Featured Artwork: Unnamed: Strength of Years

None.

Original image pre-2009

When we began the re-design of this website in 2009, this painting got lost in the shuffle and did not make it to the new site. Nonetheless, here it is now.

We now know the origin of the original image. It came from a framed sepia print given to Miss Mabel Raguse found at the Buckland (MA) Historical Society. Miss Mabel was a simple schoolteacher who managed to purchase five Woodward paintings (2 oils, 3 chalks drawings) over the span of 20 years. Her collection is a good a collection of paintings you will find among collectors. All the pieces have something rare or special about them. Miss Mabel parted with her beloved artwork as she prepared to enter nursing care in 1977. To learn more, use the links below.

Handwritten note by Woodward on the back of the print

The painting above is a very powerful composition of what appears to be an old sugar maple tree on a mound overlooking a pasture. It is leafless and from the tone and hues, even in greyscale, of the light, shades, and ground-cover suggest this is possibly a November painting. November is one Woodward's favorite months. Most impressive is the depth of field this painting gives in three dimension. The maple just pops out at you as if you are standing right in front of it.

We will continue to investigate to learn more about this painting. Should anyone have any knowledge of this painting, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Buckland school teacher Miss Mabel
Raguse in her apartment in Shelburne Falls,
MA beneath the chalk drawing From a May Hill

Mable held a high place of affection from RSW.
For her admiration and devotion to his work,
at considerable expense for a school teacher,
he honored her with a personalized gift. A
framed sepia print of an unknown painting
and personally signing the back of it for her.
And for that we HONOR her as well...

Buckland school teacher Miss Mabel Raguse purchased 2 oil paintings and 3 chalk drawings over her life time. This is quite a feat on a teacher's salary. Safe estimates of what it cost her are anywhere from $25,000 to $27,000 in today's dollars. We do not how much her wages were in that time yet it is safe to say what she spent on paintings by Woodward probably totaled around a quarter of a year's salary.

The other paintings purchased by Miss Raguse, plus Woodward's gift to her we call, The Surprise:

• Spring Window
• In the Sugar House, Boiling
• Village Church in Winter
• Unfinished Silo
• From a May Hill
• The Surprise

For more about Miss Mabel Raguse and her love of RSW's work CLICK HERE

See also our Painting story on the two silo paintings: CLICK HERE