The Daily Ardmoreite. [volume] (Ardmore, Okla.) 1893-current, 1919-05-23
OIL MILLIONAIRES AND ART

)ROF. OSCAk II. JACODoON Vi Ihe C"'
versty of Oklahoma is peeved because ac-
cording to his statement in speech delivered
in New York, oil miionairism so engrosses the
activities of the people of Oklahoma and other
western states that they have no time for art,
literature or music The professor up ana
"told on us in gigantic Gotham, presumabe
center of art literature and music in Amer
lea He laid our lack of refnement-eXcept
oil refnement-bare to babbling world OF art
highbrowsm which by this time no doubt LOOKS
upon Oklahoma as a region wherein Grass NIL
lionairsm is Brobdingnagian and aestheuc cur
ture but Lillputian in development.
OF course not all of the oil mionaires ol
Oklahoma are on our visiting list but by rea-
son of the fact that an oil millionaire in tins
state is almost as common sight as an or
dinary citizen elsewhere we have happened TO
meet a considerable number of men of the Tor
mer description; and we violate no confidence
in setting forth the fact that some OF our Ok-
lahoma oil mllionaires have just about as aoe-
quate an appreciation OF art literature anu
music as is possessed by the average cltlzeh
of anv other state. We have oil millionares,
for instance, who are university graduates ana
who knew a painting from a daub, poem
from a doggerelle and a sonata from toplcal
song long before they engaged in the oil NIL
]
ters of art, literature and music. They buy good
books and competent canvases, and their mu-
steal eouipment is not limited by any means 10
the canned product.
Oklahoma is young state, Professor ne
United States as a nation was several decades
old before it produced poet or noVellsI ol
any consequence. or a painter or a musician vi
distinction. Aesthetic appreciation, no DOUBT
was slow in developing in our infant nation as
it is slow in our baby state of Oklahoma
Give us time. Professorl We may have al
ready in our midst incipient Poes and Emer-
sons. Robins and Raphaels, Mozarts and Wag
ners. We have already a measurably large
number of citizens who possess the faculty Oh
approaching those masters and others. we ar
very far from art and literary ana muSical
centers Yet you do not know but thaJ the
man YOU meet on the street, garbed in civilian
Khaki smelling of petroleum cruae anu
smeared Herewith, could take you into his
own home and spout Shakespeare at YOU 90 d
Beethoven sonata on his own Sradivarus, OF
convince YOU in a ten minute argument that
George Eliot is the superior of Charles Dickens
as a psychologist or a physlologlst or some
thing: and it may be that this same oily per-
son could sit down to his little old typewriter
and dash YOU off Petrarchian sonnet IN 1our-
teen minutes by his diamond-studded tlme
piece, rhyme and chime perfect.
There is Just as much refinement, poVh
actual and potential i'll Oklahoma as III any
other commonwealth outside the big -cltleo
states. The Homer of the twentieth century
NAV be an Oklahoma oil Wlldcatter fof lhe
nonce. or the boy who drives your milk wagon
and awakens YOU before the full flare of dawn
NAV turn out to be a super Wagner or TRAN
gular artist of MichelagelOan might.
Give us time