we developed a wonderful, wonderful friendship, so I just want to share a fun story with you.She used to come to Maine. She came with Ginny one time to spend a week with us, and Ginny went along with her friends, so we decided we’d think up all these things Libby would love. One of the things was we took her to the Farnsworth Museum. Now we’re down in Wells Beach, Maine….and we couldn’t keep up with Libby—I’m sure you all felt the same way—and I was much younger. Anyway, we went…to the Farnsworth Museum and instead of anybody there giving us a guided tour, Libby did. She kept looking for Jamie Wyeth because he is there quite often painting, but she gave us a lesson on an illustrator who had taught N C Wyeth how to illustrate. She was looking at Andrew’s different paintings and had to ask someone who a little girl aged about 13 in a painting was, but learned that the girl’s father was always present when it happened. So now we’re outside having lunch and one of the ladies who was impressed, of course, by Libby, said we’re going to have a lecture at the Olson Farm on Cushing Island at 2pm. It was a gorgeous summer day and I asked whether she’d like to go to Cushing Island; we were going to go to Mount Blue in Camden to look over the scenery of a beautiful area. She said we should go to Mount Blue because she’d love to see that scenery….so we did, but then I said there was time to hit Cushing Island, and off we went.
If you’ve never been, you should go. Christina’s World, the farm, looks exactly like it’s painted. So Libby wasn’t satisfied just to look; she wanted to know much more about the whole business there. Down on a hill where you see Christina crawling up, there’s the family Olson cemetery, and Christina’s there with many other people. I said to Libby, who was about 85 or older so couldn’t walk down the hill, why don’t I go down and find out what’s going on down there where there were a lot of people, all Japanese. I spoke to this gentleman who was talking to everyone like we do ‘Down East’ and he said his name was John Olson and Christina was his aunt…..he said he was the last of the Olsons.
So I said there’s a lady up the hill who’d love to meet you….so up the hill he came and said he was 80 years old, and Libby said she was also in her 80s. She said, do you know the Wyeths? And he said of course he did, he was just at a party at the house this weekend…for Betsy’s birthday, who was Andrew’s wife. So she said, “I bet it was a bash” and he said “they always are and that’s all I’m going to say about that.” Libby asked if he’d met Andrew over there, and he said Andrew used to come over all the time because that’s when he was courting Betsy. Betsy was a friend of the Olsons and she’d be over there and so Andrew would really come over to get a look at and be with Betsy, so he had free reign to come into the house and paint anything he wanted at any time he wanted. So there are quite a few of Andrew Wyeth’s paintings depicting that whole area and the house there, and they all have an island nearby….
So anyway, it was a wonderful day, and really she said it was an unforgettable time. And what really made it truly unforgettable was at the end, we went to this very special restaurant where you could have all the lobster you wanted, and Libby loved that. So anyway, we have wonderful, as yourself, grateful memories of our dear, dear friend Libby Dean.
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