Sea Painter

Henry Reuterdahl, whose paint brush earned him the rank of Lieutenant Commander, U. S. N., died last week in Washington. Most of his paintings are unsalable because they are plastered to public buildings or warships, but even were they salable there would be no fluttering of art dealers excited by unspeakable profits. For Reuterdahl was not an artist; he was a craftsman; his craft, the faultless delineation of a ship. Not for him was the cloudy, light-streaked glory of Turner's seas; not for him the salty terror of Winslow Homer's rockbound coast; Reuterdahl never played ghost with John Masefield's Wanderer; Reuterdahl went with natty-suited officers of the U. S. N. Yet, as a craftsman he was master of color. He could brighten the bulkhead of an officer's messroom. He could color the Missouri Capitol with brilliant sea-script proclaiming, "We [the Navy] Are Ready Now." The Naval Academy received ten of his paintings as the gift of the late George von L. Meyer. With more delicate panels he made gay the steam yacht Noma for Vincent Astor, the schooner yacht Vagrant for Harold S. Vanderbilt, the yacht Viking for George F. Baker Jr. Among yachtsmen and Navymen, wherever he went, he made paintings, made friends.