A Gallery of Art's Drawings from his Navy Service

Filling in with some background information during a letter-writing hiatus from October 6 to November 9, 1949, as June recuperates at the hospital from a ruptured appendix…

Art brought his sketch pad with him as he toured the Pacific on Navy minesweepers.  Most of his drawings from this period are rapid sketches, in pencil or charcoal, of his immediate surroundings, including life aboard the ship and life ashore in the Philippines and Shanghai.  These drawings are a small sampling of his work.

Art's drawing of a view from
the minesweeper.



Art's drawing of a juggling entertainer.



Art's drawing of a boy
begging in Shanghai.

At the wheel, a drawing
by Art Price.

(On Thursday, June’s first year at Traphagen…)

Countdown:  Correspondence resumes in 14 days.

© 2010 Lee Price

Service

Art Price, circa 1946.

Filling in with some background information during a letter-writing hiatus from October 6 to November 9, 1949, as June recuperates at the hospital from a ruptured appendix…

High school classes were very fluid during World War II, with the boys frequently disappearing before graduation as they either enlisted or were drafted.  While still in high school, Art attempted to enlist in the Air Force but was rejected because he had had rheumatic fever in his youth.  Following this, he waited to be drafted, graduating on schedule in 1944.

Shortly following graduation, Art was drafted into the Navy.  Performing well on the tests, he was placed into special training to be a quartermaster, the petty officer in charge of day-to-day navigation tasks.  The war ended the week he shipped out, but his appointed work on a minesweeper is just as important (and dangerous) in the time immediately following a war as during.  Unexploded mines pay no heed to treaties.  During his two years of service, Art worked as a quartermaster third class on several small minesweepers in the Pacific Ocean.

From his early teenage years, Art had diligently worked on his art skills, frequently making detailed copies of drawings and photographs in Time magazine.  He took his sketchpad along with him while serving in the Pacific.  At the age of 19, he found himself stationed in Shanghai and the Philippines, drawing the exotic sights and poverty that he saw around him, so different from anything he had ever seen in the Hamptons.

YMS6, one of the Yard Minesweepers
that Art served on.



Art's sketch of the
minesweeper YMS6.













(Tomorrow, a gallery of drawings from Art’s service in the Navy…)

Countdown:  Correspondence resumes in 15 days.

© 2010 Lee Price

The Pembroke Year

June's mother, her brother Teddy, June,
and her father celebrating her
high school graduation.

Filling in with some background information during a letter-writing hiatus from October 6 to November 9, 1949, as June recuperates at the hospital from a ruptured appendix…

June did well in high school, receiving particular praise for her artistic ability.  She graduated in 1947 and was accepted at Pembroke College, the women’s college associated with Brown University (where her father had attended), a prestigious Ivy League college located in Rhode Island.

June attended Pembroke for one year.  Somewhere around this time, she was briefly engaged.  At the end of her year at Pembroke, she applied to – and was accepted at – the Traphagen School of Fashion in New York City.  She had decided to become a fashion illustrator.

Postcard of Brown University, circa 1947.

(On Monday, Art joins the Navy…)

Countdown:  Correspondence resumes in 16 days.

© 2010 Lee Price

Life During Wartime

June’s father owned a 1938 Ford, but he didn’t take it out often during World War II.  Gas was rationed during the war years so driving was reserved for

The Anderson family's 1938 Ford.

emergencies.  It was an easy walk to his phone company job in town and a pleasant evening stroll to the movie theater or to Tepper Brothers for ice cream and the evening paper.

Food was rationed, too, but June’s father knew plenty about growing his own produce from his youth on the family farm in Connecticut.  He planted his

Victory Garden on the back right corner of their property and it provided plenty of fresh vegetables for the family.

The shades of their house were black on the inside to prevent their house from being visible from above at night.  If the Germans launched a blitz against America, as they had against England, they would not see June’s house.

Soon after the war ended, June's family moved to "the big house."  Located just a block and a half down Lincoln Avenue, their handsome new house was a large rambling affair dating back to the 1850s.  A short concrete wall, perfect for balancing upon, ran along the sidewalks of Griffing and Lincoln Avenues.  Behind the house were two massive pine trees ideal for June's tree climbing adventures (not as common now as June was maturing into a proper teenager).

The Anderson family's new "big house" at the corner of
Lincoln and Griffing Avenues.

(Tomorrow, the Pembroke year…)

Countdown:  Correspondence resumes in 17 days.

© 2010 Lee Price

Art Does "Time"

Filling in with some background information during a letter-writing hiatus from October 6 to November 9, 1949, as June recuperates at the hospital from a ruptured appendix…

A budding artist, Art worked on the craft of drawing by making pencil sketches of Time Magazine photographs and artwork.  He drew many of the leading figures of the time.  These drawings are a small sampling of his work.



General George S. Patton, drawing by
Art Price.



Dwight D. Eisenhower, drawing by Art Price.

Prime Minister General Hideki Tojo, drawing by Art Price.

Winston Churchill, drawing by Art Price.

(On Friday, life during wartime…)

Countdown:  Correspondence resumes in 19 days.

© 2010 Lee Price

Two Childhoods

Filling in with some background information during a letter-writing hiatus from October 6 to November 9, 1949, as June recuperates at the hospital from a ruptured appendix…

June lived in Patchogue then Riverhead;  Art grew up in Southampton.  They were 15 miles apart and completely unaware of each other – and would remain so until that much-later night in 1949 when “Some Enchanted Evening” played, bringing them together for the first time.

June and Art grew up in the depression.  They survived the Great Hurricane of 1938 which swept directly across the East End of Long Island, causing great devastation and claiming 70 lives.  June’s father always remembered braving the hurricane to bring June home from the grade school.  Over in Southampton, Art’s father saw slates blowing off the roof of the grade school so ran inside to tell the teachers to keep the children inside.  As he left, one of the teachers loaned him a hard hat to wear just to be safe.



Unfinished Art Price sketch,
in the style of Prince Valiant.

The first movie Art remembered seeing was King Kong at the Southampton Movie Theater in 1933.  He liked the matinees and the Tarzan movies most.  Other pleasures included the Sunday comics and the Prince Valiant series of Hal Foster, whose style he would sometimes imitate in his drawings.

There was a big tree behind the house in Riverhead.  June loved climbing it and would pretend she was a jungle princess.  As she moved from childhood to pre-teen, she developed a serious crush on movie actor Alan Ladd when This Gun for Hire came out.  June was 13 and Ladd’s sensitive tough guy look (wavy hair, quiet, gentle with kittens) appealed to her.  She wasn't alone.  All the girls thought he was dreamy.

June (third from left) with friends in front of
Riverhead High School.

(On Thursday, a gallery of faces…)

Countdown:  Correspondence resumes in 20 days.

© 2010 Lee Price

Small Town Southampton

Filling in with some background information during a letter-writing hiatus from October 6 to November 9, 1949, as June recuperates at the hospital from a ruptured appendix…

Oil painting by Art of a scene in Noyack.

Although the Hamptons were already popular as a resort area in the 1930s when Art was growing up, this aspect of the community was fairly easy to ignore for many of the locals.  In most other respects, Southampton was simply another small town in America.  Rich people would come in the summer but their lives rarely intersected with those of the old-time locals.  They lived in different worlds.

Art's grade school class.



Art's drawing of his
grade school class.










In 1931, when Art was four years old, the family decided to rent out their house on Cooper Street for the summer so they could retreat to the old family grounds in Noyack, a less developed area of Southampton located along the Peconic Bay inlet on the northern shore of Long Island’s south fork.  Conditions were primitive in Noyack.  Their cottage was next to a small pond fed by a larger creek that led to Noyac Bay.  It was a world of frogs and clams.  There was a small chapel built for the little community by Mrs. Russell Sage, a wealthy relative who lived nearby in Sag Harbor.  The chapel held services on Sunday afternoon, led by the Presbyterian minister from Sag Harbor.  Art’s mother taught Sunday School, and his father played the organ, which had to be constantly pumped by the foot pedals.

For Art, summer was playtime in Noyack.  The rest of the year was dominated by the public school schedule. Art started at the school on Windmill Lane then moved to the newly built grade school on Pine Street.

Although the family’s roots were Presbyterian and Episcopal, a lively young minister attracted Art’s parents to the Southampton United Methodist Church in 1938, where they quickly became dedicated and very active members.

(On Thursday, June goes to college…)

Countdown:  Correspondence resumes in 21 days.

© 2010 Lee Price