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Portlandiana The Benoits Of Maine. ByJohn Durward.
THE ARTS A TALE OF M ~S
BY TONY RICH
N THE GLORIOUS and shoescuffed years of the Works Project Administration (created 1935, abolished 1942), U.S.sponsorship of fine art was in its early stages. In particular, the W.P.A. was to spawn a generation of regionallyaccomplished social expressionists, Depression artists who were creative enough to find inspiration where Franklin Delano Roosevelt directed them to find it: on the solemn and portentious walls of municipal buildings.
In photography, Dorothea Lange documented the Dust Bowl - funners in pain over loss of crops; no rain. Berenice Abbott shot enormous night views of Manhattan - luminous, real, frightening. Arnold Eagle addressed himself to the Jesus of the Lower East Side. And in Maine, all you have to do is drive to your local post office to get a taste ofwhat "The Regional School" - sometimes arch, sometimes doctrinaire, often socially conscious - had in store for audiences of the future.
In the South Portland Post Office, a W.P.A.mural by Azalia Pierce, the second wife of Waldo Pierce (a Hemingwaychum in Spain), tells the story of the wreck of the British steamship Bohemian, which left Liverpool February 4, 1864, with 218 passengers and wound up on Alden's Rock,just two miles south of Two Lightsand one-quarter mile offshore at Broad Cove Rock. The Bohemian was rated "A-I" by lloyd's of London, yet smashed to pieces on the coast of Maine. Fortytwo people lost their lives,and some
OItIGINAL MUItAL CAUGHT A CASUAL MOMENT ON REACH NEAll KENHERUNK~ORT. STANDING UNDER THE MURAL
MAINf MURAl
Kennebunkport's angry citizens get ready to remove unwanted art
For (our ~'l'urs t Itl')K'Opll' o( dlll-sltulll'd Al'llIIl"llI, IKlrt, 'fuilll,ltaVl' SI,t·tlll'd at ulllural put up in t post ofti<-t·by till' gowrJllllt'nL]'uilltl'cl (or tltt· I ('ral Works AlCt'II(~Yhy GUICICI'nht'imFdlowshil' \' nE'r Elizalwth Tr8,t:~', the mural (a/HIre) dt·»i('ls III ers at resort I)('al·h ut>ar t·)wn. S)M'arht>alls o( thl' cal oppt>!lition wt>re two novdist.~. nath'c !\OIl ]I neth Robert.'! anti summer f('sidt>nt Booth Tarki ton. Said Robert.s. "The painting .•• is an eyel and the whole town is L'Ihamed of it." Said Tarki
suaSTITUTE MUIIAL ••• AINTED ay MAItINE AIITIST GORDON GRANT. IS A SCENE OF HAllaOIl AND TOWN IN 1125 WH
i£NN£TH ROa£RTS, TH£ TOWN'S NOT£D NATIV£ SOH
"It's clismal ... a ('U111hinatioll of CUlH'y IslulIIl )h'xi('an f(·alism." Kl'IlIIt'\lIlIlkport's ('itiz('ns fif ~()t so an~y that thl'Y('hippt,cIill * 1,000 to buy IJstitute mural (lJelml') hy Marine Artist Gordon ~t. ""0 \\'('('101 ago the U. S. Senate voted to 8CCt'pt ~t's mural as a gift to replace unwantoo paint. Some people might think the new mural is ar. eally not so good as the old, but everyone agreed it is better suited to genteel Kennebunkport.
NK"ORT WAS IN ITS H£YDAY AS A SHI ••••ING CENTER
les Coyne, UFE magazine, copyright 1945, :le, Inc.
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RANDMOlHERPUf it this way: "The Bible says there is nothing wrong with money - it's the worship of it that is a problem." For much of the 20th century, Maine seemed to be in a worshipping mode.
In recent years, the positive potential of money has been seized upon by risk-taking private and public leaders. Maine's dramatic renewal has resulted from the treatment of money as a dynamic tool for long-term investment. From Betty Noyes' gifts to non-profits, to Joe Brennan's university rebuilding initiatives, to the Gelardi brothers manufacturing plant expansions, to the restoration of old and the constitution of new buildings, Maine is no longer sitting on its assets.
The value of money increases proportionately to the wisdom of its use. Several years ago I saw a wonderful photo of a smiling Maine resident, Tom Cabot, just after he had given more than $10 million to his college. The caption seemed to fit the picture. It went something like this: Making money is a lot of fun. Spending it is even better. Saving it provides some pleasure, but the greatest satisfaction of all comes from giving it to something you believe in.
We must take the longview: Investing in the people and the places that have special meaning for us.
Investing In Our People "The strength of our country is derived not so much from its material wealth as from the quality of its citizens," wrote the 93-year-old poet and attorney Melville Lane in 1972. He went on to say that each of us must make our own contributions "no matter how humble, in order to maintain that high quality."
Democracy is a two-way street. We must invest in our people so that they in turn can make their own future contributions.
Today we need to put our money into making Maine's citizens competitive. Foremost that means mutual respect for each other's potential. Maya Angelou's mother put it this way: "Can't do is like Don't care! Neither of them has a home." Translated, that meant that there is nothing a person can't do, and there should be nothing a human doesn't care about.
Knowledge is the new wealth of nations, so education and training must be emphasized.
Moneywill purchase buildings and hire teachers but not buy the basic skills of reading, speaking, and writing the English language or the good work habits and elements of character, such as reliability and timeliness. For those, we need accountability throughout our educational system and a passion for excellence.
At a recent course I attended, 25 people were introduced. About half of them were involved (in some way) with redirecting young people's lives. We are spending a phenomenal
BY RICK BARTON Chairman, Maine Democratic Party
A couple of examples: 1) One of the East Coast's top law enforcers said, "There are no new criminals. We never arrest anybody without a record." That means kids getting an early career start in lawbreaking and contin uing for years. 2) The Kennebec Journal (9/8/87) reported that the McKernan administration is "cutting its financial support for pregnant poor women, because demand for services has strapped state resources." Rather than asking for additional money now, the administrative decision was to gamble" on the future costs of unhealthy children. AIPHWAIDOEMERSON made the point this way: "Steam is no stronger today than it was 100 years ago, but it is put to better use." When we make the best use of our resources we thrive. Regarding our youth, early investments have proven their worth by saving future hospital, " prison, and other institutional costs.
Like our youth our workforce is central to future competitiveness, knowledge, skill enhancement, and the attraction of value-added jobs should be just as important as investments in universities and public schools. Increased sharing of responsibilities and rew~ds will pay longterm dividends. Foolish gubernatorial vetoes of the minimum wage $6,968 per year for 40 hours per week will only position Maine as an economic backwater. Good people with skills are our greatest long-term adv£ll1tage.
Keeping Maine Special
The beauty of Maine's land and waters draws and keeps us. Maine is a special place and our expenditures should enhance that fact.
First and foremost, we need to identify more key areas of the state
Continued on page 43
THE POLITICS
amount of money trying to recover from our earlier mistakes and shortcomings. Resources should be directed up front, not after the fact.
FACE
MOVERS & SHAKERS
EDDYROOSEVELT,campaigning in 1904 to keep the White House, became concerned about carrying New York, so he visited E.H. Harriman, the railroad tycoon, and Henry Clay Frick, the head of U.S. Steel, for financial help. Harriman came through with $300,000; Frick, with $100,000.
Following his election, T.R. advanced his program of business regulation, talking about the "malefactors of great wealth" and "the criminal rich." Harriman and Frickwere not amused. "He got down on his knees to us," fumed Frick. "We bought the son of a bitch and then he didn't stay bought."
Anyone in Maine who expects to "buy" a politician with a political contribution these days is throwing his money to thewipd. Not only are politicians, as a rule,a fickle, inconsistent lot ("an honest 'politician is one who, when bought, stays bought"), but with reporting regulations and contribution limitations and with Moneyed Maine's own nervous habit of placing bets on every horse in the race, the days of purchasing politicians are, with rare exceptions, over. .
This is not to say, of course, that politics and money don't enjoy each other's company. They do. But theirs is-a playful, public flirtation, rather than the Gothic Romance of secret trystsand whisperings of public fancy. (I write generally, without consideration of the netherworld of New York City and its Democratic machine.)
Although the keynote of many successful campaigns is dough, money and politics are both a whole lot cleaner than they were just a few decades ago. In the area of campaign financing, the troublesome relationship existing between them is more subtle, sophisticated, and -yes - harmless. The origin and amount of campaign money is imperfect and considered by some to be open to tinkering, but then democracy itself is imperfect (and, in fact, imperfection necessitates democracy as a form of government).
Too often, these two areas - i.e., where the money comes from, and how much money is spent - are mistakenly confused or deliberately confounded for political ends. National Democratic leaders are continually bemoaning the amount of money the Republican Party is able to raise for its candidates, saying that the amount itself is scandalous. The real reason for their consternation is their inability to raise a like sum for the coffers of their own national committee. The facts of public record show that the
MONEY IN MAINE
average contribution to the Republican National Committee (RNC) is about $35. The figure for the Democratic National Committee (DNC), which receives a huge portion of its comparatively smaller budget from political action committees (PACs), unions, corporations, and individual largesse (like Mrs. Ray Kroc's recent gift of a cool million dollars), is "unavailable. "
The Democrats use the smoke screen of how much money is spent to hide the truth that they lack either the technical sophistication or (horrors!) the public appeal to base their political organization on the support of average' American breadwinners contributing $35.
When the RNC's figures were released last fall, out of curiosity I calculated the Maine Republican Party's average contribution. In€luding all donations from PACs, corporations, and individuals, the Maine GOP's average contribution was only about $38 - even I was surprised to learn just how much we depend on grassroots financial participation!
But the Republican Party has to get the facts out. I was amused, and somewhat annoyed, by a recent editorial cartoon in the Maine Sunday Telegram, which depicted an elephantine Karen Stram, chairman of the Maine GOP, sporting a halo and an angelic look and hiding a bulging money bag at her side. Chairman Stram clipped the cartoon (I hope she's not reading this) and sent it to our finance chairman with the note: "Wishful thinking."
It's difficult to see the Maine Republican Party as beholden to Big Business on the strength of a $38 average contribution, but the perception persists. And it's difficult to combat a false impression that is reinforced by incomplete facts and half truths perpetuated by the media and by Democratic leaders who would deal rather with the question of how much money is raised and spent than with the more pointed issue of where the money comes from. AINE'SSENAIDRGeorge Mitchell is currently leading a fight in the U.S.Senate to clean up (again) campaign finan cing.His bill, 5.2, focuses on two concerns: PACsand escalating campaign costs.
Mitchell and other proponents would put "voluntary" limits on spending and PAC contributions, in exchange for public financing of con-
