Experiencing an Enduring Bond
June 8th, I posted my blog, “An Emotional Crossing Between Art and Literature,” about the novel A Piece of the World by Christina Baker Kline and Andrew Wyeth’s painting, “Christina’s World”.
This past week, we visited our son and his wife in Maine. They drove us to the remote area of Cushing, where the Hathorn and Olsons’ late-1700s 14-room colonial farmhouse still stands and is open to the public. However, at the present date, it is closed for restoration.
We were able to walk around the property, view the ocean from the hill, and peek in the windows. The kitchen still has the Glenwood stove and a rocking chair, as seen in Wyeth’s 1962 painting “Woodstove.”
The Olson family lived in the house from 1892 to 1968; prior to that, the Hathorns had lived there. Katie Hathorn was Christina’s mother, who married John Olson, a Swedish sailor. They had four children; however, brother and sister, Alvaro and Christina, stayed at home, farming the land and managing the homestead. A 1900 photograph shows Katie and John with three children standing in front of the white-washed house.
The other family to have a legacy in this house was Andrew Wyeth and his wife, Betsy James. Both of their families summered in Maine near Cushing, where they met in 1932 and married a year later. It was then that Betsy introduced her husband to the Olson family and their farmstead, a friendship that lasted a lifetime.
Andrew Wyeth had a particular fondness and artistic love for the house, the coast, and his friends, Christina and Alvaro. The house and the people were depicted in his paintings and sketches for thirty years. Wyeth later recalled, "I just couldn't stay away from there. I did other pictures while I knew them, but I'd always seem to gravitate back to the house.” Because of his paintings of this place, the homestead has become renowned, leading to its listing on the National Register of Historic Places (1995) and a National Historic Landmark (2011).
Dying a year apart, Alvaro (1967) and Christina (1968) lived in the house their entire lives. After Christina’s death, the house was sold several times and was eventually donated to the Farnsworth Art Museum in 1991.
The weathered, unpainted house on the hill overlooking the water is most recognized in Wyeth’s painting “Christina’s World”. The house and the barn are depicted in the distance, no longer whitewashed, with Christina in the foreground, crawling towards home.
Now, there is a road between the house and the barn, but if you walk down the hill and look towards the house, Wyeth’s painting captures the scene to this day!
Another significant fact was that Wyeth had a studio in the house, and Betsy was fundamental in her own vision of preserving her husband’s work and legacy in this place. In 1970, Betsy renovated the farmhouse to showcase his paintings.
Andrew and Betsy Wyeth are buried next to each other, alongside the Olson family, in the Hathorn Cemetery. The connection between the Olsons and the Wyeths has been preserved in nostalgia, and we can experience their enduring bond here.
Have you visited the Olson Homestead or another historical home that has impressed upon you a special connection? Please feel free to leave your comments below.
