Eric Sloane and The Roosevelt Field Inn

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From @wilmauch: “Here is a fantastic postcard that features an illustration by Eric Sloane, N.A. sent to me by my good friend and fellow Sloane enthusiast Randy Castellini. You can see that the illustration mimics the type of illustrations that Eric was creating for air fields like Roosevelt Field and Newark Airport. The postmark on the verso of 1940 confirms what we have suspected is the era of these maps. Recall that it was at the Roosevelt Field Inn where Eric Sloane hung one of his first cloudscapes, to which a friend asked him, ‘Who is going to buy a large painting of just the clouds?’ – Sloane had the last laugh, as it was Amelia Earhart who purchased the painting.”
Learn more about how the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum supports and promotes the legacy of Eric Sloane through a robust partnership with the Eric Sloane Museum by visiting us at www.friendsoftheericsloanemuseum.org.

Eric Sloane The Morton Salt Building Mural

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Eric Sloane painted this stunning cloudscape mural in the office of the President of Morton Salt, 1958.
Photo courtesy of Wil Mauch, from his biography of Eric Sloane. Learn more about how the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum supports and promotes the legacy of Eric Sloane through a robust partnership with the Eric Sloane Museum by visiting us at www.friendsoftheericsloanemuseum.org

Eric Sloane’s Long Island Airfields Map

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For our pilot friends – Eric Sloane’s “A Complete Map for Pilots Showing Long Island, New York, and All Nearby Pastures”, 1937. From Symbols of American Spirit: 50 Years of the Eric Sloane Museum by Wil Mauch:
“From the late 1930s to the late 1940s. Eric Sloane illustrated a number of different American airfields, airports, and seaplane basis in comic style. Similar to the way that F.W. Beers & Co. assured the commercial success of their Victorian-era maps and atlases, Eric was sure to include the names of prominent individuals, families, and businesses associated with a particular airfield.”
This is known amongst collectors as a “foil map”, as it was created using a paper backed foil, stamped, then inked. Relatively few of them survive.

Eric Sloane and the Opening of the Eric Sloane Museum

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Pleased to announce that The Eric Sloane Museum opens on April 30th for the 2022 season. Here is a throwback photo of Eric Sloane and his dog “Spooky” on the very first opening day of the museum, 28 May, 1969. From Wil Mauch’s Symbols of American Spirit: 50 Years of the Eric Sloane Museum. Image used by permission of the author.
Learn more about how the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum supports and promotes the legacy of Eric Sloane through a robust partnership with the Eric Sloane Museum by visiting us at www.friendsoftheericsloanemuseum.org.

Eric Sloane with his father

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Eric Sloane at left, his father (George Hinrichs, Sr.) at right. I always thought that, in this photo, Eric bears more than a passing resemblance to Matt Damon. Taken in 1928 at Hot Springs, Arkansas, George was recuperating from pneumonia at the time. Eric’s father would die less than a year later, on the porch of Cedarcrest, the Hinrichs family summer home on Lake Hopatcong, New Jersey. Photo courtesy of Wil Mauch, from his 2001 “Aware: A Retrospective of the Life and Work of Eric Sloane”.
Learn more about how the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum supports and promotes the legacy of Eric Sloane through a robust partnership with the Eric Sloane Museum by visiting us at www.friendsoftheericsloanemuseum.org.

Noah Blake Cabin interior, c. 1974

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An early photograph of the interior of the original Noah Blake cabin on the grounds of the Eric Sloane Museum. We rebuilt that cabin after it was determined to be structurally unsound by the state of Connecticut. We hewed (pun intended) to Eric’s vision of the cabin as he illustrated it in his 1962 classic Diary of an Early American Boy: Noah Blake 1805.
Learn more about the reconstruction of the Noah Blake cabin at https://friendsoftheericsloanemuseum.org/cabin/.

New Initiative at the Eric Sloane Museum

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Two of the nicest gentlemen you would care to meet. On the left is Andrew Rowand, who has done an incredible amount of work as the Site Manager for the museum. Andrew is incredibly hard working, has fantastic ideas, and is very knowledgeable about Eric Sloane, the museum, and many, many historic crafts and trades. He has been a great partner!
On the right is John Pennings, my successor in every meaning of the word. John is a natural leader, and is very skilled and knowledgeable in more things than I can even remember. Thank you, John, for serving as our board president.
We’re surveying the lean-to shed and listening to Andrew’s needs for an enclosed space dedicated to education…it looks as if this will be the next major project that the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum will undertake in support of our mission to assist the museum. We will keep you posted!