Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1923-01-18
WIFE
WINS FAME BY
PAINTING FLOWERS
BY FREDERIC j. HASKIN


wives, no doubt, sit at home and
placidly wait for their rowing hus-
bands to return from the field. Not
so Mrs. Charles D. Walcott, wife Of
the head of the Smithsonian insti-
tuition.
Every spring when DR.. Walcott
packs his camping things to start
for the great fossil hunting grounds
of the northwest. Mrs. Walcott
packs her knickerbockers. boots, and
water color paints and prepares to
go with him. Knockers and boots
are the only possible toys for cross
| ing glaciers, climbing mountain
trails on horseback, and camping
| for weeks at a distance of 100 miles
or more from your nearest neigh
| Dor. The paints are equally impor
tant in q different way. Mentioning
them brings to us what Mrs. Wal
colt does while her husband col
lects specimens for the Smithsonian
Her hobby is sketching wild flow
ers. She does not paint flowers in
an impressionistic way. She makes
carefully exact reproductions, paint
ed life SIZE, with colors and shad-
ing copied, and every distinguishing
feature of the plant shown.
She has 500 of these sketches OF
| wild flowers of both east and west.
She has always made her sketches,
as another person might collect
coins, entirely for the pleasure they
gave her. But recently scientists
saw them and were enthusiastic.
They pronounced the collection
unique and valuable to science. Now
some of the paintings are on exhibit
ton at the Smithsonian institution
here and at the Art Institute in Chi
cago, and Mrs. Walcott is being
urged to publish them in book form
with descriptions.
Rocky Mountain Collection
The Rocky Mountain collection is
Of especial interest to science because
no such reproductions of the wild
flowers of that region have been
made before. Botanists have collected
the flowers and pressed them and
studied the parts and determined
the families to which the plants be-
longed. But there was no set Of natu-
ralistic sketches shown g the plants
as they are when freshly plucked,
and Mrs. Walcott's work, being done
with the accuracy dear to science,
greatly pleased botanists who saw
the sketches.
It is difficult to believe that the
author of the sketches is neither a
highly trained artist nor a botanist,
Mrs. Walcott's mother, it seems, was
greatly interested in botany and in
painting. She wished her daughter
to paint flowers. So, for four years
Mary Vaux, later Mary Vaux Wal
colt, took one lesson a week in
water color painting. That was all
the training she had. Painting was
dropped for other. interests. Her
brothers were studying mineralogy
and measuring glaciers, and she
helped them with their scientific
photography.
After marrying DR.. Walcott she
gradually took up sketching again.
Now, so flower sketches a summer is
considered a fair average. 1t is be-
coming difficult for her to find sub
jects for her brush in the northwest
because SO much of the ground has
been covered in field trips. She is
still kept busy, though, for DR.. Wal
colt looks out for flower specimens
While he is engaged in his eXplora-
lions. And in winter other scientists
who know of the work send her in
teresting plants to be painted.
Sketched While Fresh
When a new specimen comes in she
drops everything and paints fast be-
fore it has a chance to wilt. Every
plant must be fketched while it is
fresh. When in the field she likes
best to take a specimen to the camp
and arrange it in water with a good
light on it.
Some plants are so fragile or are
found so far from the camp that it
would be impossible to carry speci-
mems back in good condition. In
such cases Mrs. Walcott takes her
paint box out of her kit and goes
to work wherever she is, even
though a fire beside her easel may be
necessary to keep her ands from get
ting stiff.
eve hear much of the flowers of
the Swiss Alps" Mrs. Walcott says,
''but in the Rocky Mountains of the
northwestern states and Canada there
are Alpine flowers just as rare and
beautiful as any in Switzerland.
Her collection. contains sketches of
such plants as the bladder campion
which does not grow at an altitude
OF less than $500 feet. 1t is surpris-
ing how the mountain plants struggle
for existence against overwhelming
odds. Poor soil, rocks, snow, and
oil ikrIo+ Il IL
wihld flowers of this region. One
flower, the WOolly fieabane, has a
WOOllille covering to keep it warm.
Others bloom close down between
the rocks and in sheltered valleys.
Many of these plants of the west
ern mountains are similar to the wild
flowers of more accessible parts of
the country. The names, too, are
similar. Yet almost always there
are slight differences readily percep-
tible to the botanist.
Purple and Yellow Predominant
There is comparatively little bright
pink or rose color in the wild flow
ers of this section. Purple and vel
low are more in evidence, and there
is a good deal of red, especially in
the berries and other fruits of the
plants. The basque flower, a purple
bell-shaped bloom, grows in album
dance. Then there is the red lily
witch covers the meadows on pro
tected mountain sides, and the AL
pine cinquefoil, like a yellow butter
cup, the blue camas, and several
hundred other wild flowers that
adorn the mountains in midsummer.
DR.. Walcott and his wife have
ranged over thousands of miles in
the Selkirks and the northwestern
Rockies from points in far north
ern Canada down to Montana and
Washington. They go into inacces-
sible parts Of the mountains, camp
ing sometimes a week away from a
railroad, as distance is figured by
trail. The other members of the
party are the cook and two packers
to take care of the five saddle horses