Month: December 2017

Grace Wishaar’s interest in chess as a recreation after a day spent scene painting is first mentioned in 1904. The San Francisco Call reported, “To complete the versatility of this remarkable young woman, she is an excellent musician and a clever chess player. When her eyes grow weary of color and the brush becomes a heavy weight she turns to chess for recreation” (October 13, 1904, page 6). Four decades later, Wishaar would become the Ladies Champion of the World Chess exhibition in Paris. She was sixty-eight years old, the same age as Thomas G. Moses when he painted the entire Fort Scott scenery collection.

Wishaar’s sixth husband was chess champion- Alexander Alekhine (1892-1946). Sixteen years her junior, Alekhine was born in Moscow. He grew up in an aristocratic and very wealthy family, learning to play chess at the age of six. He first encountered simultaneous blindfold chess games when he was nine years old and became enthralled with a visiting champion who competed in twenty-two games. Alekhine would eventually become one of the greatest blindfold players in history. He joined the Moscow Chess Club and won the All-Russian Amateur Tournament by 1909.In 1914 he emerged on the worldwide state, being one of the top five.

That same year, Alekhine was retained in Germany with ten other Russian chess players when war erupted. Fortunately, he escaped and returned to Russia. After the war, he began to travel again and compete all over the world, landing on US soil during 1923-1924. While in the states he participated in 24 exhibitions, even competing in one blindfold simultaneous game against twenty-one other players. Ten years later, he met Grace Wishaar in Tokyo.

Wishaar was also competing in a chess tournament. During the event, she played against Alexander Alekhine in a simultaneous exhibition. For her participation, she received one of Alekhine’s books and asked him to autograph her copy. Although sixteen years older than Alekhine, he was captivated with Wishaar and they married the following year. On March 26, 1934, their wedding ceremony took place at Villefranche-sur-Mer in France. This is about 6 miles southwest of Monaco. They lived in a magnificent chateau (La Chatellenie Saint-Aubin-le-Cauf was near Normandy), Wishaar maintained her art studio in Paris, and they traveled extensively for chess championships around the world.

Both competed at the Hastings International Chess Congress in 1936/37 where Alekhine won the Premier. He won this same tournament in previous years (1922, 1925/6, 1933/4). Wishaar won 3rd prize in the 3rd Class Morning A class competition. By 1938, a civic reception was held in their honor at the Golden Jubilee Chess Congress in Plymouth.

Life wasn’t without challenges or struggles, however, as reports continued to depict Alekhine’s excessive drinking during competitions. Yet he continued to win, game after game, and excelled in blindfold simultaneous chess challenges.

During World War II, the Nazis took over their chateau and looted its contents. Alekhine was allowed to freely travel under Nazi occupation, but no exit visa was allowed for Wishaar. After the war, Wishaar sold the chateau and spent the last five years of her life in her Paris studio. She passed away on February 21, 1956 and is buried next to Alexander in the Cimetière du Montparnasse in Paris.

Unbelievably, after the numerous years of solely receiving recognition under her maiden name, it is actually misspelled on her grave. The majority of information about Wishaar is linked to life with her sixth and last husband.

For more information about Alexander Alekhine, see Pablo Moran’s book, “A. Alekhine, Agony of a Chess Genius.” The book examines the tragic last years of world chess champion Alexander Alekhine (1892-1946), 45 of his match and tournament games in Spain and Portugal from 1943 to 1946, and 100 other late exhibition games are covered. Here is the link if you are interested in purchasing it (I did): https://www.amazon.com/A-Alekhine-Agony-Chess-…/…/0786459816. There is also a blog on his life and chess tactics by M. Silman. For those interested in Alekhine’s strategies and rise as a world champion, there is an amazing blog. It covers his life and techniques in seven parts. Here is the link to part 1: https://www.chess.com/…/alexander-alekhine-pt-1-and-the-gam…

To be continued…

Grace N. Wishaar painted scenery for a variety of venues along the west coast after leaving New York 1902. In Seattle, she was photographed painting with Sheridan Jenkins, the scenic artist for the Third Street Theatre. The following year, she began working in California. Even though she married for a third time in 1906, she continued to paint under her maiden name. Her first two husbands were Whitney Irving Eisler (1897) and Oscar Graham Peeke (1902).

On August 14, 1906, Wishaar married her third husband, John Bruce Adams. However, the marriage was short lived and in 1907 the Oakland Tribune reported, “Mrs. Grace Wishaar Adams is in Matrimonial Trouble” (July 17, 1907). Adams deserted Wishaar and left a lot of debts in her name. At the time her marriage with Adams ended, she was painting all of the scenery at Ye Liberty Playhouse and Idora Park.

In California, she also worked at San Francisco’s Majestic Theatre and few other performance venues in San José. One of her greatest supporters was Harry W. Bishop (1872-1928), considered to be one of “the pioneers of California theatredom” (Oakland Tribune, 15 June 1928, page 33).

Bishop was the adopted son of Walter M “Bishop” (1849-1901), otherwise known as Walter Morosco, the proprietor of Morosco’s Royal Russian Circus.

Harry W. Bishop’s obituary reported that he “began his career as a showman in San Francisco and ended it brokenhearted and poor as a sometime real estate operator.” But the story couldn’t be that simple. Oliver Morosco adopted Walter and Leslie Mitchell, orphaned sons of Sir John Mitchell and Dora Esmea Montrose of Utah. Some sources reported that Walter ran away from home at the age of 17 to join the circus as an acrobat.

After Walter left his circus career, he took over the Howard Street Theatre in San Francisco and started his new venture as a producer and manager. He later took over the Burbank Theatre in Oakland, as well as the Union Hall and the Grand Opera House in San Francisco. It was at the opera house that Harry W. Bishop began his career and Oliver Morosco was the treasurer. Fire destroyed the historic opera house in 1906, two years after he constructed another theatre – Ye Liberty Playhouse.

Harry W. Bishop opened Ye Liberty Playhouse in 1904, boasting the first revolving stage in the western United States. By 1905, Bishop managed the San Francisco’s Majestic Theatre, Central Theatre, the American Theatre and Bell Theatre. In Oakland, he managed Ye Liberty Playhouse, where Wishaar began as his scenic artist. Bishop would later build what became known as the Fulton Theatre too. His obituary reported that “he won a reputation as a star-maker and while his productions, both dramatic and stock, concert and musical were famous, he was not in the commercial way. Throughout his career he remained a dreamer and his sole use for money was to return it to the theatre in the way of more lavish productions and finer casts until the profit was reduced to a minimum.”

Bishop was ahead of his time, not only offering Wishaar the opportunity to paint at his theaters, but also offering other women positions as ushers and ticket takers. There was another aspect to Bishop that I find fascinating as it would have greatly affected the venue where Wishaar worked. Bishop was an inventor, filing for patents relating to theatre design and stage construction.

In 1908 Bishop filed for a patent. His invention was “to provide a theater structurally arranged to permit the elevating or lowering of the main stage; to provide a vertically movable stage, horizontally ‘revoluble,’ and means for accomplishing this action; to afford a stage adapted to be bodily raised or lowered and simultaneously revolved if so desired, or lowered, and have a portion of its area revolving in one direction while another portion is rotating reversely.” Bishop stated that it was also “desirable to raise or lower certain scenes, suspended from or secured to the rigging-loft.” It goes onto describe that the principal advantages of his invention was in “the possibility of setting up all the scenes each completely, on the surface of the stage, the area of which may be divided into scenes as desired, and of suspending all the drops, hanging pieces, ceiling borders, ceiling pieces and border and other overhead lights that may be used, for all the scenes each completely, from the gridiron or rigging-loft, and of then revolving the stage and the rigging loft in a horizontal plane so that each scene is, in its proper sequence, aligned proximate to the proscenium.” He proposed that there was incentive “to devise a theatrical structure that will admit of building or setting scenes of as nearly normal and natural effect as is possible to attain, by elevating or lowering all of the visible matter within the proscenium.

Here is the link: https://www.google.com/patents/US1136860?dq=ininventor:%22Harry+W+Bishop%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi1772s46fYAhWM5YMKHXT_Du8Q6wEIMTAB

In 1914, Bishop also engineered a new and improved proscenium opening and structure. The ultimate purpose of his invention was “to produce upon the mind an impression of the picturesque, unmechanical production and to eliminate the rigidness given by architectural ornamentation common to arch work and prosceniums.” This was enhanced by “providing a curtain movable just behind the rear edge of the frame and which may be decorated with a scene harmonious and introductory to the arrangement of property on the stage so that when the curtain rises the transition is a continuation of the introductory scene on the curtain.” Lights were placed in a concavo-convex contour at such a depth that it projects somewhat in front and behind the wall.”

Here is the link: https://www.google.com/patents/US1008886?dq=ininventor:%22Harry+W+Bishop%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwievLW83afYAhWe8oMKHYRTC0gQ6wEIODAC

In 1918, Harry W. Bishop lost the majority of his fortune including his home in the exclusive Piedmont residential district. Wishaar had also lived in Piedmont with her family. A decade later Bishop passed away, leaving his widow Florence and five children: Mrs. George Stimmel, Lester K., Walter K., Dalton, and Beverly Bishop. By 1928, Wishaar was still in Europe and continuing on with her own adventure that had begun in 1914. California remained far behind her.

To be continued…

“Tales of a Scenic Artist and Scholar” will return on Tuesday, December 26.

Until then, here is a delightful advertisement for Santa Claus Soap that I stumbled across in the Weekly Pioneer-Times (Deadwood, South Dakota) from March 30, 1893 (page 2). This just made me giggle!

I couldn’t believe my eyes when I read the following: “Ride a cockhorse, to Chicago of course, to get some of Santa Claus’ Soap which is boss.  Its merits for cleaning and washing the clothes, assure it a welcome wherever it goes.  Fairbank’s Santa Claus Soap is the best for every household use.  All grocers keep it.  Made only by N. K. Fairbank & Co., Chicago.

Have a wonderful Christmas eve and day!

Wendy

The rise of Grace Wishaar as a scenic artist has many fascinating twists and turns that brings her from coast to coast and back again. However, her career as an artist began at the San José Art School. Interestingly, her first drawing instructor there would later rise to fame as a scenic artist in New York – Lee Lash (1864-1935). The Lee Lash Studio was founded in 1891 and continued operations until approximately the mid-1940s.

When the Wishaar family left California for Washington, she continued with her artistic studies. In 1894 she completed her first scene painting project. The Washington Standard heralded her success, reporting, “Seattle has a young lady scenic painter, in Miss Grace Wishaar. A new drop curtain, at Cordray’s which is universally admired, is from her brush” (30 Nov. 1894, page 2). Wishaar was eighteen years old when she painted the Cordray drop curtain.

Five years later, she ventured east to continue her artistic training at the William M. Chase School of Art and continue her scenic art career in New York. One of the first individuals that she sought out was her first instructor – Lee Lash. However, Lash he was not supportive of his former pupil entering the field of scenic art. A 1903 interview with Wishaar reported that he “coolly turned her down” and said that “scene painting was no work for a woman; that her sex would make her unwelcome among the workmen, and that women were too ‘finicky’ for work that demands broad effects” (San Francisco Call, October 13, 1904, page 6).

It was after the rejection of Lash and many other scenic artists that Frank D. Dodge gave her a chance.

I cannot imagine what Wishaar was subjected to as she went from shop to shop, looking for work. I read her story and start to feel slightly nauseous as I wonder when the glass ceiling will break and at what point women will achieve equality. Here we are 118 years later and many of us are still encountering horrific prejudice because of our gender. A 1903 newspaper article written by Marilla Weaver provides a small glimpse into the extreme hardships encountered by Wishaar while searching for work in New York. Weaver reported, “There was success for her, but not till after a struggle so hard and bitter that it ought to make American men bow their heads and a dull red flush of shame dye their cheeks when they remember the mothers that gave them life. It was the old struggle against sex prejudice. Here was this slender, gifted, graceful girl, a skillful scenic artist, a stranger, away from her parents, seeking honorable employment at work she could do as well as the best. Men who should have welcomed her turned from her with ominous muttering and black scowls. Sex jealousy!”

Scenic artists active in New York at the turn of the century included Ernest Albert (1857-1946), Charles Basing (1865-1933), Wilfred Buckland (1866-1946), Joseph Clare, Homer F. Emens (1862-1930), Frank E. Gates, George Gros (1859-1930), J.M. and T.M. Hewlett, Lee Lash, H. Robert Law (1880-1925), St. John Lewis, W.H. Lippincott, John Mazzonovich, P. J. MacDonold. L. A. Morange (1865-1955), Thomas G. Moses (1856-1934), Joseph Physioc (1866-1951), Hugh Logan Reid, Edward G. Unitt, Charles G. Witham, Joseph Wickes, and John H. Young (1858-1944). Fortunately, Wishaar’s drive and talent caused her to excel in a world primarily dominated by men. Wishaar became so successful that she soon went into business for herself. I do wonder if she left the studio because of her male co-workers. It could have been that it was far easier to work alone than suffer the animosity and daily heckles of your male colleagues.

What I find the most fascinating is Wishaar’s versatility, painting both miniatures and scenery. She spanned the entire artistic spectrum!

An article in 1904 reported “Miss Wishaar’s talent sweeps over a wide range. Not only is she adept with a broad brush and tricky “distemper” of the scene painter, but she is even more skillful with the tiny “camel’s hair” and oil of the miniature artist.” In the article, Wishaar was quoted saying, “I love my work. It is progressive, there is room for originality, and results are quick. I do wish you would say something about the medium I use. People generally think that scenery is painted with a whitewash brush and that some kind of wash is used. But the distemper with which I work is an opaque watercolor. It is delightfully effective, but plays some tricks sometimes on those unfamiliar with its vagaries. The first trick it played on me was with a garden drop. I fairly reveled in the delicious greens that paled and deepened under my brush, but when it dried! I wish you could have seen it.” Wishaar was noted as laughing heartily when she remembered the “dull picture” into which her work had faded.

In an earlier article, she commented, “Distemper is a really beautiful medium. You can produce such fine effects with it! But it’s very tricky unless you know just how to handle it.” This article appeared throughout the country: the Topeka State Journal (May 25, 1903, page 8), the Racine Journal-Times (Wisconsin, 27 July 1903, page 7), the Wilkes-Barre Record (Pennsylvania, 7 May 1903, page 2), the Wichita Daily Eagle (Kansas, 3 May 1903, page 22), the Richmond Item (Indiana, 2 May 1903, page 10), the Marion Star (Ohio, 2 May 1903, page 10), the Decatur Herald (Illinois, 14 June 1903, page 19), the Lincoln Star (Nebraska, 5 May 1903, page 9), and many others publications that are not digitally available to date.

Wishaar was able to overcome many gender barriers and still rise to the top of her profession in a relatively short period of time during the early twentieth century. But wait, there’s more!

To be continued…

Grace Wishaar described her entry into the New York scenic art world in 1901 when she was interviewed by the Buffalo Morning Express and Illustrated Buffalo News in the article “She is a Scenic Artist” (April 4, 1901, page 3). Wishaar was quoted saying, “I am convinced that I am a curiosity…People catch sight of my skirts both here [New York Theater] and at the Herald Square, where I sometimes work, and they stop rehearsal and bet on what I am and call up to me to find out.” Of her career in scenic art, Wishaar explained to another reporter, “The work is intensely interesting and I sometimes consider it as instructive as what are sometimes erroneously called the ‘higher forms of art.’” She was also a portrait painter.

When Wishaar first arrived in New York, she visited many of the studios to seek out possible employment. She explained that the scenic artists at the Metropolitan Opera House and elsewhere laughed at her for even thinking of entering into the profession. She then systematically went from one scene painter to another, asking to do only one piece. The standard response was “A girl in the flies? Absurd! Why she’d have to wear bloomers!” To each, Wishaar insisted, “a scenic painter was made, not born.”

Within four months time Wishaar was a member of Frank D. Dodge’s staff and working with five men to produce all of the scenery for “The Casino Girl” and “The Prima Donna.” Dodge was the official scenic artist for both the Herald Square Theatre and the New York Theatre. She described that every morning at 5 o’clock she appeared with the other scenic artists where she worked all day on the bridge or on her high solitary platform.

In a 1905 article “A Lady Scene Painter,” Wishaar reported to have been engaged in painting scenery with Dodge or more than four years, explaining that not all of her work was confined to New York City. She would go “at Mr. Dodge’s request, to all parts of the country.” Wishaar also explained the current artistic process: “When we receive an order for an important production, a consultation is held with the author of the play, and if the scenes are laid in another State, either I or Mr. Dodge take a journey to the particular locality and make sketches. If the scene is laid abroad, we have to read up on it, and when the play is English we get many a useful hints from the beautiful production, “Country Life.”

This is exactly what Thomas G. Moses and many other scenic artists were still doing. Although the rise of the studio system confined many scenic artists to a single location where painted scenery was produced and shipped to the appropriate venue, there were still projects that made more sense to complete on site after a series of sketches were made. Moses had been very active in this aspect of his career. What I find fascinating is that as a female, she wasn’t being hidden inside a scenic studio where her work would be examined as part of a group project. She was being sent out on location as an artist representing the studio of Frank D. Dodge.

An article in “Success Magazine” from 1906 featured Wishaar in the segment “Life Sketches of Ambitious Young Men and Women” (page 32). The article started with “What Miss Grace N. Wishaar Has Accomplished in a Field in Which She Seemed Totally Unfitted.” It was followed with “pluck, enthusiasm, and conscientious work have enabled Miss Grace N. Wishaar to become the only woman scenic artist in the United States.” History was rewritten for Wishaar a bit in this article. In it, she politely writes to Frank D. Dodge in New York. After receiving no response, she appears at his studio to make a personal plea. The article continues,

“Mr. Dodge looked at her smilingly. He liked the enthusiasm she displayed, although he felt he had no use for women in his studio. The idea of women painting huge pieces of scenery on a bridge away up under the roof of the theatre struck him as being somewhat amusing.

‘I don’t see what I can do for you,’ he said. ‘Women are not adapted to this work. Besides, my men would certainly go on strike if I should put you among them on a bridge.’

‘I don’t believe they would at all,’ replied Miss Wishaar, ‘and so far as lack of adaptability for the work is concerned, I intend to show that I am adapted for it; I’ll disguise myself as a boy, – if I find that nobody will give me a chance as a woman.’

‘Well,’ he finally said, ‘come back to-morrow, and I’ll take the matter up again.’ The next morning, Miss Wishaar appeared with a satchel in hand holding her artist’s painting dress. She was ready to go to work. “This business-like method strengthened the good impression she had made on Mr. Dodge, and without further delay he put her to work in the model room, and a few days later gave her an opportunity to do real scenic painting on the bridge.” His artists protested, but were told they must give the young woman fair play. Within a week she had won their good will, chiefly because she asked no favors and had shown that as a craftsman she could “hold up her end” with any of them.”

Within a year and a half after her arrival in New York, Wishaar had become the director of scene painting in “an important theatre” that remained unnamed. She must have been quite something to rise that quickly as it took many men years to make the jump from staff painter to director.   A large order for painted scenery for a theatre in Seattle was received by Mr. Dodge. As this was Wishaar’s home city, the idea of returning as “a successful worker in her chosen field” appealed to her. Arrangement was made for Wishaar to go to the Pacific Coast where she began painting scenery in Portland, Seattle, Tacoma, San Francisco and Oakland.

To be continued…

Grace Norton Wishaar was born October 26, 1876, in Beverly, New Jersey. She died on February 21, 1956 in France. Wishaar’s story goes from being a scenic artist during the 1890s in Seattle to being the Ladies Champion of the Paris Chess Championship in 1944.

She was the daughter of Émile Bernard Weishaar and Marie Ida Smith. The Wishaar family moved around a lot and eventually settled in Seattle, Washington where her mother became a playwright and her father was dramatic editor for a newspaper.  Both Grace and her sister Jennie (b. 1880) were encouraged to develop their talents. Grace studied art, opening a portrait studio, while Jennie McGraw Wishaar, (born 1880) studied music.

On July 7, 1896, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer” reported that Grace Wishaar was “Seattle’s talented young artist” (page 9). The population at the time was approximately 65,000 people. The article commented that with “a few years study [Wishaar] would develop into genius that would enable the young lady to make herself riches and fame” She had just completed a series of painted portraits.

One day, the Seattle Theatre needed an artist to paint a drop. Grace’s father mentioned the prospective project to his daughter and encouraged her to contact the manager, Mr. Russell. Although he laughed at the idea of having any woman paint for his theatre, Russell gave Wishaar the opportunity to prove herself. The drop was such a success that she continued to paint for theaters in the area, including both the Seattle Theatre and the Cordray Theater over the next two years.

Neither of these venues was small and the drop could have easily measured approximately 34 feet wide. Her work at the Seattle Theatre was for a house of 1300 people. Located at the northeast corner of Third and Cherry Street, the building had thirteen dressing rooms, eight properties room, and was lit by electricity. The proscenium measured 33 feet wide by 36 feet high and the stage was 40 feet deep. The height to the rigging loft was 64 feet with two bridges, suggesting that the drops were flown. The official scenic artist for the venue was listed as T. Masis in the 1897 Julius Cahn’s Official Theatrical Guide. However, this might have only meant that he created the original scenery for the venue as Thomas G. Moses was listed as the scenic artist for the Tacoma Theatre at the same time that was approximately 35 miles away.

Later newspaper interviews covering Wishaar noted that she also worked for actress Katie Putnam (actress and wife of producer and manager Henry B. Emery), as well as with Sosman & Landis at this time. As I read Sosman & Landis, I got goose bumps; Moses was in the region at the time as it was just before he left the scenic studio to work in New York! Of all the scenic studios and artists that were working in the Pacific Northwest at the time, Wishaar mentioned working with Sosman & Landis! Both she and Moses left for the East coast approximately at the same time too.

In 1900 Thomas G. Moses left Sosman & Landis to start another scenic art partnership with Will Hamilton. Moses & Hamilton produced scenery for opera, Broadway and Coney Island from 1900-1904, when he returned to Chicago. It was after working with Sosman & Landis that Wishaar also decided to head east where she would get training in Boston and then paint scenery in New York. What was the possibility that Moses met Wishaar? It is unclear which Sosman & Landis artists Wishaar worked with, so the question remains unanswered. But someone encouraged Wishaar to leave Seattle and forge ahead.

Wishaar also had an extremely interesting personal life – the kind that is the subject for a great book. In 1897, Wishaar married Whitney Irving Eisler (September 13, 1897). This was at the time that she began painting for theatre in Seattle. In 1898, she had a child. However, that child was named after the man who would be her second husband by 1902, Peeke.

Carroll Earl Beauchamp Peeke (1898–1991) was the son of Oscar Graham Peeke. Lt. Col. Carroll Peeke grew up in Seattle, fought in WWI, and graduated from University California at Berkely. Hejoined the San Francisco Call-Bulletin in 1922 and later worked as city and diplomatic editor at the Times Herald in Washington, D.C.

The year after Wishaar gave birth to Carroll, she left Seattle for New York with a determination to succeed in the world of scenic art, later returning in 1902. There is something about a woman continuing with her career even after giving birth during the 1890s that greatly intrigued me. During the fall of 1899 Wishaar studied at the Chase Art School, only briefly returning to Seattle, before looking for work in New York by January 1901.

Four months later, she was interviewed by the by the Buffalo Morning Express and Illustrated Buffalo News (April 4, 1901, page 3). They published an article, “She is a Scenic Artist,” reporting that Miss Grace Wishaar had recently arrived from Seattle and was working with the scenic artist Frank D. Dodge. Wishaar was described as dressed in a denim apron with “forty kinds of paint” on it. The journalist also commented how pretty this small “slip of a girl” was with her brown hair and dark eyes.

The article also made it clear that Wishaar had no interest going out or being distracted while working in New York. At the end of the interview she simply explained, “I am here to work. I confess I don’t like theaters and the cafes very well, and if I had wanted society, I should have stayed in Seattle for that. I love my work. I love it! There is no place in the world, you know, where it is taught. I have been lucky enough to be born able to do it a little, and I won’t share my time with anything else.” She continued, “They told me at half the theaters in town that a woman couldn’t do it. Any way, I have proved one woman can.”

To be continued…