Joseph Pennell's Pictures Of War Work In America

JOSEPH PENKELLS PICTURES OF WAR WORK IN AMERICA REPRODUCTIONS OF A SERIES OF LITHO GRAPHS OF MUNITION WORKS MADE BY HIM WITH THE PERMISSION AND AUTHORITY OF THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT, WITH NOTES AND AN INTRODUCTION BY THE ARTIST PHILADELPHIA AND LONDON J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY 1918, 1Q1S, BY JOSEPH 1918 INTRODUCTION MY LITHOGRAPHS OF WAR WORK I HAVE come back from the Jaws of Death back from the Mouth of Hell to my own land, my own people. I have never passed such an exciting year in my life and beside, I hope I have been able to accomplish something in my work which shall show one phase of the Wonder of the Worlds Work of to-day. I was honoured a year ago by being permitted by the Rt. Hon. David Lloyd George, then Minister of Munitions in England, to make drawings in the vari ous factories and works and shipyards which were engaged in war work in that country and the records of what I saw were published as lithographs of War Work in England and in a previous volume in this series. Now, though I do not believe in war, I do not see why some pictorial record of what is being done to carry on the war should not be made made from an artists standpoint for we are in it being in the world but I am not of it. When my work or as much of it as I was allowed to do was finished and exhibited and published I was invited by the French Minister of Munitions, M. Albert Thomas, to visit the front and make studies of similar subjects in France, but owing to a com bination of unfortunate circumstances though I went to France twice during the Summer of this year, I was unable to get anything of importance. This was my fault, or my misfortune I failed and the memory of my failure will haunt me, and be acause of regret to me, all my life unless I am able to wipe out my failure in another visit to France. But though I failed to make any drawings any records of the subjects I was so freely shown I was shown on my two visits many subjects, which were supremely interesting, could I have but drawn them had I been able to do so they would have been worth doing. Not only was I taken to the front, which was not the part I saw, picturesque, but I was also taken to see some of those parts of France which have been fought over, some of the towns which have been destroyed, some of the land which is desolate, and I have also seen some of the French munition factories. Then I came home, for I believe the place for an American at the present time is at home. And on my arrival I was authorized to make records by our Government similar to those I had made in England, and had failed to make in France what I have done in the United States is shown in this hook. I have had more opportunities of seeing what is being done in war work in England, France and the United States than any one else and in a fashion that no one else has been permitted to see. I have seen war in the making. Yet I did not do these drawings with any idea of helping to win the war, but because for years I have been at work from my earliest drawings trying to record The Wbnder of TVork, and work never was so wonderful as it is to-day. And never had any one such help such aid, such encouragement given him to record its wonder and by the Governments of the three great coun tries which are engaged in this incredibly horrible, absolutely unneces sary war, easily avoided war, to quote a British Statesman. Not only have I seen the Wonder ofWork in these three lands but before the war I saw it in Belgium, Germany and Italy. I have drawn it everywhere, save in Luxembourg, and there, too, I have seen it but made no drawings for it was so easy to get to that land and so that country was put off for a more convenient season a season I fear which will never come again. I ana not going to make com parisons but I am going to say that the TV onder of Work is more wonderful in the United States than anywhere else in the world to-day...