor, had became head boy. After leaving Harrow he followed in his headmaster's footsteps at Trinity. Later he became a writer and, for 35 years, a distinguished fellow of St Catherine's College, Cambridge.

Reproduced below is a sardonic cartoon of Vaughan published in the British Vanity Fair in 1872, ten years after the scandal. It includes the Latin words novo episcopari which, translated, mean I do not want to be a bishop. In those days the words were traditionally uttered twice by those nominated for such a post. Of course, their tongue would be firmly in their cheek but, in Vaughan's case the words have a somewhat ironic interpretation. He never did become a bishop.

John Addington Symonds was born in Clifton, Bristol, in 1840. His father – also John Addington Symonds – was an eminent physician with an enormous and lucrative practice whose fame extended over much of the West Country. The Symondses were a cultured family and Dr Symonds himself had interests extending to art, archaeology, science and literature. The younger Symonds started at Harrow in 1854 and went on to Balliol College, Oxford, in 1860. He had inherited many of his father's interests but, possibly as a result of experiencing the homosexuality rampant at Harrow during his time there, he also became a life-long advocate of male sexual relationships. Such practices were anathema to Victorian society and had to be kept secret. Nevertheless, although married and with a family, he wrote poetry inspired by his own homosexual affairs.

George Gilbert Scott (1811-1878) was one of a family of architects. Among his many other designs are the Albert Memorial in Hyde Park, the recently restored Midland Grand Hotel at St Pancras Station and Christchurch Cathedral in New Zealand (devastated by the 2011 earthquake) and St Nikolaikirche, Hamburg, which was the tallest building in the world from 1874 to 1876 but which was heavily bombed during WWII.

Lord Palmerston (1784-1865) was at Harrow from 1795-1800 and, when he laid the foundation stone of the Library in 1860, had recently started his second stint as Prime Minister. He was 76 at the time but vigorous and in good health. He was still in office five years later in 1865 when he developed a feverish chill. It is thought that, when his doctor suggested that he could die from the fever, his retort was "Die, my dear doctor. That is the last thing I would do". Whether or not those were his last words, the fever was certainly his nemesis. He is the most recent prime minister to have died in office and, after 11 May 2012, he will become one of only two prime ministers in 200 years to have done so. If you're wondering why this should be so, read what is written here. And note that the subject of the article is yet another Harrovian and scholar of Trinity College, Cambridge!

Charles Vaughan's successor as headmaster was another cleric, the Rev Henry Montagu Butler (1833-1918) – in those days headmasters of Harrow were invariably drawn from the Church of England priesthood. Montagu Butler, as he was known, was only 27 when appointed to the post and served for the ensuing 25 years. He was the son of the Rev George Butler (1774-1853) who had been headmaster of the School from 1805 to 1829. Thus the Butlers, father and son, served as headmasters of Harrow for half of the 19th century. Henry junior started as a pupil at the school in November 1846 and was head boy in 1850-51.

George Butler was a wealthy man and, throughout his time at Harrow School, he purchased land on the Hill and its northern slopes. In 1814 he been made the Rector of Gayton in Northants and, on retiring from the headship, he took up his duties as parish priest of Gayton with the same zeal that he had given to his time at Harrow. His son, Henry, was born in Gayton when George was in his 60th year and it's no coincidence that there is a Gayton Road in central Harrow. Indeed there is another seat of learning along that road – although it's somewhat less exclusive than Harrow School itself. Harrow High School was founded as Harrow County School in 1911.

Montagu Butler was one of the nine children of the Rev George Butler – four sons and five daughters. And amongst the grandchildren of Montagu himself and his elder brother, Spencer Percival Butler, were at least two men who achieved achieved fame in the 20th century. One of Montagu's grandsons was Guy Montagu Butler (1899-1981), an accomplished Olympic athlete and one of Spencer's many grandchildren was Richard Austen Butler. RAB, as he was usually known, was a distinguished British parliamentarian whose career spanned four decades in the mid 20th century. He was the pilot of the 1944 Education Act which laid the foundations for British education over the rest of the century. He later held a number of cabinet posts, including Home Secretary, Foreign Secretary and Chancellor of the Exchequer. His last post was Deputy Prime Minister after which he retired from politics and became Master of Trinity College, Cambridge – once the stamping ground of one Charles John Vaughan and his young friend, Alfred Pretor.

One of John Symonds' daughters Margaret – or Madge as she was better known – became a novelist. She married William Wyamar Vaughan (1865-1938), a cousin of Virginia Woolf. William Vaughan's father, Henry Halford Vaughan was, like Charles John Vaughan, educated at Rugby and Cambridge – and William himself was headmaster of Rugby School from 1921-1931. But the families were not related.

William and Madge's daughter, Janet Maria Vaughan (1899-1993), was a physiologist and academic who served as Principal of Somerville College, Oxford from 1945 until 1967. She was made a DBE in 1957 and an FRS in 1979.

In 1947, under Janet Vaughan's watch, a student of the college, Margaret Roberts, graduated with a second-class honours degree in chemistry. Four years later the said Miss Roberts married a British businessman named Denis Thatcher.

And the rest is history!

Harrow School is not the only school in Harrow to be associated with John Lyon. Further down the hill – on its southwestern slopes – is a place of learning called The John Lyon School. It was founded in 1876 by the Governors of Harrow School with the intention of realizing anew the vision that John Lyon had aspired to when he started Harrow School in the first place – a vision that had somehow got forgotten over the years. John Lyon's aim was to provide an education for boys who lived in the vicinity of Harrow. In the years since it was set up, the school named after him has lived up well to its expectations. Interestingly, its four houses are named not after its own former headmasters but after those of the 'other place' further up the hill. They include both Butler and Vaughan – but it was not always so. In my time at the school in the early 1950s the houses were rather less pretentiously named after the points of the compass. My house was North which, I'm relieved to report, became Butler. It was the luckless West house that became Vaughan. Were the houses of John Lyon School to have been named after its own headmasters one of them would surely have been Oscar Alfred Le Beau who was in post during my first year at the school. He served as headmaster for 25 years and as science master for about ten years before that. Another obvious candidate would be Ernest Young who was first a master at the school and then, after a spell abroad, became headmaster from 1898 until 1910. After that he became the first headmaster of Harrow County School when it was founded in 1911. You can read all about him in Ernest Young – first headmaster of Harrow County School by Stephen Frost. To download it Google "Ernest Young B Sc" (with the quotes) and click on the link. Alumni of John Lyon's include bandleader Victor Silvester, lawyer Francis Bennion and actor Timothy West. Former pupils of Harrow County School comedian Cardew Robinson, broadcaster Clive Anderson and politicians Michal Portillo and Diane Abbott.

* The road of danger, guilt, and shame: the lonely way of A.E. Housman by Carol Efrati, p287.

Sourced principally from Harrow School, Yesterday and Today (1948) by Edward Dalrymple Laborde, A History of Harrow School, 1324-1991 by Christopher Tyerman (2000), from John Addington Symond: a Biography by Phyllis Grosskurth (1975) and from Wikipedia.

500th view: 22 September 2012

Army Photography Contest - 2007 - FMWRC - Arts and Crafts - Beluga

Image by familymwr
Army Photography Contest - 2007 - FMWRC - Arts and Crafts - Beluga

Photo By: PO3 Stephen Gonzalez

To learn more about the annual U.S. Army Photography Competition, visit us online at www.armymwr.com

U.S. Army Arts and Crafts History

After World War I the reductions to the Army left the United States with a small force. The War Department faced monumental challenges in preparing for World War II. One of those challenges was soldier morale. Recreational activities for off duty time would be important. The arts and crafts program informally evolved to augment the needs of the War Department.
On January 9, 1941, the Secretary of War, Henry L. Stimson, appointed Frederick H. Osborn, a prominent U.S. businessman and philanthropist, Chairman of the War Department Committee on Education, Recreation and Community Service.
In 1940 and 1941, the United States involvement in World War II was more of sympathy and anticipation than of action. However, many different types of institutions were looking for ways to help the war effort. The Museum of Modern Art in New York was one of these institutions. In April, 1941, the Museum announced a poster competition, “Posters for National Defense.” The directors stated “The Museum feels that in a time of national emergency the artists of a country are as important an asset as men skilled in other fields, and that the nation’s first-rate talent should be utilized by the government for its official design work... Discussions have been held with officials of the Army and the Treasury who have expressed remarkable enthusiasm...”
In May 1941, the Museum exhibited “Britain at War”, a show selected by Sir Kenneth Clark, director of the National Gallery in London. The “Prize-Winning Defense Posters” were exhibited in July through September concurrently with “Britain at War.” The enormous overnight growth of the military force meant mobilization type construction at every camp. Construction was fast; facilities were not fancy; rather drab and depressing.
In 1941, the Fort Custer Army Illustrators, while on strenuous war games maneuvers in Tennessee, documented the exercise The Bulletin of the Museum of Modern Art, Vol. 9, No. 3 (Feb. 1942), described their work. “Results were astonishingly good; they showed serious devotion ...to the purpose of depicting the Army scene with unvarnished realism and a remarkable ability to capture this scene from the soldier’s viewpoint. Civilian amateur and professional artists had been transformed into soldier-artists. Reality and straightforward documentation had supplanted (replaced) the old romantic glorification and false dramatization of war and the slick suavity (charm) of commercial drawing.”

“In August of last year, Fort Custer Army Illustrators held an exhibition, the first of its kind in the new Army, at the Camp Service Club. Soldiers who saw the exhibition, many of whom had never been inside an art gallery, enjoyed it thoroughly. Civilian visitors, too, came and admired. The work of the group showed them a new aspect of the Army; there were many phases of Army life they had never seen or heard of before. Newspapers made much of it and, most important, the Army approved. Army officials saw that it was not only authentic material, but that here was a source of enlivenment (vitalization) to the Army and a vivid medium for conveying the Army’s purposes and processes to civilians and soldiers.”
Brigadier General Frederick H. Osborn and War Department leaders were concerned because few soldiers were using the off duty recreation areas that were available. Army commanders recognized that efficiency is directly correlated with morale, and that morale is largely determined from the manner in which an individual spends his own free time. Army morale enhancement through positive off duty recreation programs is critical in combat staging areas.
To encourage soldier use of programs, the facilities drab and uninviting environment had to be improved. A program utilizing talented artists and craftsmen to decorate day rooms, mess halls, recreation halls and other places of general assembly was established by the Facilities Section of Special Services. The purpose was to provide an environment that would reflect the military tradition, accomplishments and the high standard of army life. The fact that this work was to be done by the men themselves had the added benefit of contributing to the esprit de corps (teamwork, or group spirit) of the unit.
The plan was first tested in October of 1941, at Camp Davis, North Carolina. A studio workshop was set up and a group of soldier artists were placed on special duty to design and decorate the facilities. Additionally, evening recreation art classes were scheduled three times a week. A second test was established at Fort Belvoir, Virginia a month later. The success of these programs lead to more installations requesting the program.
After Pearl Harbor was bombed, the Museum of Modern Art appointed Mr. James Soby, to the position of Director of the Armed Service Program on January 15, 1942. The subsequent program became a combination of occupational therapy, exhibitions and morale-sustaining activities.
Through the efforts of Mr. Soby, the museum program included; a display of Fort Custer Army Illustrators work from February through April 5, 1942. The museum also included the work of soldier-photographers in this exhibit. On May 6, 1942, Mr. Soby opened an art sale of works donated by museum members. The sale was to raise funds for the Soldier Art Program of Special Services Division. The bulk of these proceeds were to be used to provide facilities and materials for soldier artists in Army camps throughout the country.
Members of the Museum had responded with paintings, sculptures, watercolors, gouaches, drawings, etchings and lithographs. Hundreds of works were received, including oils by Winslow Homer, Orozco, John Kane, Speicher, Eilshemius, de Chirico; watercolors by Burchfield and Dufy; drawings by Augustus John, Forain and Berman, and prints by Cezanne, Lautrec, Matisse and Bellows. The War Department plan using soldier-artists to decorate and improve buildings and grounds worked. Many artists who had been drafted into the Army volunteered to paint murals in waiting rooms and clubs, to decorate dayrooms, and to landscape grounds. For each artist at work there were a thousand troops who watched. These bystanders clamored to participate, and classes in drawing, painting, sculpture and photography were offered. Larger working space and more instructors were required to meet the growing demand. Civilian art instructors and local communities helped to meet this cultural need, by providing volunteer instruction and facilities.
Some proceeds from the Modern Museum of Art sale were used to print 25,000 booklets called “Interior Design and Soldier Art.” The booklet showed examples of soldier-artist murals that decorated places of general assembly. It was a guide to organizing, planning and executing the soldier-artist program. The balance of the art sale proceeds were used to purchase the initial arts and crafts furnishings for 350 Army installations in the USA.
In November, 1942, General Somervell directed that a group of artists be selected and dispatched to active theaters to paint war scenes with the stipulation that soldier artists would not paint in lieu of military duties.
Aileen Osborn Webb, sister of Brigadier General Frederick H. Osborn, launched the American Crafts Council in 1943. She was an early champion of the Army program.
While soldiers were participating in fixed facilities in the USA, many troops were being shipped overseas to Europe and the Pacific (1942-1945). They had long periods of idleness and waiting in staging areas. At that time the wounded were lying in hospitals, both on land and in ships at sea. The War Department and Red Cross responded by purchasing kits of arts and crafts tools and supplies to distribute to “these restless personnel.” A variety of small “Handicraft Kits” were distributed free of charge. Leathercraft, celluloid etching, knotting and braiding, metal tooling, drawing and clay modeling are examples of the types of kits sent.
In January, 1944, the Interior Design Soldier Artist program was more appropriately named the “Arts and Crafts Section” of Special Services. The mission was “to fulfill the natural human desire to create, provide opportunities for self-expression, serve old skills and develop new ones, and assist the entire recreation program through construction work, publicity, and decoration.”
The National Army Art Contest was planned for the late fall of 1944. In June of 1945, the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C., for the first time in its history opened its facilities for the exhibition of the soldier art and photography submitted to this contest. The “Infantry Journal, Inc.” printed a small paperback booklet containing 215 photographs of pictures exhibited in the National Gallery of Art.
In August of 1944, the Museum of Modern Art, Armed Forces Program, organized an art center for veterans. Abby Rockefeller, in particular, had a strong interest in this project. Soldiers were invited to sketch, paint, or model under the guidance of skilled artists and craftsmen. Victor d’Amico, who was in charge of the Museum’s Education Department, was quoted in Russell Lynes book, Good Old Modern: An Intimate Portrait of the Museum of Modern Art. “I asked one fellow why he had taken up art and he said, Well, I just came back from destroying everything. I made up my mind that if I ever got out of the Army and out of the war I was never going to destroy another thing in my life, and I decided that art was the thing that I would do.” Another man said to d’Amico, “Art is like a good night’s sleep. You come away refreshed and at peace.”
In late October, 1944, an Arts and Crafts Branch of Special Services Division, Headquarters, European Theater of Operations was established. A versatile program of handcrafts flourished among the Army occupation troops.
The increased interest in crafts, rather than fine arts, at this time lead to a new name for the program: The “Handicrafts Branch.”
In 1945, the War Department published a new manual, “Soldier Handicrafts”, to help implement this new emphasis. The manual contained instructions for setting up crafts facilities, selecting as well as improvising tools and equipment, and basic information on a variety of arts and crafts.
As the Army moved from a combat to a peacetime role, the majority of crafts shops in the United States were equipped with woodworking power machinery for construction of furnishings and objects for personal living. Based on this new trend, in 1946 the program was again renamed, this time as “Manual Arts.”
At the same time, overseas programs were now employing local artists and craftsmen to operate the crafts facilities and instruct in a variety of arts and crafts. These highly skilled, indigenous instructors helped to stimulate the soldiers’ interest in the respective native cultures and artifacts. Thousands of troops overseas were encouraged to record their experiences on film. These photographs provided an invaluable means of communication between troops and their families back home.
When the war ended, the Navy had a firm of architects and draftsmen on contract to design ships. Since there was no longer a need for more ships, they were given a new assignment: To develop a series of instructional guides for arts and crafts. These were called “Hobby Manuals.” The Army was impressed with the quality of the Navy manuals and had them reprinted and adopted for use by Army troops. By 1948, the arts and crafts practiced throughout the Army were so varied and diverse that the program was renamed “Hobby Shops.” The first “Interservice Photography Contest” was held in 1948. Each service is eligible to send two years of their winning entries forward for the bi-annual interservice contest. In 1949, the first All Army Crafts Contest was also held. Once again, it was clear that the program title, “Hobby Shops” was misleading and overlapped into other forms of recreation.
In January, 1951, the program was designated as “The Army Crafts Program.” The program was recognized as an essential Army recreation activity along with sports, libraries, service clubs, soldier shows and soldier music. In the official statement of mission, professional leadership was emphasized to insure a balanced, progressive schedule of arts and crafts would be conducted in well-equipped, attractive facilities on all Army installations.
The program was now defined in terms of a “Basic Seven Program” which included: drawing and painting; ceramics and sculpture; metal work; leathercrafts; model building; photography and woodworking. These programs were to be conducted regularly in facilities known as the “multiple-type crafts shop.” For functional reasons, these facilities were divided into three separate technical areas for woodworking, photography and the arts and crafts.
During the Korean Conflict, the Army Crafts program utilized the personnel and shops in Japan to train soldiers to instruct crafts in Korea.
The mid-1950s saw more soldiers with cars and the need to repair their vehicles was recognized at Fort Carson, Colorado, by the craft director. Soldiers familiar with crafts shops knew that they had tools and so automotive crafts were established. By 1958, the Engineers published an Official Design Guide on Crafts Shops and Auto Crafts Shops. In 1959, the first All Army Art Contest was held. Once more, the Army Crafts Program responded to the needs of soldiers.
In the 1960’s, the war in Vietnam was a new challenge for the Army Crafts Program. The program had three levels of support; fixed facilities, mobile trailers designed as portable photo labs, and once again a “Kit Program.” The kit program originated at Headquarters, Department of Army, and it proved to be very popular with soldiers.
Tom Turner, today a well-known studio potter, was a soldier at Ft. Jackson, South Carolina in the 1960s. In the December 1990 / January 1991 “American Crafts” magazine, Turner, who had been a graduate student in art school when he was drafted, said the program was “a godsend.”
The Army Artist Program was re-initiated in cooperation with the Office of Military History to document the war in Vietnam. Soldier-artists were identified and teams were formed to draw and paint the events of this combat. Exhibitions of these soldier-artist works were produced and toured throughout the USA.
In 1970, the original name of the program, “Arts and Crafts”, was restored. In 1971, the “Arts and Crafts/Skills Development Program” was established for budget presentations and construction projects.
After the Vietnam demobilization, a new emphasis was placed on service to families and children of soldiers. To meet this new challenge in an environment of funding constraints the arts and crafts program began charging fees for classes. More part-time personnel were used to teach formal classes. Additionally, a need for more technical-vocational skills training for military personnel was met by close coordination with Army Education Programs. Army arts and crafts directors worked with soldiers during “Project Transition” to develop soldier skills for new careers in the public sector.
The main challenge in the 1980s and 90s was, and is, to become “self-sustaining.” Directors have been forced to find more ways to generate increased revenue to help defray the loss of appropriated funds and to cover the non-appropriated funds expenses of the program. Programs have added and increased emphasis on services such as, picture framing, gallery sales, engraving and trophy sales, etc... New programs such as multi-media computer graphics appeal to customers of the 1990’s.
The Gulf War presented the Army with some familiar challenges such as personnel off duty time in staging areas. Department of Army volunteer civilian recreation specialists were sent to Saudi Arabia in January, 1991, to organize recreation programs. Arts and crafts supplies were sent to the theater. An Army Humor Cartoon Contest was conducted for the soldiers in the Gulf, and arts and crafts programs were set up to meet soldier interests.
The increased operations tempo of the ‘90’s Army has once again placed emphasis on meeting the “recreation needs of deployed soldiers.” Arts and crafts activities and a variety of programs are assets commanders must have to meet the deployment challenges of these very different scenarios.
The Army arts and crafts program, no matter what it has been titled, has made some unique contributions for the military and our society in general. Army arts and crafts does not fit the narrow definition of drawing and painting or making ceramics, but the much larger sense of arts and crafts. It is painting and drawing. It also encompasses:
* all forms of design. (fabric, clothes, household appliances, dishes, vases, houses, automobiles, landscapes, computers, copy machines, desks, industrial machines, weapon systems, air crafts, roads, etc...)
* applied technology (photography, graphics, woodworking, sculpture, metal smithing, weaving and textiles, sewing, advertising, enameling, stained glass, pottery, charts, graphs, visual aides and even formats for correspondence...)
* a way of making learning fun, practical and meaningful (through the process of designing and making an object the creator must decide which materials and techniques to use, thereby engaging in creative problem solving and discovery) skills taught have military applications.
* a way to acquire quality items and save money by doing-it-yourself (making furniture, gifts, repairing things ...).
* a way to pursue college credit, through on post classes.
* a universal and non-verbal language (a picture is worth a thousand words).
* food for the human psyche, an element of morale that allows for individual expression (freedom).
* the celebration of human spirit and excellence (our highest form of public recognition is through a dedicated monument).
* physical and mental therapy (motor skill development, stress reduction, etc...).
* an activity that promotes self-reliance and self-esteem.
* the record of mankind, and in this case, of the Army.
What would the world be like today if this generally unknown program had not existed? To quantitatively state the overall impact of this program on the world is impossible. Millions of soldier citizens have been directly and indirectly exposed to arts and crafts because this program existed. One activity, photography can provide a clue to its impact. Soldiers encouraged to take pictures, beginning with WW II, have shared those images with family and friends. Classes in “How to Use a Camera” to “How to Develop Film and Print Pictures” were instrumental in soldiers seeing the results of using quality equipment. A good camera and lens could make a big difference in the quality of the print. They bought the top of the line equipment. When they were discharged from the Army or home on leave this new equipment was showed to the family and friends. Without this encouragement and exposure to photography many would not have recorded their personal experiences or known the difference quality equipment could make. Families and friends would not have had the opportunity to “see” the environment their soldier was living in without these photos. Germany, Italy, Korea, Japan, Panama, etc... were far away places that most had not visited.
As the twenty first century approaches, the predictions for an arts renaissance by Megatrends 2000 seem realistic based on the Army Arts and Crafts Program practical experience. In the April ‘95 issue of “American Demographics” magazine, an article titled “Generation X” fully supports that this is indeed the case today. Television and computers have greatly contributed to “Generation X” being more interested in the visual arts and crafts.
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What mischief can I get up to?

Image by stewartbaird
It's the end of the work week, so what better time to post a fun picture. I love the expression on my son's face on this one; he looks like he's up to something doesn't he? I've also got a version of this that I tweaked a bit with Snap Art to create a "cartoon" look. If you're interested its over here.


Not much post-processing on this one; minor adjustments made inside Apple Aperture. You can't mess with art :-)

From my blog at www.stewartbaird.com

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a weeks worth of pictures

Image by jessica wilson {jek in the box}
just a pop of eye candy to remind me that i did indeed have a somewhat productive week. not pictured are the dvds watched, the books read, the floors swept, the laundry washed and the trash cans unemptied....whee!

clockwise from top left:
*washing vintage doll clothes
*hanging with my flickr friends
*vegan oatmeal bars
*picnic dinner with the mister
*freehand embroidery for fun
*guerilla art project
*a new batch of grape juice
*a lesson in cartooning
*happy bed bunting

Created with fd's Flickr Toys.