The Scoutmaster

{{Infobox artwork

| title = The Scoutmaster

| image_file = The Scoutmaster.jpg

| artist = Norman Rockwell

| year = 1956

| medium = Oil on canvas

| height_imperial = 46

| width_imperial = 33

| height_metric = 117

| width_metric = 84

| museum = National Scouting Museum

}}

The Scoutmaster is a 1956 painting by American illustrator Norman Rockwell. It was originally created by Rockwell for the 1956 Brown & Bigelow Boy Scout Calendar. Since then, it has become one of the most collected images that Rockwell created for the Boy Scouts of America.{{cite web|title = The Scoutmaster by Norman Rockwell|url = http://www.bsamuseum.org/Exhibitions/CellPhoneTour.aspx|website = National Scouting Museum|publisher = Boy Scouts of America|access-date = June 3, 2014|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20131204060437/http://www.bsamuseum.org/Exhibitions/CellPhoneTour.aspx|archive-date = December 4, 2013}}

Creation

Rockwell set out to create a painting dedicated to the Scoutmasters of the United States. In 1953, he visited the 4th National Scout jamboree at Irvine Ranch.{{cite web|last1=Oakland Area Council|title=The Scoutmaster by Norman Rockwell|url=http://www.sfbac-history.org/OAC_History2.html|publisher=San Francisco Bay Area Council|access-date=June 3, 2014}} Rockwell, who used photographs as a source for his paintings, was staging a photo shoot at the jamboree. He approached a Scoutmaster from Oakland and asked him for four boys to pose for a photo. One of the four chosen was Howard Lincoln who would become the chairman of Nintendo of America and later the CEO of the Seattle Mariners. Lincoln is directly to the right of the campfire. The four Scouts set up tents and built a fire in the middle of a {{convert|90|F|C}} day.{{cite web|last1=Payne|first1=Patti|title=M's' Lincoln relives Norman Rockwell moment|url=http://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/stories/2005/03/07/newscolumn2.html|publisher=American City Business Journals|access-date=June 3, 2014}} Rockwell found a professional Scouter at the jamboree headquarters to pose as the Scoutmaster for the all-day photo shoot.{{cite journal|last1=Hillcourt|first1=Bill|title=Norman Rockwell|journal=Scouting|date=1978|volume=66|issue=3|page=104}}

Later that year, Lincoln and the other three Scouts each received a $25 check and a letter from Rockwell asking them to sign a release. Over the course of the next three years, Rockwell turned the daytime pictures into a nighttime painting. The tents in the painting were modified to be civilian tents with guylines and sidewalls instead of military-style pup tents. It debuted as the 1956 Boy Scout Calendar published by Brown & Bigelow.

Composition

The painting is a late night scene that features a Scoutmaster, in full uniform, looking into the dying remains of a campfire.{{cite journal|title=Rockwell and Csatari: A tour de force|journal=Scouting|date=2008|volume=96|issue=2|page=6}} The cookware for that night's dinner is still visible. In the background four Scouts are asleep in two tents. Lincoln is in a white shirt directly to the right of the Scoutmaster; his face is visible.

Reception and legacy

The Scoutmaster received praise from Peggy Heinkel-Wolfe who referred it is as one of Rockwell's "master works".{{cite news |last1=Heinkel-Wolfe |first1=Peggy |title=Boy Scout Exhibit Highlights Rockwell's Storytelling Genius |access-date=October 25, 2022 |work=Star-Telegram |date=February 1, 2003 |location=Fort Worth, TX|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/111976520/boy-scout-exhibit-highlights-rockwells/}}

The painting was utilized by the Boy Scouts of America as the cover art for the 1960 edition of the Scoutmaster's Handbook and an issue of the magazine Boys' Life.

The Scoutmaster

Creation

Composition

Reception and legacy

References

Further reading