6.3.2026 – how did this painting

how did this painting
end up on the art market?
Elliott sold it …

Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque by Winston Churchill

I was intrigued to read this morning, the article, Was Churchill a Serious Artist? This Exhibition Says, ‘Yes.’, slugged, ‘In the first major British retrospective for over 60 years, a London museum seeks to recast the wartime leader as a painter with emotional depth.’ by Leo Sands in the New York Times for several reasons.

The first thing that struck me was that an article that discussed whether Mr. Churchill was serious painter did not include the famous exchange between Mr. Churchill and his body guard, Sergeant Edmund Murray, who also painted.

Mr. Churchill reviewed Sergeant Murray’s work and according to Sergeant Murray, “He looked at the first. ‘Very good.’ He looked at the second. ‘Very, very good.’ He looked at the third. ‘Excellent. You know, they are much better ‘than mine’ — then he sort of giggled with his eyes squeezed up and shining impishly ‘but yours are judged on their merit …'” (from Churchill’s Bodyguard by Edmund Murrary,(W.H. Allen: London, 1987).

How Mr. Sands could ignore this is beyond me but then I am not writing for the New York Times.

The second item that intrigued me was the the auction of the above piece, Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque, sold at auction for a record $11.5 million dollars.

The painting is famous as it reported to be only painting painted by Churchill during World War 2.

Mr. Churchill painted it after a the summit meetings with Franklin Roosevelt in Casablanca and he convinced FDR, that he had to come with Churchill to Marrakesh to see the sun set over the Atlas Mountains from a specific tower in a specific villa.

FDR went along and even allowed himself to be hand carried by two Secret Service agents to the top of the tower where he sat in a wicker chair while he and Churchill watched the sunset.

After FDR left, Churchill called for his paints and painted this painting that he later presented to FDR.

And that is where I got intrigued.

The NYT article stated, that when the painting was sold in 2021, the seller was Angelina Jolie, who had received the painting as a gift from Brad Pitt.

Huh, wah?

How did Brad Pitt find the Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque by Winston Churchill?

Luckily there is Wikipedia and it says: The painting was inherited by Roosevelt’s son Elliot who sold it to George W. Woodward of Nebraska in 1950. It was purchased by Norman G. Hickman of New York in 1964. Hickman was a financier, collector and film producer, who had worked on The Finest Hours, a documentary on Churchill’s life. During Hickman’s ownership, the painting was exhibited at the National Churchill Museum at Fulton, Missouri. It remained in his family’s ownership until it was placed with M.S. Rau Antiques of New Orleans in 2011. It was then bought by the actress Angelina Jolie.

Ahhhhhhhhhhh

Elliot sold it.

FDR and Eleanor had 5 children.

The accounted for 19 marriages.

And were often in need of funds.

So was Eleanor, as FDR had spent most of his inheritance on Warm Springs as a polio center.

A friend of the family suggested to Eleanor that maybe she could sell off FDR’s famous stamp collection.

She had hoped for a single buyer but it turned out that so many folks wanted something of FDR’s that piece was stamped THE FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT COLLECTION and sold bit by bit and rescued Eleanor.

I know this because I have something from the collection that my wife got me for a birthday years ago.

I am reminded of another FDR and his boys story.

FDR had a copy made of the famous George Washington Desk that is used by the Mayor of New York that is supposed to have been the desk George Washington used as President when the Capitol was in New York.

This was the desk that is in FDR’s office in the FDR Library at Hyde Park.

During the Clinton Administration someone had the great idea that Bill should deliver a speech from the Roosevelt Library and so it was set up.

When the time came, Bill walked into the office and sat at the desk with a mug of coffee and he caught one of the museum curators glaring at him.

He looked at her and looked at his coffee and looked at desk.

He mimed to her that he understood and had it under control, sat at the desk and set the coffee on a rug on the floor.

According to legend the curator fainted.

See the desk WAS a copy of FDR’s copy of Washington’s desk as his son, James, wanted his Dad’s desk and made the swap.

It was the rug that was original and originally the rug was a handmade Persian rug that had been gifted to FDR by the King of Saudi Arabia and reportedly worth 100s of thousands of dollars.

Anyway, how did Brad Pitt get Churchill’s painting?

Well, Elliot sold it.

6.2.2026 – afforded the most

afforded the most
spacious ample life that has
ever been witnessed

Adapted from the passage in the essay, “Roosevelt from Afar” in the book, Great Contemporaries by Winston Churchill, (Thornton Butterworth Ltd.: London, 1937) where Mr. Churchill writes.

It is a very open question, which any household may argue to the small hours, whether it is better to have equality at the price of poverty, or well-being at the price of inequality.

Life will be pretty rough, anyhow.

Whether we are ruled by tyrannical bureaucrats or self-seeking capitalists, the ordinary man who has to earn his living, and tries to make provision for old age and for his dear ones when his powers are exhausted, will have a hard pilgrimage through this dusty world.

The United States was built upon property, liberty and enterprise, and certainly it has afforded the most spacious and ample life to the scores of millions that has ever yet been witnessed.

This was in 1937.

Pretty much the world was still the grip of a global depression with Nazi Germany picking up speed.

And Mr. Churchill wrote of the United States of America that it:

was built upon property,

liberty

and enterprise,

and certainly it has afforded the most spacious and ample life to the scores of millions that has ever yet been witnessed.

Mr. Churchill writes, Life will be pretty rough, anyhow.

Mr. Churchill writes, the ordinary man who has to earn his living, and tries to make provision for old age and for his dear ones when his powers are exhausted, will have a hard pilgrimage through this dusty world.

And still Mr. Churchill writes, built upon property, liberty and enterprise, and certainly it has afforded the most spacious and ample life to the scores of millions that has ever yet been witnessed.

How did we do this?

Mr. Jefferson said, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

All are created equal.

Accepting that and somehow, it afforded the most spacious and ample life to the scores of millions that has ever yet been witnessed.

Making America Great … again?

Always thought it kinda was.

from *The Golden Rule* by Norman Rockwell

4.15.2026 – no more for him life’s

no more for him life’s
stormy conflicts charging like
clouds across the sky

HUSH’D be the camps to-day;
And, soldiers, let us drape our war-worn weapons;
And each, with musing soul retire, to celebrate,
Our dear commander’s death.

No more for him life’s stormy conflicts;
Nor victory, nor defeat—No more time’s dark events,
Charging like ceaseless clouds across the sky.

But sing, poet, in our name;
Sing of the love we bore him—because you, dweller in
camps, know it truly.

Sing, to the lower’d coffin there;
Sing, with the shovel’d clods that fill the grave—a
verse,
For the heavy hearts of soldiers.

Hush’d Be the Camps To-Day by Walt Whitman as published in The Patriotic Poems of Walt Whitman (Garden City: Doubleday, 1918),

Wikipedia says: “Hush’d Be the Camps To-Day” is a poem by Walt Whitman dedicated to Abraham Lincoln. The poem was written on April 19, 1865, shortly after Lincoln’s assassination.

Whitman greatly admired Lincoln and went on to write additional poetry about him: “O Captain! My Captain!”, “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d”, and “This Dust Was Once the Man.”

“Hush’d” is not particularly well known, and is generally considered to have been hastily written.

Some critics highlight the poem as Whitman’s first attempt to respond to Lincoln’s death and emphasize that it would have drawn comparatively little attention if Whitman had not written his other poems on Lincoln.

Although they never met, Whitman saw Abraham Lincoln several times between 1861 and 1865, sometimes in close quarters.

The first time was when Lincoln stopped in New York City in 1861 on his way to Washington. Whitman noticed the President-elect’s “striking appearance” and “unpretentious dignity”, and trusted Lincoln’s “supernatural tact” and “idiomatic Western genius”.

He admired the President, writing in October 1863, “I love the President personally.”

Whitman considered himself and Lincoln to be “afloat in the same stream” and “rooted in the same ground”.

Whitman and Lincoln shared similar views on slavery and the Union, and similarities have been noted in their literary styles and inspirations.

Whitman later declared that “Lincoln gets almost nearer me than anybody else.”

As for the New York Times article, I am always re-amazed at the amount of correct detail the reporting had when you consider this was 1865 and the paper went to press within 24 hours of the assassaitnation.

Maybe more than his Birthday being a holiday, April 15th should be a national Day of Mourning when you look at how much this Country gained when he was born and how much this Country lost when he was killed.

Then of course, my relationship to the history has changed so much in the last decade as I review all the actions and the struggles of the past, I find it difficult to reconcile that all that history led to where we are today.

What a mockery on so many levels.

What Mr. Lincoln said on the field at Gettysburg has just as much application TODAY as it did in 1863.

It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.

It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us —

that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion —

that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain —

that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom —

and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

4.9.2026 – officer and man

officer and man
allowed return to their homes
not to be disturbed

APPOMATTOX C. H., VA.,

Ap 9th, 1865.

GEN. R. E. LEE,
Comd’g C. S. A.

GEN: In accordance with the substance of my letter to you of the 8th inst., I propose to receive the surrender of the Army of N. Va. on the following terms, to wit: Rolls of all the officers and men to be made in duplicate.

One copy to be given to an officer designated by me, the other to be retained by such officer or officers as you may designate.

The officers to give their individual paroles not to take up arms against the Government of the United States until properly exchanged, and each company or regimental commander sign a like parole for the men of their commands.

The arms, artillery and public property to be parked and stacked, and turned over to the officer appointed by me to receive them.

This will not embrace the side-arms of the officers, nor their private horses or baggage.

This done, each officer and man will be allowed to return to their homes, not to be disturbed by United States authority so long as they observe their paroles and the laws in force where they may reside.

Very respectfully,

U. S. GRANT,
Lt. Gen.

So goes the letter from General US Grant (USA) to General RE LEE (CSA) offering terms of surrender for the Army of Northern Virginia on April 9, 1865, 161 years ago today.

About that moment, Bruce Catton wrote:

It was Palm Sunday, and Lee rode to the house of a man named McLean to have a talk with Grant. He wore his best uniform and he had a sword buckled at his side, and there should have been lancers and pennons and trumpets going on before, for he was the last American knight and he had a grandeur about him, and when he rode out of the war something that will never come back rode out of American life with him.

Grant looked at the beaten army and he saw his own fellow Americans, who had made their fight and lost and now wanted to go back and rebuild. But the war had aroused much hatred and bitterness, especially among those who had done no fighting, and Grant knew very well that powerful men in Washington were talking angrily of treason and of traitors, and wanting to draw up proscription lists, so that leading Confederates could be jailed or hanged.

The sentence Grant had written would make that impossible. They could proceed against Robert E. Lee, for instance, only by violating the pledged word of U. S. Grant, who had both the will and the power to see his word kept inviolate. If they could not hang Lee they could hardly hang anybody. There would be no hangings. Grant had ruled them out.

— It did not strike the eye quite as quickly, but U. S. Grant had a certain grandeur about him, too.

Remember when all of us could live in this Country not to be disturbed by United States authority.

Who knew what it would take to make America great.

3.4.2026 – trivial effort

trivial effort
man can lie, does he believe
oh, probably not

If we would learn what the human race really is, at bottom, we need only observe it in election times.

A Hartford clergyman met me in the street, and spoke of a new nominee – denounced the nomination, in strong, earnest words – words that were refreshing for their independence, their manliness.

He said, “I ought to be proud, perhaps, for this nominee is a relative of mine; on the contrary I am humiliated and disgusted; for I know him intimately – familiarly – and I know that he is an unscrupulous scoundrel, and always has been.”

You should have seen this clergyman preside at a political meeting forty days later; and urge, and plead, and gush – and you should have heard him paint the character of this same nominee.

You would have supposed he was describing the Cid, and Great-heart, and Sir Galahad, and Bayard the Spotless all rolled into one.

Was he sincere?

Yes – by that time; and therein lies the pathos of it all, the hopelessness of it all.

It shows at what trivial cost of effort a man can teach himself a lie, and learn to believe it, when he perceives, by the general drift, that that is the popular thing to do.

Does he believe his lie yet?

Oh, probably not;

From The Character of Man in The Autobiography of Mark Twain by Mark Twain (Berkeley : University of California Press, 2010).