CASS GILBERT-ARCHITECT
244 MADISON AVENUE-NEW YORK

CASS GILBERT
JOHN R. ROCKART
EUGENE WARD
SAMUEL A. McQUIRE
CASS GILBERT, JR.
REX D. READ
JOSEPH T. MOHN

TELEPHONE
CALEDONIA 8980-1-2

September 28, 1928.

My dear Cortissoz:

I am sending with this the nomination form
for our friend William Mitchell Kendall and hope you will
"sign on the dotted line" and return it to me by the
messenger.

I would like very much to get it into the
hands of the secretary of the American Academy of Arts and
Letters today if it is convenient to you. Also I hope you will
talk up Kendall's candidacy and do all you can to help his
election. I am sure you agree with me that we ought to
have him in the Academy.

With kindest regards,

Mr. Royal Cortissoz,
70 Fifth Avenue,
New York City.

Enc.

P.S. This letter will be sent to you by mail.

Sometimes I have thought that I might have
done something with pen and ink if I had
not been so drawn into other channels.

Since you are interested in
these things, I would like very much if
you would dine with me some night at home
and let me show you a few water-colors and
sketches which I have made from time to
time in Europe. Mrs. Gilbert I know will
be delighted to get your point of view.

Sincerely yours,

244 MADISON AVENUE

December 6, 1928.

Dear Cortissoz:

I felt sure you would appreciate
the lines from Emerson's Essay on Character
as descriptive of Mead. Perhaps the reason
they were in my memory was that I ran across
them some twenty years ago when the medal of
the American Institute of Architects was
awarded to McKim, and Mead received it for him
after his death. I happened to preside at
the ceremony. Mead's self-effacement on
that occasion and my own knowledge of his
part in the work of the great firm of McKim,
Mead & White made me apply these lines to
him in the little talk that I was called upon
to make shortly afterwards, so while I have
not thought of them for a very long time they
came vividly to my mind while you were
speaking at the memorial meeting the other
night, and I take this opportunity to thank
you for what you said about Mead and also
for the very kind reference which you made
concerning me. Believe me I was deeply
touched by it.

Yes, I recall the drawing that you
refer to, it was made, as I remember it, when
I was on a visit to New York several years
after I left the old firm. I was living in
the Siberian exile of Minnesota and had come
on to New York for a little of the association
which I valued so much. Of course I went
in to see them and Stanford While grabbed me
by the shoulder and said I must make a
drawing or two for them. I think the drawing
you refer to was one of those that I made for
him at that time. As I recall it, it was
something with a tapestry hanging high on the
wall. I am so pleased that you remember it.

244 MADISON AVENUE

November 27, 1929.

Dear Cortissoz:

That was a very notable talk you gave us last night at the Academy. It was so charming, so well stated, and so delightful in its quality, that it opened the meeting with just the touch that was needed. I heard so many words of praise for you and for what you said that I am sure you would have been immensely pleased if you had heard it all yourself. You were all that I knew you would be, the real representative of the Fine Arts.

Art thrives by appreciation more than by criticism, and you are the kindly critic whose appreciation of all of the Fine Arts gives you what I ascribed to you, the "authority" to speak for the Fine Arts.

Thanking you again most heartily and with kindest personal regards, I remain

Mr. Royal Cortissoz,
31 West 10th Street,
New York City.

NATIONAL ACADEMY OF DESIGN

AMSTERDAM AVENUE AT 109TH STREET
NEW YORK CITY

OFFICERS

CASS GILBERT PRESIDENT
HARRY W. WATROUS FIRST VICE-PRESIDENT
ROBERT AITKEN SECOND VICE-PRESIDENT
CHARLES C. CURRAN CORRESPONDING SECRETARY
ALBERT P. LUCAS ASS'T CORRESPONDING SECRETARY
HOBART NICHOLS RECORDING SECRETARY
HENRY PRELLWITZ TREASURER
JOHN RUSSELL POPE ASSISTANT TREASURER

—
FOUNDED 1825

COUNCIL

CHARLES S. CHAPMAN
ERNEST L. IPSEN
CARL RUNGIUS
CHAUNCEY F. RYDER
EUGENE SAVAGE
JAMES EARLE FRASER

MRS. G. W. MAYNARD
CLERK OF THE ACADEMY

244 Madison Avenue

January 15, 1930.

Dear Mr. Cortissoz:

I have had several replicas made in bronze of
the gold medal of the National Academy of Design (the
President's medal) which was presented to Mr. Elihu Root on
November 26th, 1929 and on which occasion you were kind
enough to deliver an address. In view of your appreciation
of the Fine Arts, it has occurred to me that you might be
interested in having a replica of the medal as a souvenir
of that occasion and I am therefore sending you a copy.

The design and modeling are the work of
Mr. Robert I. Aitken, formerly of California and now a
resident of New York, who is one of our ablest sculptors
and a master of the art of low relief.

I am sending one copy of the medal to the
President and to each of the speakers on the occasion of
the presentation. Very few of these replicas have been
struck so that it will have the value of a rarity.

I trust you will accept this with my
compliments and as an expression of appreciation.

I remain

President
National Academy of Design.

G:W