Many years ago on a hot summer Saturday, I helped my wife’s mother’s second husband clean out the home of his first wife’s aunt, an elderly woman he had looked after for many years, hurrying over to close her windows when a thunderstorm was coming, doing her grocery shopping, driving her to the doctor. She had shared the house with her sister and brother-in-law, but they were dead, and now she was in a nursing home. I was a willing volunteer. I love old stuff. I love kitchen drawers, desk drawers and dresser drawers. I love basements and attics, especially attics. In this particular attic, where the temperature was about 110 degrees, I found an old green metal box with a tight fitting lid. It was amidst some newspapers and magazines that were destined for the curb. I lifted the box’s lid, and said aloud, “Eureka.” A latter-day Aladdin, I had stumbled upon the brother-in-law’s personal library.
On top was a copy of Captain Billy’s Whiz Bang, a title I had always thought of as mythical. With trembling hands I put the lid back on, carried the box downstairs into cooler strata, went outside and said to my wife’s mother’s second husband, “I found some magazines. Can I take them home?” And he said, “Sure!” It was one of the happiest moments of my life.
At home, in the cool of the evening, I cataloged my new treasures. Captain Billy was only the beginning. Next were copies of Calgary Eye Opener, filled with jokes about drinking and fast women. Then several copies of Ballyhoo, filled with jokes about drinking and fast women.
Finally, the mother lode: From the 1920’s, copies of Art & Beauty Magazine for Art Lovers and Art Students. Carl was an Art Lover for sure, and so was I. In between ads for Crayola Crayons and one-page articles about Renoir were sepia-toned photos of young women draped in sheer gauze and holding glass spheres, up high, as if to catch the light.
In some pictures, the models were draped with silk and reclining on divans. In others, they cavorted in the forest like fairies. When not posing for great artists, the captions informed me, these young ladies appeared on stage in the Ziegfeld Follies, Earl Carroll’s Vanities, George White’s Scandals. I began to recognize recurring favorites: Jewel La Kota, the Philbin Sisters, Frances Norman, who seemed up for anything. Oh my.
Of course, my attitude toward this windfall was one of reverence. I nodded as I read the words of Edwin Bower Hesser in his Arts Monthly Pictorial of September 1926:
“Copies falling into the hands of utter laymen should not be misunderstood — we beg you to realize that in the realm of art the undraped body is an essential — that it is the basis of practically all design and all decoration. The young ladies who have posed for these pictures have done so in sincerity and as an aid to artistic development — they are entitled to respect. Even if you are not one of the inner circle devoting their whole lives to art, try to look at these pictures only in the light of understanding and appreciation of the beauty given to the world by its Creator. This magazine was founded on a basis of cleanliness and seeking after truth — its editors believe that in the perfect human body is the hope of a greater America for the future, a pure, clean womanhood and masculine minds of understanding and sympathy.”
There was so much to be reverent about. Thelma Hill from the Mack Sennett comedies, the cast of Shubert’s “A Night in Paris” and individual photos of Catherine Gallimore and Helen Gay, more lovelies from the Earl Carroll Vanities — Eileen Adair, Zena Trett, Nina Sorrell, Peggy Shannon, Rose Marie Haynes, Florence Ward, Greta Garde, Peggy Driscoll and Rose Wenzel. More showgirls with names like Eva Tanguay (Miss ‘I Don’t Care’ in a costume made primarily from long feathers), Helen Wherle, Billee Bostick, Lottie Marcy, Cloy St. Claire and Ripples Covert. Plus Miss Alaska, Helmar Liederman.
There were photos by Alfred Cheney Johnston, William Henningsen, Harold Dean Carsey, Ness, Smythe, J. W. Pondelicek (who discovered beauty among the sand dunes of Lake Michigan), Paul Broadly, John De Mirjian, and Edwin Bower Hesser. And, as you would expect, poetry from Swinburne, Milton and Tennyson elevated the tone.
I wondered if the brother-in-law ever thought about who might find his collection one day. Would it be his widow? A neighbor? A stranger? Would someone appreciate it as much as he had? He needn’t have worried.
* * *
Photos: Art & Beauty, January 1928, photo by Lejaren A. Hiller; the model is Mary Phillips of the Ziegfeld Follies. Rose Marie Haynes of Earl Carroll’s Vanities appears in an uncredited photo in an undated issue of All Arts & Photos. Lastly, the cover of Edwin Bower Hesser’s Arts Monthly Pictorial, September 1926, model unnamed.
Faithful Readers 
Hi……..
My story is a bit like yours. We had a live in housekeeper fro some 15 years. We were called one day from people in Canoga Park CA. The housekeepers sister had more less “Gone Oover The Edge” mentally. My parents, bother and I drove to rescue her and bring her back to her home city. Spokane Wa.
We found her living in great dispare in the home she and her husband had purchased many years earlier. They had $ from his work with Jean Harlow. Her husband was “The Edwin Bower Hesser”!
My brother and I slept in his art studio below the house on street level.
We did bring Eva his wife, model and muse back to Spokane. She lived in our house for a year.
We did bring a few treasures back from their house….If we had more time and $ we should have rented a u haul and filled the massive collection of his work there in his studio.
My mom called St. Vincent De Paul to come and get a key to the house. This was in 1969.
It is my understanding that a great deal of his photos negatives etc did finally make it to UCLA Special Collections.
Doug Foland Portland OR.
Thank you so much for adding this! Indeed, I do hope Hesser’s work found a good home.
Wow what a find, you must have been very excited. But no Louise Brooks in there? That’s a shame, she did pop up in a few of these, especially AMP…
Actually, I do have one of Lulu; it is quite magical.
That’s terrific, can we prevail upon you for a scan then please? 😀
Hello.
I have been working on a book since September 2012.
“A Tribute To Edwin Bower Hesser And His Wife Eve.”
There are a couple of publishing groups looking at it.
I have several options. Amazon – E bay – I’m getting an ISBN #
See a preview at http://www.Hesserphotobook.com – http://www.edwinbowerhesser.com
Thanks…. Have a great Spring. Doug Foland Portland OR.
Doug, I wish you every success. I think Hesser’s work was magical. Kihm
[…] Art & Beauty showcases a less well-known side of him: the lifelong junk shop rummager and connoisseur of vintage media, which he values for the craftsmanship of “the golden age of graphic art”. Published in 1996 and 2002, with the third volume yet to hit the streets, the project was inspired by a soft porn magazine of the 1920s that smuggled risque photographs past the censor under the titular fig leaf Art & Beauty Magazine for Art Lovers and Art Students. […]
[…] Art & Beauty showcases a less well-known side of him: the lifelong junk shop rummager and connoisseur of vintage media. Published in 1996 and 2002, with the third volume yet to hit the streets, the project was inspired by a soft porn magazine of the 1920s that smuggled risque photographs past the censor under the titular fig leaf Art & Beauty Magazine for Art Lovers and Art Students. […]
I have the copy with All -Arts & Photos Quarterly Spring-Summer Edition withThelma Hill on the cover and on the back cover featuring From Shubert’s “A Night in Paris.” The condition is fair as the pages are very fragile and deteriorating on the bottom of some of the pages. There are 80 pages, with the cover and the back cover separated from the magazine. All other pages are intact. Magazine I guess is 89 years old, so considering the age, it is in fairly good shape. The price is .35 cents. Could not find the year, but probably around 1928. Does anyone have a guess at value. Thanks.
Judith, I can’t say specifically, but I sold several of these on eBay for about $50 – $75 each.
[…] Art & Beauty showcases a less well-known side of him: the lifelong junk shop rummager and connoisseur of vintage media, which he values for the craftsmanship of the golden age of graphic art. Published in 1996 and 2002, with the third volume yet to hit the streets, the project was inspired by a soft porn magazine of the 1920s that smuggled risque photographs past the censor under the titular fig leaf Art & Beauty Magazine for Art Lovers and Art Students. […]