By James Head
I am an attorney by profession but have a love of art and history, which led me to write several books on the legendary American illustrator and portrait painter Howard Chandler Christy.
Early on in my research around 2007, I discovered in the Smithsonian photographic archives of Christy’s work the existence of two photos of what then appeared to be two separate portraits he painted of Collette Ramsey Baker in the late 1930s. I was intrigued, especially because in each portrait Collette had a different hair color and style. In one, she looked like 1930s movie star Myrna Loy, and in the other, she resembled movie star Veronica Lake.
Howard Chandler Christy (above) painting Collette Ramsey Baker as a brunette (top), and the 1938 portrait after her hair color was altered (center).
I decided to do more research and discovered online that Collette was the founder and director emerita of the Deafness Research Foundation, which later was renamed Hearing Health Foundation. I wrote a letter to the foundation, and I was so surprised to receive a phone call about a week later from Collette’s husband, Maurice Baker, stating that she had received my letter and would love to talk to me about her close friendship with Howard Chandler Christy.
In fact, Collette said, “Mr. Head, you can’t write a book about Mr. Christy without talking with me.”
With that, I flew down to Vero Beach, Florida, met her at her home in June 2007, and interviewed her. I also photographed all of the original Christy works she owned and photographed the letters that Christy sent to her over the years. They clearly had a fond relationship, and Christy appeared to think quite highly of Collette, as she did of him.
In the living room of her Vero Beach home was the final portrait Christy painted of her in 1938, where she appeared as a blonde. Christy presumably had painted over a portion of the earlier version where she appeared as a brunette. I asked her about why she changed her hairstyle mid-portrait, and she politely quipped, “Well, you know how women are. Also, blonde is my natural hair color.”
I was so thoroughly impressed with Collette, and will never forget the Sunday afternoon I spent with her talking about her long friendship with Christy. “I knew Mr. Christy very, very well from the 1930s until his death” in 1952, she said. “I didn’t know him [when he was] a very young man but as a great artist. He was among, if not the greatest, of all the industrial, religious, and political leaders I have known.”
Following her death in 2010, Christy’s portrait of Collette, which she so treasured, appeared at auction in Thomaston, Maine, and I purchased it for my home, where my wife and I treasure it each day.
James Head lives in Virginia. For more about his books on Christy, see anaffairwithbeauty.com. For more details including many photos of correspondence and artwork, see hhf.org/collette-and-christy.
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