LARGE 48″ x 24” PAINTING: Ocean Scene with seagull.
Artist: Painted in 1972 by Barbara Barry Thompson, aka Babah Hanson, mother of actress Lea Thompson. Read more complete information about this accomplished artist, below.
The Story behind this painting: Barbara Barry Thompson told the story to this exceptional painting in this July 20th 2008 interview archived in the Daily Inter Lake newspaper of Kalispell, Montana, titled “Painting a Life” –
Description: Large Black and Yellow Wave Painting with Red Splat and Cloth Media, Painting on stretched canvas.
PRINT: DOONESBURY CARTOON
Description: Cartoon strip mentioning Jonathan Livingston Seagull
Description: Framed photo of Richard Bach flying a biplane, possibly a Travel Air.
PHOTO: Color photo of Richard Bach, taken in-flight, flying his BD-5J Jet, estimated late 1975.
We believe this photo was made during a photo shoot for Flying Magazine, which ran an article about Richard Bach and his BD-5J at about that time.
You can find out more about this aircraft and Richard Bach’s involvement with it, and see what the original version of this photo looked like, here. There is also a copy of the original photo from the Flying Magazine article here.
Title: “Galaxy”. White splatter on black background
Artist: Richard Bach
Year (estimated): Early 1970’s
Description: Original painting on “Fredrix” Canvas Panel.
Photo: Grumman Goose over water
Presumed owner of aircraft: Richard Bach
Rejection Letter: Upon opening the acrylic photo frame of this Grumman Goose photo shown below, a rejection letter from Readers Digest was discovered carefully hidden in the back of the frame.
It is dated November 30th 1976, and advises ‘Eleanor’ that Readers Digest would not be interested in publishing Richard Bach’s book “Illusions”.
The book was subsequently published the following year, 1977, by Dell Books, and went on to sell over 15 million copies.
We believe that the Eleanor addressed in this letter was Eleanor Friede, a book editor at Macmillan book publishing, who in 1969 recommended Richard Bach’s book “Jonathan Livingston Seagull” to her senior editors for publication.
The incredible story about how Richard Bach beat the MIT mainframe computer while sitting at his terminal 1,350 miles away in Florida, was described by him in an article in the New York Times published July 18th 1975. Thanks to the archives of the NYT, that story can be read here.