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4-16-1958 Congressional Record Reprint - Statue of Charles M. Russell Mike Mansfield 1903-2001
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This Speech is brought to you for free and open access by the Mike Mansfield Papers at ScholarWorks at University of Montana. It has been accepted for inclusion in Mike Mansfield Speeches by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks at University of Montana. For more information, please contact [email protected]. 1958 April 16 CONGRES AL RECORD- SENATE 5795 regulations al!'ecting railroad transportation: (See the remarks or Mr. HUMPHREY when Now, therefore, be It he Introduced the above blll, which appear Resolved, That the clerk o! the board be under a separate heading.) dlre~tPrl to ~Pnd a coov o! this resolution from foreign co By Mr. IVES: togc xhlbition at th S. 3629. A bill to authorize certain beach Sen. Statement of e held at Loulsvllle, erosion control of the short or the State of IVES thont payment or t!l New York !rom Fire Island Inlet to Jones sup) SENATOR MIKE MANSFIELD Joses (Rept. No. 1436). Inlet; to the Committee on Public Works. o! t (D. Montana) On the introduction of OF JOINT COMMI E ON STATUE OF CHARLES M. RUSSELL RE: legislation to accept RUCTION OF BUILDING FOR Mr. MANSFIELD. Mr. President, to Charles M. Russell statue SEUM OF HISTORY AND day I am pleased to announce to the IOLOGY FOR THE SMITH Senate that the State of Montana will ~ in Statuary Hall una N INSTITUTION
Mike Mansfield Papers, Series 21, Box 39, Folder 50, Mansfield Library, University of Montana 5796 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD- SENATE April 16 tunda of the Capitol; and the printing of Montana Is proud of her adopted son, charted northwest wilderness to explore the Charlie Russell. No one has ever painted vast new lands acquired under the Louisiana the installation proceedings. her portral t so vigorously or so well. No one, Purchase. In conclusion, Mr. President, I ask In word, picture, or by any other device, has Four of the Bent offsprings-Charles, unanimous consent that there be printed yet captured the pioneer flavor of the West's George, Robert, and Wllham-qulckly be in the RECORD, at the conclusion of my formative years more vividly. came Identified wl th the bazacdous frontier remarks, three commendations of Rus The Charles M. Russell Room at the new fur trade. George was among the early white sell: Charles Marion Russell, a Brief Historical Society Museum In Helena, Mont., Americans to trod what was to become houses one of the world's finest collections Montana soil, trapping for the American Fur Commentary by Old Friends; Russell, of C. M. R .'s lmpenshable art; more than Co., as early as 1816. William and Charles Artist or Illustrator? by K. Ross Toole; 100 choice Items. Many of these are now achieved the greatest fame. William was and, c. M. R., He-Man Artist of a Raw being reproduced exclusively by the U. 0. identified with the famous adobe outpost Boned Era, by Michael Kennedy. Colson Co., of Paris, Ill. known as Bent's Fort. He built a trading There being no objection, the com post in 1824 on the Arkansas River and was mendations were ordered to be printed RUSSELL, ARTIST OR ILLUSTRATOR? considered one of the first permanent white (By K. Ross Toole) settlers in what later became Colorado. An in the RECORD, as follows: Intimate of such mountain men as Kit Car CHARLES MARION RUSSELL, A BRIEF COMMEN There has long been an argument ln certain son and the Intrepid Jim Bridger, Wllliam TARY BY OLD FRIENDS circles as to whether Charles M. Russell was Bent was a prototype of the rugged breed Will Rogers once said, "Charlle Russell an artist or an illustrator. He thought of who first peopled the Rocky Mountain region. wasn't just another artist. He wasn't 'just himself as an Illustrator, but lt ls doubtful It was inevitable that he should be the boy that he would ever have entered in the argu another· anything." hood hero of Charley Russell; even though ment himself, pro or con. He painted what And J . Frank Doble, the sage Texan who Charles Bent, who was active ln the Santa Fe he saw and what be knew. And he painted trade, achieved a higher station In life. He has chronicled the West so well, has written: with a ftdellty that bas seldom been matched "One cannot imagine Charles M. Russell was Governor of New Mexico Territory when by any Illustrator. Yet Russell's works are killed by Pueblo Indians, at Taos. In 1847 living in a world without horses. If the notable not merely because be knew the wheel had never been devised, he could have Charley Russell started sketching and horse, the Indian, and the Montana land modeling at an early age. He sketched from been content. The steamboat had carried scape. Russell was painting and sculpting a traders and trappers up the Missouri River llve models and preferred clandestine visits vanishing era and a vanishing race, and he to the teeming river front where the bearded and become a feature ln the pageant of the knew lt. Unlike the vast majority of his con West before he was born; he accepted the buckskin men were unloading furs from temporaries, he saw the inherent dignity ln mackinaws and .bullboats; or loadh1g vital steamboat, respected lt. When, ln 1880, at the Indian and he was acutely conscious of the age of 16, he went to Montana, he trav cargo aboard the river craft headed back to the tragedy involved In the Indian's pllght. the frontier-to school. He preferred al eled by the raUway to Its end and then took In the 1880's, when the sentiment that "the the stage. The Far West was at that time most anything to school. Even a term In a only good Indian ls a dead Indian," was stlll New J ersey mllltary academy failed to dis stlll an unfenced and comparatively unoc strong In the West, Russell lived with the cupied expanse of grass and mountains; he tract his fanciful mind from things west Bloods and came to understand them. More, ern. So Charley's merchant father devised accepted and respected the steam engine as he came to admire and respect their way of one of its features. As lt hauled ln plows, a scheme; sent him to the raw hinterland llfe. This ls either explicit or Implicit ln all and cure him, once and for all, of those ro barbed wire, and people, be would, had be his pain tlngs of Indians. had the power, have J osbuaed the sun to a mantic notions. Travellng by way of the Whlle many a story about Russell has pic Utah Northern Rallroad and stagj!coach with permanent standstlll. The Russell genius tured him as a cowboy first and an artist was ad verse to change. an adult famlly friend named Pike Mlller, the second, s=h Is not the case. He was more a 16-year-old boy rolled Into the gold mining "Russell's devotion to old times, old ways, phllosopher than a cowhand, more a trans city of Helena, In the spring of 1880. As the old West did not come from age. It was lator than a doer, and all these elements of related, many years later, by his wHe Marne: congenital. Even ln Infancy be p)ctured the his nature came out in his brush and finger "When they arrl ved there, the streets were West of Indians, spaces, and outlanders, and tips. knew what he wanted. • • • He wanted lined wit h freight outfits. He saw bull He was immensely conservative; he de teams, with their dusty whackers, swinging room; be wanted to be left alone; he belleved tested the change that was putting an end to In other people being le!t alone. • • • In 16-foot lashes with riftelike reports over 7 the way of life he loved and to the open or 8 yoke teams; their string of. talk profane one respect be was far ahead of his contem range that gave him a sense of freedom he poraries, who generally_ said that the only and hide blistering as their whips, but un could find nowhere else. There ls a poignant derstood by every bull, mulesklller or jerk good Indian was a dead Indian. He bad nostalgia In most of his work subsequent to profound sympathy for the Plains Indians. llne man. • • • It was also ration time for 1900 which Is a reflection of a genuine sad the Indians, so the red men were standing • • • When sometimes he spoke of 'my peo ness. It ls this feeling In his work that sets ple,' he meant the horseback Indians. He or riding ln that quiet way of theirs, all him apart from his Imitators. wearing skin leggings and robes. • • • The called the white man nature's enemy. The Charles Russell was a strange mixture of Indians harmonized with nature and bad no picturesqueness of 1t all filled the heart and more desire to conquer lt or alter any aspect strength and weakness. He was no business soul of this youthful traveler." man and he left the matter of commerclal of lt than a cottontall rabbit. The total population of Montana Territory lzlng his work to his shrewd wife. He drank was less than 40,000 at that time. "Over and over, he pictured schooners, too much whisky with old cronies. His freight wagons, packhorses, Indian buffalo loyalty to the old things and the old times Pike Miller had a sheep ranch In the newly hunters, cowboys, Northwest mounted· po was Intense and he was always an easy touch. opened Judith basinland just wrested from llee, horse thieves, stage robbers, and other His humor was much llke that of his good the Indians and buffalo and made more horseback men. Bull whackers, muleskln friend, Wlll Rogers-wry, often turned on secure by the building of Fort Maginnis. ners, stage drivers, and their contemporaries himself, sometimes a llttle satlrlcal. In short, Charley soon left Mlller and teamed up with of the frontier were as congenial to him as Charles M. Russell, as Wlll Rogers put lt, was Jake Hoover, hunter. trapper, and compatible 'Nature's cattle,' among which the coyote "a real downright, honest to God human companion. In 2 years, under able tutelage, and the tortoise were ln as good standing as being." And that is another thing that sepa he learned much about wlldllfe, the raw the elk and the antelope. • . • • rates Russell from his imitators. country, and its inhabitants, both white and red. "Russell's opposition to change was but Russell has become part myth, part legend the' obverse of his concentration upon the ln Montana, and he is rapidly coming to His father's plan had gone astray. Money old. His art can be comprehended only occupy a similar position throughout the for Charley to return home with was re through an understanding of his conserva country. This ls the case not merely because turned. When the boy had saved enough tism. It was not the conservatism of the he was a good painter and sculptor of roman of biB own earnings from trapping, he did privileged who resent change because tic subjects, but because behind his work waa return ln 1882. But St. Louis was dull and change wlll take away their prlvlleges. It a man In love with a vanishing age and Its colorless now. Charley left after 4 months, was the conservatism of love and loyalty," people. never to leave his adopted State of Montana Doble says. again, except for Infrequent visits here and Wlll Rogers also said: "He loved nature abroad. c . M. R .• HE-MAN OF A RAW-BONED ERA everything he painted God had made. In "Kid" Russell hired out as a night wrangler people, he loved human nature. In stories, (By Michael Kennedy) to the first cow outfit he struck after his ar he loved human interest. You never saw Charles M. Russell was born with an In rival In Bllllngs. They tralled a thousand one ot his paintings that you couldn't tell herent love of the western frontier. That cattle into the Judith Basin. Then came just what the Indians, the horse, and the was In St. Louis, Mo., historic river town, jobs with other cow outfits. In the winter buffalo were thinking about. • • • He was on March 19, 1864; the year that Montana of 1886- 87 he pain ted his fabulous postcard a great story teller. • • • He not only left us Territory was created. His heritage was deep size Waiting for a Chinook, which informed great llvlng pictures of what our West was, ly rooted. Russell's paternal grandparent, Stadler and Kaufman, in Helena, that the but he left u s an example of how to llve In Sllas Bent. later a noted frontier judge, ar tragic hard winter which marked the decline friendship with all mankind. A real, down rived In St. Louis ln 1804, as the Lewis and or open-range ranching, had wiped out their right, honest-to-God human being." Clark Expect! tlon was departing for the un- herd of 5,000 Bar R cattle.
Mike Mansfield Papers, Series 21, Box 39, Folder 50, Mansfield Library, University of Montana 1958 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD- SENATE 5797 In 1888. 'Russell, who was painting and The concurrent resolution Mike Mansfield Papers, Series 21, Box 39, Folder 50, Mansfield Library, University of Montana