President Franklin Pierce--Second Worst U.S. President Ever?

 

Franklin Pierce (November 23, 1804 – October 8, 1869) was an American politician who served as the 14th president of the United States from 1853 to 1857. A northern Democrat who believed that the abolitionist movement was a fundamental threat to the nation's unity, he alienated anti-slavery groups by signing the Kansas–Nebraska Act and enforcing the Fugitive Slave Act. Conflict between North and South continued after Pierce's presidency, and, after Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860, the Southern states seceded, resulting in the American Civil War.

Pierce was born in New Hampshire, the son of state governor Benjamin Pierce. He served in the House of Representatives from 1833 until his election to the Senate, where he served from 1837 until his resignation in 1842. His private law practice was a success, and he was appointed New Hampshire's U.S. Attorney in 1845. Pierce took part in the Mexican–American War as a brigadier general in the United States Army. Democrats saw him as a compromise candidate uniting Northern and Southern interests, and nominated him for president on the 49th ballot at the 1852 Democratic National Convention. He and running mate William R. King easily defeated the Whig Party ticket of Winfield Scott and William A. Graham in the 1852 presidential election.

As president, Pierce attempted to enforce neutral standards for civil service while also satisfying the Democratic Party's diverse elements with patronage, an effort that largely failed and turned many in his party against him. He was a Young America expansionist who signed the Gadsden Purchase of land from Mexico and led a failed attempt to acquire Cuba from Spain. He signed trade treaties with Britain and Japan and his Cabinet reformed its departments and improved accountability, but political strife during his presidency overshadowed these successes. His popularity declined sharply in the Northern states after he supported the Kansas–Nebraska Act, which nullified the Missouri Compromise, while many Southern whites continued to support him. The act's passage led to violent conflict over the expansion of slavery in the American West. Pierce's administration was further damaged when several of his diplomats issued the Ostend Manifesto calling for the annexation of Cuba, a document that was roundly criticized. He fully expected the Democrats to renominate him in the 1856 presidential election, but they abandoned him and his bid failed. His reputation in the North suffered further during the American Civil War as he became a vocal critic of President Lincoln.

Pierce was popular and outgoing, but his family life was difficult; his three children died young and his wife, Jane Pierce, suffered from illness and depression for much of her life. Their last surviving son was killed in a train accident while the family was traveling, shortly before Pierce's inauguration. A heavy drinker for much of his life, Pierce died in 1869 of cirrhosis.  Wikipedia

 

Colleen Dewhurst--Celebrated Actress & One Time President of Actors' Equity

 Colleen Rose Dewhurst (June 3, 1924 – August 22, 1991) was a Canadian-American actress mostly known for theatre roles. She was a renowned interpreter of the works of Eugene O'Neill on the stage, and her career also encompassed film, early dramas on live television, and performances in Joseph Papp's New York Shakespeare Festival. One of her last roles was playing Marilla Cuthbert in the Kevin Sullivan television adaptations of the Anne of Green Gables series and her reprisal of the role in the subsequent TV series Road to Avonlea. In the United States, Dewhurst won two Tony Awards and four Emmy Awards for her stage and television work. In addition to other Canadian honors over the years, Dewhurst won two Gemini Awards (the former Canadian equivalent of an Emmy Award) for her portrayal of Marilla Cuthbert; once in 1986 and again in 1988. It is arguably her best known role because of the Kevin Sullivan produced series’ continuing popularity and also the initial co-production by the CBC; allowing for rebroadcasts over the years on it, and also on PBS in the United States. The initial broadcast alone was seen by millions of viewers.

Dewhurst was born June 3, 1924, in Montreal, Quebec, the only child of Frances Marie (nee Woods) and Ferdinand Augustus "Fred" Dewhurst. Fred Dewhurst was the owner of a chain of confectionery stores and had been a celebrated athlete in Canada, where he had played football with the Ottawa Rough Riders. The family became naturalized as U.S. citizens before 1940. Colleen Dewhurst's mother was a Christian Scientist, a faith Colleen also embraced. The Dewhursts moved to Massachusetts in 1928 or 1929, staying in the Boston area neighborhoods of Dorchester, Auburndale, and West Newton. Later they moved to New York City and then to Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin. Dewhurst attended Whitefish Bay High School for her first two years of high school, moved to Shorewood High School for her junior year, and graduated from Riverside High School in Milwaukee in 1942. About this time her parents separated. Dewhurst attended Milwaukee-Downer College for two years, then moved to New York City to pursue an acting career.

One of her more significant stage roles was in the 1974 Broadway revival of O'Neill's A Moon for the Misbegotten as Josie Hogan, for which she won a Tony Award. She previously won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in 1961 for All the Way Home. She later played Katharina in a 1956 production of Taming of the Shrew for Joseph Papp. She (as recounted in her posthumous obituary in collaboration with Tom Viola) wrote:

With Brooks Atkinson's blessing, our world changed overnight. Suddenly in our audience of neighbors in T-shirts and jeans appeared men in white shirts, jackets and ties and ladies in summer dresses. We were in a hit that would have a positive effect on my career, as well as Joe's, but I missed the shouting.

She played Shakespeare's Cleopatra and Lady Macbeth for Papp and years later, Gertrude in a production of Hamlet at the Delacorte Theatre in Central Park.

She appeared in the Alfred Hitchcock Presents episode Night Fever in 1965 and with Ingrid Bergman in More Stately Mansions on Broadway in 1967. José Quintero directed her in O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night and Mourning Becomes Electra. She appeared in Edward Albee's adaptation of Carson McCullers' Ballad of the Sad Cafe and as Martha in a Broadway revival of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, with Ben Gazzara which Albee directed.

She appeared in 1962 as Joanne Novak in the episode "I Don't Belong in a White-Painted House" in the medical drama The Eleventh Hour, starring Wendell Corey and Jack Ging. Dewhurst appeared opposite her then husband, Scott, in a 1971 television adaptation of Arthur Miller's The Price, on Hallmark Hall of Fame, and an anthology series. There is another television recording of them together when she played Elizabeth Proctor to the unfaithful John in Miller's The Crucible (with Tuesday Weld). In 1977, Woody Allen cast her in his film Annie Hall as Annie's mother.

In her autobiography, Dewhurst wrote: "I had moved so quickly from one Off-Broadway production to the next that I was known, at one point, as the 'Queen of Off-Broadway'. This title was not due to my brilliance, but, rather, because most of the plays I was in closed after a run of anywhere from one night to two weeks. I would then move immediately into another."

In 1972 she played a madam, Mrs. Kate Collingwood, in The Cowboys (1972), which starred John Wayne. Dewhurst also appeared with Wayne in the 1974 film McQ. She was the first actress to share a love scene with Wayne in bed. In 1985, she played the role of Marilla Cuthbert in Kevin Sullivan's adaptation of Lucy Maud Montgomery's novel Anne of Green Gables and reprised the role in 1987's Anne of Avonlea (also known as Anne of Green Gables: The Sequel) and in several episodes of Kevin Sullivan's Road to Avonlea.

Dewhurst was on hiatus from Road to Avonlea when she died in 1991. Sullivan Productions was unaware she was terminally ill, so her portrayal of Marilla ended posthumously. This was accomplished by shooting new scenes with actress Patricia Hamilton acting as a body double for Dewhurst and by recycling parts of scenes from Anne of Green Gables, Road to Avonlea, and using Dewhurst's death scene as Hepzibah in Sullivan's production of Lantern Hill. The latter was a 1990 television film based on L.M. Montgomery's Jane of Lantern Hill.

During 1989 and 1990, she appeared in a supporting role on the television series Murphy Brown playing Avery Brown, the feisty mother of Candice Bergen's title character; this role earned her two Emmy Awards, the second being awarded posthumously. Dewhurst won a total of two Tony Awards and four Emmy Awards for her stage and television work. Season 4, Episode 6 entitled "Full Circle" was the Murphy Brown episode filmed shortly after her death and dedicated to her memory.

In a review of Dewhurst's final film role as Ruth in Bed and Breakfast (1991), Emanuel Levy wrote “Bed and Breakfast is the kind of small, intimate picture that actors revere. The stunningly sensual Dewhurst, in one of her last screen roles, dominates every scene she is in, making the lusty and down-to-earth Ruth at once credible and enchanting.“

Dewhurst was president of the Actors' Equity Association from 1985 until her death. She was the first national president to die in the office. 

Colleen Dewhurst was married to James Vickery from 1947 to 1960. She married and divorced George C. Scott twice. They had two sons, Alexander Scott and actor Campbell Scott; she co-starred with Campbell in Dying Young (1991), one of her later film roles as she died in August 1991.

During the last years of her life she lived on a farm in South Salem, New York, with her partner Ken Marsolais. They also had a summer home on Prince Edward Island, Canada.

Maureen Stapleton wrote about Dewhurst:

Colleen looked like a warrior, so people assumed she was the earth mother. But in real life Colleen was not to be let out without a keeper. She couldn't stop herself from taking care of people, which she then did with more care than she took care of herself. Her generosity of spirit was overwhelming and her smile so dazzling that you couldn't pull the ... reins in on her even if you desperately wanted to and knew damn well that somebody should.

Dewhurst's Christian Science beliefs led to her refusal to accept any kind of surgical treatment. She died of cervical cancer at the age 67 at her South Salem home in 1991. She was cremated and her ashes were given to family and friends; no public service was planned.

Over the course of her 45-year career, Dewhurst won the 1974 Sarah Siddons Award for her work in Chicago theatre, two Tony Awards, two Obie Awards, and two Gemini Awards. In 1989, she won the Genie Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role for her role in Hitting Home. Of her 13 Emmy Award nominations, she won four. She was inducted into the American Theatre Hall of Fame in 1981.

• 1961: Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play - All the Way Home
• 1974: Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play - A Moon for the Misbegotten
• 1986: Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress – Miniseries or a Movie - Between Two Women
• 1989: Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series - Murphy Brown: "Mama Said"
• 1989: Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie - Those She Left Behind
• 1991: Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series - Murphy Brown: "Bob and Murphy and Ted and Avery"
  

 Wikipedia

 

 

 

 

 

Raymond Massey

 

Raymond Hart Massey (August 30, 1896 – July 29, 1983) was a Canadian actor, known for his commanding, stage-trained voice. For his lead role in Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1940), Massey was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor. He reprised his role as Lincoln on television and in How the West Was Won (1962). Among his other well-known roles were Dr. Gillespie in the NBC television series Dr. Kildare (1961–1966), John Brown in Santa Fe Trail (1940) and Seven Angry Men (1955), Abraham Farlan in A Matter of Life and Death (1946), and Jonathan Brewster in Arsenic and Old Lace (1944).

Massey was born in Toronto, Ontario, the son of Anna Vincent, who was American-born, and her husband Chester Daniel Massey, the wealthy co-owner of the Massey-Harris tractor company. He was the grandson of businessman Hart Massey and great-grandson of company founder Daniel Massey. His branch of the Massey family immigrated to Canada from New England a few years before the War of 1812, their ancestors having migrated from England to the Massachusetts colony in the 1630s.

He attended secondary school at Upper Canada College in Toronto for two years before transferring to Appleby College in Oakville, Ontario. He also took several courses at the University of Toronto, where he was an active member of the Kappa Alpha Society.

Massey joined the Canadian Army at the outbreak of World War I, and served on the Western Front in the Royal Regiment of Canadian Artillery. Lieutenant Massey returned to Canada after being wounded at Zillebeke in Belgium during the Battle of Mont Sorrel in 1916 and was engaged as an army instructor for American officers at Yale University. In 1918, he was recalled to active service and joined the Canadian Siberian Expeditionary Force that went to Siberia during the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War. On the orders of his commanding general, he organized a minstrel show troupe with himself as end man in blackface to bolster morale of allied troops on occupation duty in Vladivostok.

In 1942, during World War II, Massey rejoined the Canadian Army and served as a major in the adjutant general's branch. After being wounded, he was invalided from the Canadian Army in 1943. He became an American citizen in 1944.

He first appeared on the London stage in 1922 in Eugene O'Neill's In the Zone.^[4][5] According to his obituary in The New York Times, he appeared in "several dozen plays and directed numerous others" in England over the next decade. The Washington Post credited him with performances in over 80 plays, including Pygmalion with Gertrude Lawrence; Ethan Frome with Ruth Gordon; and the George Bernard Shaw works The Doctor's Dilemma and Candida with Katharine Cornell. In 1929, he directed the London premiere of The Silver Tassie. He received poor reviews in his debut on Broadway in an unorthodox 1931 production of Hamlet.

The first movie he was in was High Treason (1928). In 1931, he played Sherlock Holmes in The Speckled Band, the first sound film version of the story. In 1934, he played the villain in The Scarlet Pimpernel, and in 1936, he starred in Things to Come, a film adaptation by H.G. Wells of his own speculative novel The Shape of Things to Come (1933). In 1944, Massey played the district attorney in Fritz Lang's classic film noir The Woman in the Window, which starred Edward G. Robinson and Joan Bennett. He portrayed the American Revolutionary War character Abraham Farlan, who hated the British for making him a casualty of that war, in the 1946 film A Matter of Life and Death (titled Stairway to Heaven in the U.S.).

Despite being Canadian, Massey became famous for playing archetypal American historical figures. He played abolitionist/insurrectionist John Brown in two films: Santa Fe Trail (1940) and again in the low-budget Seven Angry Men (1955). The character of Brown is a wild-eyed lunatic in Santa Fe Trail, whereas he is a well-intentioned but misguided character in the more sympathetic Seven Angry Men. Massey scored a great triumph on Broadway in Robert E. Sherwood's Pulitzer Prize-winning play Abe Lincoln in Illinois despite reservations about Lincoln's being portrayed by a Canadian. He repeated his role in the 1940 film version, for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor. Massey again portrayed Lincoln in The Day Lincoln Was Shot on Ford Star Jubilee (1956), a silent appearance in How the West Was Won (1962), and two TV adaptations of Abe Lincoln in Illinois broadcast in 1950 and 1951. He once complained jokingly that he was "the only actor ever typecast as a president." His preparation for the role was so detailed and obsessive that one person commented that Massey would not be satisfied with his Lincoln impersonation until someone assassinated him. On stage in a dramatic reading of Stephen Vincent Benét's John Brown's Body (1953), Massey, in addition to narrating along with Tyrone Power and Judith Anderson, took on the roles of both John Brown and Lincoln.

Massey played a Canadian on-screen only once, in 49th Parallel (1941).

During World War II, he teamed up with Katharine Cornell and other leading actors in a revival of Shaw's Candida to benefit the Army Emergency Fund and the Navy Relief Society.

Massey portrayed Jonathan Brewster in the film version of Arsenic and Old Lace. The character had been created by Boris Karloff for the stage version, and a running gag in the play and the film was the character's resemblance to Karloff. Even though the film was released in 1944, it was shot in 1941, at which time Karloff still was contracted to the Broadway play and could not be released for the filming (unlike his costars Josephine Hull, Jean Adair and John Alexander). Massey and Karloff had appeared together earlier in James Whale's suspense film The Old Dark House (1932).

After Massey became an American citizen, he continued to work in Hollywood. Memorable film roles included the husband of Joan Crawford during her Oscar-nominated role in Possessed (1947) and the doomed publishing tycoon Gail Wynand in The Fountainhead (1949), with Patricia Neal and Gary Cooper. In 1955, he starred in East of Eden as Adam Trask, father of Cal, played by James Dean, and Aron, played by Richard Davalos.

Massey became well known on television in the 1950s and 1960s. He was cast in 1960 as Sir Oliver Garnett in the episode "Trunk Full of Dreams" of the NBC series Riverboat.

Massey is remembered as Dr. Gillespie in the popular 1961–1966 NBC series Dr. Kildare, with Richard Chamberlain in the title role. Massey and his son Daniel were cast as father and son in The Queen's Guards (1961).

 

Massey was married three times.

• Margery Fremantle from 1921 to 1929 (divorce); they had one child, architect Geoffrey Massey.
• Adrianne Allen from 1929 to 1939 (divorce); Allen was a stage actress in London and on Broadway. They had two children who followed them into acting: Anna Massey and Daniel Massey.
• Dorothy Whitney from 1939 until her death in 1982.

His high-profile estrangement and divorce from Adrianne Allen was the inspiration for Ruth Gordon's and Garson Kanin's script for the film Adam's Rib (1949), starring Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy, and indeed Massey married the lawyer who represented him in court, Dorothy Whitney, while his then former wife, Allen, married the opposing lawyer, William Dwight Whitney.

Massey's older brother, Vincent Massey, was the first Canadian-born governor general of Canada. Massey also dabbled in politics, appearing in a 1964 television advertisement in support of the conservative Republican presidential nominee Barry Goldwater. Massey denounced U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson for a "no-win" strategy in the Vietnam War, suggesting that Goldwater would pursue an aggressive strategy and win the war quickly.

Massey died of pneumonia in Los Angeles, California on July 29, 1983, a month before he would have turned 87. His death came on the same day as that of David Niven, with whom he had co-starred in The Prisoner of Zenda and A Matter of Life and Death. Massey is buried in New Haven, Connecticut's Beaverdale Memorial Park.

Massey has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for films at 1719 Vine Street and one for television at 6708 Hollywood Boulevard. His achievements have also been recognized in a signature cocktail, the Raymond Massey.    Wikipedia

 

Jackie Kennedy

 

Jacqueline "Jackie" Lee Kennedy Onassis (née Bouvier /ˈbuːvieɪ/; July 28, 1929 – May 19, 1994) was an American writer, book editor, and socialite who served as the first lady of the United States from 1961 to 1963, as the wife of President John F. Kennedy. A popular first lady, she endeared the American public with her devotion to her family, dedication to the historic preservation of the White House, the campaigns she led to preserve and restore historic landmarks and architecture along with her interest in American history, culture and arts. During her lifetime, she was regarded as an international icon for her unique fashion choices, and her work as a cultural ambassador of the United States made her very popular globally.

After studying history and art at Vassar College and graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in French literature from George Washington University in 1951, Bouvier started working for the Washington Times-Herald as an inquiring photographer. The following year, she met then-Congressman John Kennedy at a dinner party in Washington. He was elected to the Senate that same year, and the couple married on September 12, 1953, in Newport, Rhode Island. They had four children, two of whom died in infancy. Following her husband's election to the presidency in 1960, Kennedy was known for her highly publicized restoration of the White House and emphasis on arts and culture as well as for her style. She also traveled to many countries where her fluency in foreign languages and history made her very popular.^[3][4] At age 31, she was named Time magazine's Woman of the Year in 1962.

After her husband's assassination and funeral in 1963, Kennedy and her children largely withdrew from public view. In 1968, she married Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis, which caused controversy. Following Onassis's death in 1975, she had a career as a book editor in New York City, first at Viking Press and then at Doubleday, and worked to restore her public image. Even after her death, she ranks as one of the most popular and recognizable first ladies in American history, and in 1999, she was listed as one of Gallup's Most-Admired Men and Women of the 20th century. She died in 1994 and was buried at Arlington National Cemetery alongside President Kennedy and two of their children, one stillborn and one who died shortly after birth. Surveys of historians conducted periodically by the Siena College Research Institute since 1982 have consistently found Kennedy Onassis to rank among the most highly regarded first ladies by the assessments of historians. Wikipedia for which see more

 

Bob Ross--Joy of Painting--"Mister Rogers with a Palette"

 

 

Robert Norman Ross (October 29, 1942 – July 4, 1995) was an American painter and art instructor who created and hosted the The Joy of Painting, an instructional television program that aired from 1983 to 1994 on PBS in the United States, CBC in Canada, and similar channels in Latin America, Europe and elsewhere. Ross would subsequently become widely known through his posthumous internet presence.

Ross was born in Daytona Beach, Florida, to Jack and Ollie Ross, a carpenter and a waitress respectively, and raised in Orlando, Florida. As an adolescent, Ross cared for injured animals, including armadillos, snakes, alligators and squirrels, one of which was later featured in several episodes of his television show. He had a half-brother Jim, whom he mentioned in passing on his show. Ross dropped out of high school in the 9th grade. While working as a carpenter with his father, he lost part of his left index finger, which did not affect his ability to later hold a palette while painting.

In 1961, 18-year-old Ross enlisted in the United States Air Force and was put into service as a medical records technician. He rose to the rank of master sergeant and served as the first sergeant of the clinic at Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska, where he first saw the snow and mountains that later appear as recurring themes in his paintings. He developed his quick painting technique during brief daily work breaks. Having held military positions that required him to act tough and mean, "the guy who makes you scrub the latrine, the guy who makes you make your bed, the guy who screams at you for being late to work", Ross decided he would not raise his voice when he left the military.

During his 20-year Air Force career, Ross developed an interest in painting after attending an art class at the Anchorage U.S.O. club. He found himself frequently at odds with many of his painting instructors, who were more interested in abstract painting. Ross said, "They'd tell you what makes a tree, but they wouldn't tell you how to paint a tree."

Ross was working as a part-time bartender when he discovered a TV show called The Magic of Oil Painting, hosted by German painter Bill Alexander. Alexander used a 16th-century painting style called alla prima (Italian for 'first attempt'), widely known as "wet-on-wet", that allowed him to create a painting within thirty minutes. Ross studied and mastered the technique, began painting and then successfully selling Alaskan landscapes that he would paint on novelty gold-mining pans Eventually, Ross's income from sales surpassed his military salary. He retired from the Air Force in 1981 as a master sergeant.

He returned to Florida, studied painting with Alexander, joined his "Alexander Magic Art Supplies Company" and became a traveling salesman and tutor. Annette Kowalski, who had attended one of his sessions in Clearwater, Florida, convinced Ross he could succeed on his own. Ross, his wife, Kowalski and Walt, her husband, pooled their savings to create his company, which struggled at first.

Ross was noted for his permed hair, which he ultimately disliked but kept after he had integrated it into the company logo.

In 1982, a station in Falls Church, Virginia, aired a taping of his art class as a pilot, and 60 PBS stations signed up for the show in the first year. In 1983, PBS station WIPB lured him to Muncie, Indiana, with the promise of creative freedom, and he found a kinship with the staff. He moved home to Florida in 1989 but continued to travel to Muncie every three months to tape the show. Ross said he did the show for free and made his income from how-to books, videotapes and art supplies.

The show ran from January 11, 1983, to May 17, 1994, but reruns still continue to appear in many broadcast areas and countries, including the non-commercial digital subchannel network Create and the streaming service Hulu. In the United Kingdom, the BBC re-ran episodes during the COVID-19 pandemic while most viewers were in lockdown at home.

During each half-hour segment, Ross would instruct viewers in the quick, wet-on-wet oil painting technique, painting a scene without sketching it first, but creating the image directly from his imagination, in real time. He explained his limited paint palette, deconstructing the process into simple steps.

Artist and art critic Mira Schor compared Ross to Fred Rogers, host of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, noting that Ross's soft voice and the slow pace of his speech were similar.

With help from the Kowalskis, Ross used his television show to promote a line of art supplies and class recordings, building what would become a $15-million business – Bob Ross Inc. – which would ultimately expand to include classes taught by other artists trained in his methods. Following Ross's death, ownership of the company was passed to the Kowalskis.

Ross also filmed wildlife, squirrels in particular, usually in his garden, and he would often take in injured or abandoned squirrels and other animals. Small animals often appeared on his Joy of Painting canvases.

Ross painted an estimated 30,000 paintings during his lifetime.^[18] Despite the unusually high supply of original paintings, Bob Ross original paintings are scarce on the art market, with sale prices of the paintings averaging in the thousands of dollars and frequently topping $10,000. The major auction houses have never sold any of Ross's paintings, and Bob Ross Inc. continues to own many of the ones he painted for The Joy of Painting, as Ross himself was opposed to having his work turned into financial instruments. "A Walk in the Woods", Ross's first television painting, was sold in a pledge drive offering shortly after the first season aired; it is, as of September 2023, in the hands of Ryan Nelson, a Minnesota-based art dealer who acquired it from its original buyer and has been the primary dealer for the few Ross paintings that have reached the open art market. Nelson has placed an asking price of $9,850,000 for the sale of the painting and has indicated he has other plans for the painting if it does not sell for that price.

In contrast to more traditionally famous artists, Ross's work, described by an art appraisal service as a cross between "fine art" and "entertainment memorabilia" — is most highly sought after by common fans of The Joy of Painting, as opposed to wealthy collectors. The artwork circulating among collectors is largely from Ross's work from before he launched the television show.

A cigarette smoker for most of his adult life, Ross expected to die young and had several health problems over the course of his life. He died at the age of 52 on July 4, 1995, in Orlando, Florida, due to complications from lymphoma.

His remains are interred at Woodlawn Memorial Park in Gotha, Florida, under a plaque marked "Bob Ross; Television Artist". Ross kept his diagnosis a secret from the general public. His lymphoma was not known outside of his circle of family and friends until after his death.

Under the terms of the incorporation of Bob Ross Inc., the death of any partner in the company would lead to that person's stock being equally divided among the partners. Ross's death, along with that of his second wife, the other partner in the company, left the Kowalskis with sole ownership of the company. The Kowalskis were largely only interested in using Ross's name for painting supplies. They became very aggressive against Ross's family members and associates, allegedly trying to pressure an ailing Ross to sign over rights to his estate before his death.

Instead, Ross wrote the Kowalskis out of his will and testament, leaving his estate and rights to his name and likeness to his son Steve and half-brother Jimmie Cox. The Kowalskis countered that virtually everything Ross had done in his lifetime was a work for hire and thus Ross had no right to bequeath them. The Kowalskis eventually won the lawsuit.

After the Kowalskis retired and Joan Kowalski took over the company, she became more open to merchandising the Ross brand outside of its core business of painting products, setting in motion the mass marketing of his name from the 2010s onward. Joan also engineered a settlement with Steve Ross and Jimmie Cox granting Bob Ross Inc. rights to Ross's name and likeness, in exchange for a guarantee that Steve Ross could resume his art career without threat of lawsuit, something that Steve Ross said had largely stopped him from painting in public after his father's death.

 

 

 

Howard Duff

 

Duff was born in Charleston, Washington (today a part of Bremerton), in 1913. He graduated from Roosevelt High School in Seattle in 1932, where he began acting in school plays after he was cut from the school basketball team.

Duff worked locally in Seattle-area theater until entering the United States Army Air Corps during World War II. He was eventually assigned to their radio service, and announced re-broadcasts prepared for the Armed Forces Radio Service (AFRS). In this role, he served as the announcer for the drama Suspense, dated March 16, 1943. 

Duff's most memorable radio role was as Dashiell Hammett's private eye Sam Spade in The Adventures of Sam Spade (1946–1950). Due to accusations of Duff being a communist and with his TV and film career starting to take hold, he ultimately left the program in 1950 at the start of its final season; Stephen Dunne took over the voice role of Spade.

Duff was signed to a long-term contract with Universal, and made his film debut alongside Burt Lancaster as an inmate in 1947's Brute Force. The movie was produced by Mark Hellinger and directed by Jules Dassin, who gave Duff a bigger role in their next film, The Naked City (1948). He subsequently reunited with Lancaster for the family drama All My Sons (also 1948), based on the play of the same name by Arthur Miller.

More substantial roles soon followed, with Duff taking the lead in numerous Westerns and films noir including Illegal Entry, Red Canyon, Johnny Stool Pigeon, Calamity Jane and Sam Bass (all 1949);^[6]Spy Hunt, Shakedown and Woman in Hiding (all 1950). The latter film saw Duff act alongside his future wife Ida Lupino; the couple would subsequently co-star in a further four films during the 1950s.

In 1951, Duff made a pilot for a new radio series, The McCoy. Following his marriage to Lupino in October 1951, Duff was granted a release from his contract with Universal.

Duff appeared in the 1952 film That Kind of Girl (aka Models Inc), and also featured in Spaceways, and Roar of the Crowd (both 1953), the latter for Monogram Pictures, which ultimately made Jennifer (also 1953), the second movie in which he starred alongside his wife.

His other film appearances beside his wife; Don Siegel's Private Hell 36 (1954); Lewis Seiler's Women's Prison (1955), and Fritz Lang's While the City Sleeps (1956) continued Duff's successful run of movies during the 1950s. 

In addition to his movie roles, Duff also experienced success in television, with appearances in the 1950s series The Star and the Story, Climax! and Crossroads. From January 1957 to July 1958, he appeared with Lupino in the CBS sitcom Mr. Adams and Eve, which revolved around the private lives of two fictitious film stars, Howard Adams and Eve Drake, who were married to each other. They also served as producers.

Other TV roles included an appearance in NBC's western series Bonanza, playing a young Samuel Langhorne Clemens in his early life in the West as a satirical and crusading journalist, in the first-season episode "Enter Mark Twain". Duff also featured in episodes of numerous TV series during the 1960s including The Twilight Zone, Burke's Law, Combat, episode “Missing in Action”The Eleventh Hour, Mr. Novak and Batman (the latter in an episode entitled "The Entrancing Dr. Cassandra", alongside wife Ida Lupino). In 1960, Duff portrayed Arthur Curtis on The Twilight Zone in an episode titled “A World of Difference.” In 1963 Duff appeared as Ed Frazer on The Virginian in the episode titled "A Distant Fury."

Duff had the lead role in the short-lived TV series Dante (which ran for only one season; 1960–61), but found greater success as Detective Sergeant Sam Stone in the ABC police drama Felony Squad (1966–69). Duff appeared in all 73 episodes of the series during its three-season run, alongside his co-stars Dennis Cole and Ben Alexander. He also directed one episode; "The Deadly Abductors".

Duff also directed seven episodes of the 1965–1966 television sitcom Camp Runamuck. 

Duff died at age 76 of a heart attack on July 8, 1990, in Santa Barbara, California.

 

 

 

Rutgers, the Dutch Reformed Church, & Langdon-Rockstein Connections

 

 Kirkpatrick Chapel  New Brunswick  New Jersey

 

In the fall of 1959, several of my classmates from the Riverside High School [Riverside, New Jersey] Class of 1959 and I entered Rutgers College in New Brunswick [NJ]. Three of us started out residing on the same floor in Freylinghuysen Hall, one of three newish, high-rise dorms 'on the banks of the Old Raritan' that also included Hardenbergh Hall and [then] Livingston Hall, now renamed as Campbell Hall.. 

 

The following semester I moved across the street into Hegeman Hall, part of a quad, consisting of Hegeman, Wessels, Leupp, and Pell Halls known collectively as the Bishop quadrangle on what was part of the Old Queens College campus..  

 

When I started at Rutgers I didn't know that it had been founded by members of the Dutch Reformed Church (DRC). I hadn't even ever heard of the DRC before I matriculated!  Well, many years later, when I became deeply involved in our family history, I found so many Dutch surnames in my family tree that I thought to see if we were related to any of the people for whom the quad was named. 

 

Remarkably, I found that not only were we related to one, but that we were related to many of the people for whom buildings on the College Avenue Old Queens Campus were named. Also, Henry Rutgers, the benefactor after whom the school was named, is my 4th cousin seven times removed (4c 7x). 

 

Starting near the top of the map above and going down the campus, more or less, here are the buildings and name connections below.

 

Simeon De Witt [4c 6x] Building, one of the School of Communications & Information's buildings.

 

Alexander Library named for Archibald Stevens Alexander [half 9c 2x] 

 

Brower Commons was the Rutgers dining hall, recently replaced by the Atrium, was named for Charles H. Brower  [half 9c 3x].

Clothier Hall was named for my 12c 1x, Robert Clarkson Clothier, the fourteenth President of Rutgers. He was the nephew of Isaac Hallowell Clothier [11c 2x] one of the founding partners of the Strawbridge and Clothier Department stores.

 

Mettler Hall was named for John Wyckoff Mettler [7c 2x] the founder and president of Interwoven Stocking Company of Somerset County, New Jersey, and member of Rutgers Board of Trustees.

Bishop House was built for James Bishop [3c 6x], a prominent businessman and Congressman.

Hegeman Hall is after John Rogers Hegeman, sr. [6c 4x] who had been the President of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company from 1891 until his retirement.. 

 

Wessels Hall, is named after Wessel Wessels [5c 5x.] Leupp, however, was not not related, but Pell, was named for John Henry Pell husband of Mary Bogert Wessels [6c 4x] whose father was Wessel Wessels. She donated the funds for both her father's and husband's namesake buildings. 

 

Demarest Hall was named after William Henry Steel Demarest [6c 3x] who was the first Rutgers alum to become President of Rutgers and who as president, established New Jersey College for Women (now Douglass College) in 1918. 

 

Freylinghuysen Hall was named for the Freylinghuysen family and I have four notable cousins among them with intimate connections to the history of Rutgers College.. 

 

Voorhees Hall was named for Ralph Garret Voorhees [6c 5x]. 

 

Hardenbergh Hall named after Jacob Rutsen Hardenbergh [4c 7x] who was the first president of Rutgers College..

 

Brett Hall  was named in honor of Philip Milledoler Brett  (husband of Margaret Abbie Strong [7c 2x]). Brett was the captain of the football team that played Princeton University in 1892 in which he was apocryphally credited with saying: "I'd die to win this game." Which gave rise to the song "Nobody Ever Died for Dear Old Rutgers" in the Broadway musical "High Button Shoes."

Van Nest Hall, where I had all my classics courses, was named in honor of Abraham Van Nest [3c 7x].

 

Gardner A. Sage Library  was named for Gardner Avery Sage [7c 5x], an active member of the DRC who donated the library building and other properties to the seminary.

 

Murray Hall  is named in honor of the mathematician David Murray [7c 4x],who greatly influenced Rutgers' development in mathematics and sciences and who later was an advisor to Meiji era Japan.

Van Nest Hall, where I had several classes has been renovated and repurposed, was named after Abraham Van Nest [3c 7x] who was the President of Greenwich Savings Bank and who served as a Rutgers trustee for forty years.

The Daniel S. Schanck Observatory was built in 1865, largely funded by New York City businessman Daniel S, Schanck [husband of my 6c 4x Mary Ann Smock].

Geology Hall  was built with funds raised by Rutgers 8th president William Henry Campbell [husband of my 6c 5x, Catherine Elsie Schoonmaker] and designed by Henry Janeway Hardenbergh  [8c 3x].

A BRIEF OUTLINE OF RUTGERS EARLY HISTORY

 

Rutgers was founded by charter signed by Governor William Franklin, son of Benjamin Franklin, November 10, 1766. The college was to be called Queens College in honor of Charlotte of Mecklenburg, wife of King George III of England [7c 5x].  

 

A second charter was signed by Governor Franklin on March 20, 1770, in order to allow resident status for New York residents as well as New Jersey residents in order to make it easier to raise funds especially with affluent members of the Dutch Reformed Church in New York.

 

In May of 1771 the Board of Trustees selected New Brunswick, New Jersey, for the permanent site of the campus. Beginning in November of 1771 classes were first held in what was then the Red Lion Inn. Teaching a handful of students there was by Frederick Theodore Freylinghuysen [3c 7x], the eighteen year old grandson of Theodorus Jacobus Freylinghuysen (husband of my 1c 9x, Eva Terhune) and the stepson of Jacob Rutsen Hardenburg [4c 7x].

Queen’s College held its first commencement in October, 1774. Nineteen-year-old Matthew Leydt (QC1774) [4c 6x] was the entire graduating class.  

Distinguished alumni of the 1700's included James Schureman Queens College (QC '75) {who was the husband of  Eleanor Davidse Williamson [3c 7x]} who represented New Jersey in the Continental Congress and later the U.S. House and Simeon De Witt (QC1776) [4c 6x],  who was served George Washington as Geographer and Surveyor General of the Continental Army during the American Revolution and later served as Surveyor General of the State of New York for the fifty years from 1784 until his death. 

 

The first president of Queens College was Reverend Jacob Rutsen Hardenbergh. [4c 7x]

 

 The second President was  Reverend William Adolphus Linn husband of Helena Louw [6c 4x] who was selected after the death of President Hardenbergh.

 

The Reverend Ira Condict , husband of Sarah Perrine [5c 6x] was selected by the Trustees as president pro tempore. The college's third president, Condict, was instrumental in raising funds to support the building of the Queen's College Building, the school's first dedicated building, April 27, 1809

 

Notable alumni of the period 1800-1850 include William Augustus Newell (QC 36), White House Physician, New Jersey Governor [first of six Rutgers alumni to be governor of New Jersey], and father of the U.S. Coast Guard. 

 

The fourth President of Rutgers was Reverend John Henry Livingston , husband of Sarah Levy Livingston, [4c 6x] {yes, her surname was also Livingston, they were second cousins}.

 

In 1825 Queens College was renamed Rutgers College in honor of Colonel Henry Rutgers [4c 7x] . In March of 1825 Colonel Rutgers also donated a bell that still hangs in the cupola of the Old Queens building.

Former U/S. Congressman Abraham Bruyn Hasbrouck, husband of Helena Jansen [4c 7x] was named the sixth President of Rutgers and the first layman to serve as President.

Theodore Freylinghuysen [half 6c 4x], once U.S. Senator, one-time Whig Party Vice-Presidential nominee running with Henry Clay of Kentucky at the top of the ticket, and former President of New York University became the seventh President of Rutgers.

 

On April 21, 1847, the cornerstone of the second instructional building, Van Nest Hall was laid. The hall was named for Abraham Van Nest [3c 7x], a New York City merchant, president of Greenwich Bank, and devoted Rutgers trustee.The building was designed by Nicholas Wyckoff [half 7c 4x].

 

New Jersey Governor Foster McGowan Voorhees (RC '77)  [half 7c 2x ], was one of the distinguished alumni of the period 1850-1900.

In 1859, blaming declining enrollment, inadequate funding, and student and public apathy on an unruly faculty, President Theodore Frelinghuysen [half 6c 4x] fired every faculty member except George H. Cook, who would go on to have a major impact on the college.

 

Theodore Frelinghuysen  [his first wife was Charlotte Mercer, [half 6c 4x], former U.S. Senator from New Jersey, U.S. vice presidential candidate in 1844, and former chancellor of New York University, was inaugurated as the seventh president of Rutgers. Enrollment grew under his watch, but the gains were short-lived as students left to fight in the Civil War. 

 

Theological Hall was built to house seminary work, marking, for the first time, the physical separation of the college from the church.

 

The eighth President of Rutgers College was William Henry Campbell, husband of Catharine Elsie Schoonmaker [5c 5x]. Campbell had been professor of Oriental languages in the Theological Seminary and professor of belles lettres in Rutgers College.

 

In May 1886 Robert H. Pruyn (RC1833, '36), husband of Jane Ann Lansing [6c 4x] and who had been appointed by President Lincoln, presented his credentials to serve as the second U.S. ambassador, or envoy, to Japan at a time when that country was just beginning to open up to the West. 

 

Alumnus George Henry Sharpe (RC1847, '50) [ 6c 5x] was tasked by Union Army Major General Joseph Hooker to "pull together an organization charged with getting information about the enemy." First called the Secret Service Department, his unit was later known as the Bureau of Military Information. Sharpe's Civil War creation was "an all-source intelligence organization," the Army's first. Sharpe's wife was Caroline Hasbrouck, a daughter of Rutgers' sixth president, Abraham Bruyn Hasbrouck.

 

In 1864 the Dutch Reformed Church severed its ties with Rutgers when the school became the land grant university of the State of New Jersey under the Morrill Land-Grant Acts .

In 1865 Francis Cuyler Van Dyck (RC1865), husband of Sara Van Nuis [3c 4x], who would later be appointed the college's first dean, enrolled in the Rutgers Scientific School as a graduate student in chemistry, the first graduate student at Rutgers. "At that time there were no formal courses for graduate students, and provision had not yet been made for 'earned' graduate degrees."

 

President Lincoln signed legislation establishing the National Academy of Sciences to advise the federal government on matters of science. Rutgers mathematician Theodore Strong [8c 5x] was named a charter member. The National Academy of Sciences: The First Hundred Years 1863–1963 describes Strong as "an excellent pure mathematician ... he was at work on a treatise on differential and integral calculus.

 

On December 17, 1867, President Andrew Johnson submitted to the House of Representatives George Henry Sharpe's (RC1847, '50) [6c 5x] investigative report on possible European connections to the Lincoln assassination. Sharpe was sent to Europe by Secretary of State William Seward "to ascertain, if possible, whether any citizens of the United States in that quarter, other than those who have heretofore been suspected and charged with the offense, were instigators of, or concerned in, the assassination of the late President Lincoln."

 

Geological Hall, a Gothic brownstone structure which houses the departments of geology, physics, and military science, was designed by Henry Janeway Hardenbergh [8c 3x], great-great-grandson of Rutgers' first president, Jacob Rutsen Hardenbergh . Today, on its second floor, is the Rutgers Geology Museum, nationally recognized for its outstanding collection of minerals, fossils, Indian relics, and modern shells. A 10,000-year-old mastodon has dominated the museum for over a century.

 

Mason Welch Gross [10c] served in World War II in the Army Intelligence Corps, and was assigned to a bomber group based in Italy. Gross earned the Bronze Star, and was later discharged as a Captain. He then became Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Assistant to the Dean of Arts and Science at Rutgers University in 1946. In 1947 he was promoted to assistant dean and associate professor, and in 1949 was appointed to the newly created position of provost to take over the duties of the ailing Robert Clarkson Clothier who took a leave of absence. Clothier resigned his office in 1951 and Gross continued as provost under the newly appointed Lewis Webster Jones. He was then given the additional title of vice president in 1958. Jones resigned the presidency in August 1958, and in February 1959, Gross was chosen as president. On May 6, 1959, he became the sixteenth president of Rutgers University. [From 1949 to 1950 he was a panelist on the television quiz show, Think Fast. He was also a judge for the show, Two for the Money from 1952 to 1955.] The Rutgers School for the Creative and Performing Arts at Rutgers was renamed as the Mason Gross School of the Arts in 1979 in his honor.