The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1899-10-20
LUCKY ANNA KLOAPKE
Who Inherits the Great Rosa
Bonheuf's Wealth
Is AN AMERICAN GIRL
But Rosa Has More Relatives
Than Dewey.
Is AN AMERICAN G

New York, Oct. 19.-The Journal says:
To an American girl Rosa Bonheur, the
great animal painter, has left her for
J tune.
The forests of Fontainebleau rustic
with the news. The wind blows it from
leaf to leaf The animals that roam there
| at liberty, tame and wild, whine and howl
it by night. The birds twittering to one
another chirp it from branch to branch.
Rosa Bonheur is dead"
"Our friend, who appreciated US; our
our protector, who btfriended US, is dead
'Who is this woman who will reign in
her stead?
whence comes she?
What is she?
"Who knows herr"
| And in response thousand murmurs
| float in the echo of the breezes.
The first and most startling announces
briefly that the name of the heiress is
Anna KlumDke.
Search you may in all the annals Of
the Bonheur pedigree, there appears new
er a Klumpke-father, son, nephew, or
niece. Not even is there a connection,
however remote, of the name.
What tie was there that made the IA
nous painter bequeath to this Anna
Klumpke the fortune coveted by relatives
One bond only there was-the eternal
bond of friendship.
Rosa Bonheur met Anna Klumpke
when life's fitful fever was almost spent.
She met and loved her. She sought to at
test the full value of this feeling, the
depth of the desire she had to see her
han ~ ms 10
heir.
To her she has left the chateau at BY,
fortune in itself.
Inside it is one vast museum of the ar
lists work. Two large rooms are filed
with sketches. Portfolios of them are
piled upon floors and tables. They are
representations of the work of lifetime,
exquisite witnesses of the patience and
perseverance that attained perfection.
They are worth more than their weight
in gold. Yet Rosa Bonheur has always
refused to sell hem. 1t was supposed that
at her death they would go to the Muse
UNI of the Louvre.
But that was before fair-haired wo-
man came out of Western America to
the little village of BY, with an enchant-
ing smile or her lips and the captivating
light of youth in her eyes.
To her is left. besides a fortune esti-
mated at many millions of francs-the
largest fortune ever achieved by French
woman. Georges Sand earned during
her lifetime one million francs, but, as
she acknowledged shortly before her
death, she had never saved a sou. Rosa
Bonheur was more thrifty.
For more than forty years this greatest
of animal painters made from $4,000 to
$500 a year, and her expenses are said
not to have exceeded one-fifth of this.
Anna Klumpke is sole heir, to the ex-
clusion of family connections and friends
of a lifetime. She will therefore claim al
so the little house in the Rue dAssas,
where the artist lived for years and which
was the rendezvous of all that was queer,
poor and Bohemian in the artistic world
of Paris. 1t was here that Nathalie Mi
cas-, the friend of Rosa Bonheurs youth,
presided and welcomed the unlucky one.
1t was here that her best-known work,
1.-The Horse Fair" was painted. 1t was
this cottage that was. finally converted
into a temporary asylum for poor artists.
The great painter a thousand times dur
ing her career. gave evidence of a rare
and kindly nature a nature moulded for
perfect friendship.
Two years ago Anna Klumpke entered
into her life and remained until the end,
which came on May &c of this year.
To the id woman living alone on the
edge of her forest it seemed simple
enough to leave what was hers as she
pleased. But in so doing she who wished
peace for her friend has placed her in the
center of a battle.
Rosa Bonheurs large fortune. so hon.
orably won, is the subject of litigations
that threaten to be endless. AS many
unheard of relatives as cropped up to sur
hound Admiral Dewey on his kreat fete /
day have appeared in every part of
France to contest the will.
Those who We're never even counted In |
the great artists circle of friends are
uppermost in the struggle. Her nephews |
and neces, her two surviving sisters
old women now-are mute with astonish- t
ment.
Meanwhile, in the greatGhistoric chateau /
seals have been set upon all the doors ex- |
cept two. Within these two lives the le- |
gatee. a child of the West. a daughter of /
the Golden Gate.
Anna Klumpke IS a Californian. She /
was born in San Francisco not more than /
thirty years ago. Her father is a hol- /
lander. her mother an American.
It is recorded of her now that celebrity
has been thrust upon her, that her early I
education took place in a public school /
in San Francisco.
Suddenly her mother, an exceptional 4
woman, discovered that she had an ex- /
ceptional child-a child who should not +
be wasted upon the rocky ridges of the /
Californian coast, a child who needed fer (
her proper development the environments I
of an artistic center. Paris shortly be-
came the home of the Klumokes.
-Four Of them have since become distin-
guished. Augusta. the second daughter.
has devoted her life to the study of med /
icine. and has married a physician The
third. Dorothy. is a distinguished mathe-
maucian and astronomer. in charged of 4
a department in the Paris observatory
Julia. the youngest. is vioiinist who
has the distinction OF being Ysaye's most
talented pupil.
OF the quartet, Anna, the first born