RSW's Diary Comments

Unnamed: Goodnow Pasture

"Painted in 1936. From Leon Goodnow's pasture at the Mill Yard (the old Purinton homestead farm). Exhibited generally about the country. Painted from the pasture. A smaller 25" x 30" (In an Autumn Pasture) was made in the studio from this canvas."

Editor's Note:

The image to the right is a signed but unnamed painting of the Goodnow Pasture in autumn without the Holstein cows. We chose this for color over In an Autumn Pasture because it is a much better picture.

This better image of the sepia print was found recently (Sept. 2023) by the website administrator, Larch Purinton, Dr. Mark's son. It is just one of many images lost over the years as Dr. Mark's vision declined and error made. We hope to recover all that was lost but it will take time.

One last thing, Woodward often got the year he made a painting wrong. This canvas first exhibits at UMass in January of 1938, making this a 1937 painting.

Woodward and Williams posing along
side the Heath Pasture House. Earl's wife
Ruth the most likely photographer.

We have a sneaking suspicion Woodward's friend, F. Earl Williams, is deeply involved with this painting and may have eventually ended up with it as its owner. We say this because Williams was once a resident of Gardner, MA, and the local high school's principal for many years before leaving to work at the University of Pennsylvania in some sort of capacity. This painting exhibited 3 times in Gardner, the high school ('39), the town hall ('40), and the women's club ('48). Whenever we see Gardner show up in our records we know Williams is involved.

In the artist will, Woodward left specific instructions that Williams was to get 3 finished paintings of his choosing from what remained in the estate. In all, we believe Williams had as many as 8 paintings, none of which the whereabouts are known to this day. Williams and his wife Ruth did not have children and so after their deaths we do not know what happened with their remaining estate. We believed Woodward entrusted Williams to somehow uphold and keep his legacy alive (along with Dr. Mark). Woodward gave Williams his "Painting Diary" and was the only person he let take pictures of him- some of which he actually posed! (left)

We are not saying Williams (a Deerfield alum) did not do enough to keep Woodward's legacy alive, in fact, he was probably the catalyst behind the 1969-70 Deerfield Academy's American Studies Group taking up Woodward's cause as their annual project producing the artist only artist catalog to date. That catalog and mimeographed copies of the painting diary were used as a primary resource by Dr. Mark in the creation of this website which aptly carries Woodward's legacy for the foreseeable future. Still, it would just be nice to know what happened to all those paintings... each one very special to the artist. We are sure Williams had a plan. It would have been nice if he had shared it with Dr. Mark before his passing. We imagine and hope Williams left them to a private collection, but have no proof of such.

A picture of the painting on display at an
unknown gallery. The picture probably taken by
F. Earl Williams. There are no notations on the back.

To the left is a picture of An October Pasture hanging above a fireplace. The location is not known. It could possibly be a gallery or museum given the table in the left side looks to be a display case/ table.

The subject of this painting, Goodnow's Pasture, in Buckland, MA, was much admired by Woodward. He painted it at least three times, and possibly as many as five...

This one is his most highly regarded, just look at where it exhibited. It is one of just a handful of paintings to exhibit at Williams College's Museum of Art in Lawrence Hall. Also, anything sent to Springville, Utah, was quintessentially Woodward. Springville's annual art exhibition is an International show drawing hundreds of the this country's and the world's best artist. Woodward's Boston agent, Vose Galleries, are heavily involved sending all its artist work to exhibit. Woodward had great success there... often a picture of his work was selected out of hundreds to appear in the newspapers by the paper's editors to accompany the article announcing the show's opening.