Bangor painter murdered by her lover has artwork up for public sale this weekend
Bangor native Helena Wooden Smith was a proficient panorama painter, and in 1910 had arrange among the many inventive glitterati of Carmel-by-the-Sea, a bohemian enclave close to Monterey, California, hobnobbing with the likes of writers Jack London and Upton Sinclair and painter William Merritt Chase.
However Smith would solely take pleasure in just a few years within the seemingly idyllic inventive neighborhood. Her life was minimize quick in 1914 at age 49 when she was murdered by her lover, photographer George Kodani, who was later convicted of strangling her and burying her physique on the seaside in Carmel.
Earlier than she was residing la vie boheme in California, she was the daughter of a well-to-do Bangor household that valued and inspired creativity. Her father, Ruel Smith, was the longtime courtroom clerk for Penobscot County, and her youthful brother, Perley, would develop as much as be an editor for Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World newspaper, and in addition write the favored Rival Camper sequence of boy’s books, all set in Maine.
Smith went to Bangor Excessive College, and after graduating taught artwork lessons to native college students. She was among the many first college students on the Pratt Institute in New York, which was based in 1887, and in addition studied with Boston painter Charles Woodbury. Her work was exhibited in artwork reveals in Boston, New York, Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia.
Round 1904, Smith left Bangor and moved to New York, the place she taught for a time on the Pratt Institute. She then moved to Minneapolis earlier than heading to California in 1909, finally settling in Carmel-by-the-Sea. She obtained a big inheritance when her father died in 1908 that allowed her to purchase a bungalow in Carmel, which she reworked into an artwork studio the place she entertained fellow artists and plenty of friends from Bangor. She taught lessons on the famed Carmel Arts and Crafts Membership,
It was on this inventive, freewheeling setting that Smith first met Kodani, son of a distinguished Japanese American household in Monterey. Whereas many particulars of their relationship won’t ever be identified, it appears clear that that they had a romantic connection. Whereas Kodani was a well known native photographer who had turn out to be part of the Carmel artwork scene, California had an extended historical past of anti-Asian racism, and miscegenation legal guidelines made it unlawful for folks of two totally different races to be collectively or marry.
There was a lot hypothesis across the time of Smith’s homicide, however there are some undisputed information concerning the crime. On Aug. 12, 1914, Smith went lacking from her Carmel dwelling, final seen that afternoon with Kodani. Her canine was additionally lacking. Kodani was questioned by the police, however maintained he’d merely visited together with her for a short while after which left. A observe was later discovered floating within the driveway, purportedly written by Smith however presumably written by Kodani, claiming she was out of city for just a few days.
Carmel residents started combing the realm for indicators of Smith, and Kodani was nowhere to be discovered. Native newspapers printed lurid, racist headlines that every one however convicted Kodani, and reporters even tried to attach him to an tried homicide earlier that yr, additionally in Carmel. Kodani was lastly arrested on Aug. 22, and on Aug. 23, a search get together found Smith’s physique on the seaside. She had been bludgeoned within the face, a rope was tightly wound round her neck, and she or he was wrapped in a rug and buried within the sand.
After being offered with pictures of Smith’s physique, Kodani confessed to murdering her, claiming that they had had a “lover’s quarrel” and he then snapped and attacked her. He went to trial in October — extremely rapidly by at the moment’s requirements — and was sentenced to life in jail. He spent the following 32 years at Folsom State Jail, earlier than being paroled in 1946.
Again dwelling in Maine, the Bangor Each day Information extensively lined Smith’s homicide and the next homicide trial. Over the previous century, her work have sometimes been displayed in Maine, together with a big exhibition of feminine painters from Bangor, held in 1993 by the Bangor Historic Society and the Maine Humanities Council.
Her work remained well-liked with rich Mainers for a lot of a long time. A number of of these work ended up within the palms of Newburgh uncommon bookseller and artwork collector Gary Woolson, who for years collected works by Maine artists. When Woolson died in January, Scott DeWolfe and Frank Wooden, uncommon e-book and vintage sellers based mostly in Alfred, purchased his assortment, together with 4 work by Smith.
These Smith work can be up for public sale this weekend on the Downeast Artwork & Antiques Present in Blue Hill, Aug. 2-4.
