Internationally acclaimed artist Max Hayslette donates his original painting of the Meadow River Lumber Company to the Rainelle Restoration Project.
Max Hayslette’s original 18” x 24” framed oil painting of the Meadow River Lumber Company with a market value of $4,500, was formally presented by Marilyn Cooper, exclusive area representative for Max Hayslette at the Cooper Gallery in Lewisburg, West Viirginia, to the Rainelle Area Planning Commission’s Restoration Project. The event was held Thursday, December 9th at at the newly-renovated City National Bank building in Rainelle, WV.
The Meadow River Lumber Company painting is oil on canvass. Hayslette composed the images from photographs supplied by Andy Pendleton, Ed McCall and others. He says the painting is “semi-sepia like image with muted colors, not a true sepia but the painting has an aged, 1930's look.”
Since Hayslette could not be at this event, Marilyn Cooper read his letter to the Commission:
“I am happy to help with Rainelle's very worthy cause,” Hayslette said. “Rainelle has been doubly hit with the worst kind of set-backs...the closing of the Meadow River Company and the horrific loss of jobs, and then being by-passed by the building of Interstate 64.”
"Greenbrier means to me sitting with one toe in the Meadow River at Crawley and two hands on a bamboo fishing pole at dusk when the catfish are biting. These memories live long and Greenbrier runs deep in my blood. I'd write Huckleberry Finn, but I think someone else has already done that."
"My Dad worked for the Meadow River Lumber Company in Rainelle, WV, for at least two decades. My first bicycle came from the Company Store. I could write a song, but I think that's been done."
"I felt a surge of nostalgia when asked to do a painting of the old mill as I remember it from the 30's and 40's and I tackled the project with enthusiasm. I'd like to thank all the Greenbrier folks and alumni who provided the archival photographs and material from which I constructed the final painting."
"I'm not sure about others, non WV folk, but it seems to me that the emotion of place runs deeper with regards to Greenbrier than elsewhere. We retain that special feeling of belonging, even those of us who migrated decades ago for various reasons. Like Swallows of Capistrano with precision we return to Greenbrier to renew the spirit and nourish the soul."
Max Hayslette is a Rupert native who sold all fifty watercolors at his first one-man show when he was sixteen years old at Rainelle Furniture Company. Hayslette now lives and works about as far from Rainelle as possible, at Kingston, Washington, overlooking Puget Sound. And yet he visits relatives in western Greenbrier County at least twice a year, and every Sunday, he telephones his Aunt Wilda Shafer on Anjean Road.
In the photo to the right is Mr. Harris who worked at the Meadow River Lumber Company for 50 years. He is now 88 years old and still lives in one of the company houses. When he was viewing the painting he said, "it looks just like the lumber company."
Hayslette applied his imagination to memories of the Meadow River Lumber Company in executing this painting. “The combination of a long dance between memory and imagination is the root from which my images grow.”
Of the thousands of paintings over his long career, this is Hayslette’s second historical painting. The first was early in his career on commission from the Chicago Medical Society. It is not, however, his first dip into historical work. “I worked on the Williamsburg VA restoration project in the 1950's while working for a Chicago design firm. I visited Williamsburg last year and found much of my work in the Visitor Center still intact.”
(Andy Pendleton, left and Marilyn Cooper displaying original oil painting, oil print and poster).
Copies of the oil print on canvass, signed by the artist, will be sold for $395. Copies printed on acid free paper, signed by the artist, are $295. And 17” x 21” quality posters on paper are available for $35.00 each or $45.00 with an original artist’s signature. Send your check payable to Rainelle Restoration Project, c/o Andy Pendleton, PO Box 223, Rainelle WV 25962 or call Andy at 304-438-7662 or 304-667-9233.
NOTE:
Dale H. Tincher from Raleigh N.C., a 1964 Rainelle High School gradauate, purchased Max Hayslette's original Meadow River Lumber Company painting and has donated the painting to the Greenbrier County Historical Society, with the purchase price ($4,500) going to the Rainelle Planning Committee for Rainelle Restoration. Dale did not want to see this beautiful painting purchased and placed in someone's home, where those who love Rainelle would not be able to enjoy it.
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