William Draper interview - Session 2 .MR. MCNAUGHT: Friday, June 3, 1977, William McNaught talking to William Draper. MR. DRAPER: Well then I told about the Captain, just trying to get going, being at Adak and the unattractive lieutenant commander. Well, then as I said Sam Hammill and I who was the assistant executive -- the executive officer of the base, we left on the Arthur Middleton. Didn't I tell about this, the Arthur Middleton and the boats breaking apart? I think I did, didn't I? MR. MCNAUGHT: Yes, you did. MR. DRAPER: Oh, well, there's no point of going to that now. Then I came back to Washington. Did I say -- where did I end on that Amchitka note I wonder? ] MR. DRAPER: Now I know where to go. We were on Amchitka and I told about the planes dropping the bombs each day and my -- and how if it hit the tundra the bomb did no damage unless it made a direct hit. MR. MCNAUGHT: Yes. MR. DRAPER: Well, I was there for about a month and they were draining this lake, turning a lake into an airfield, and it was amazing the Seabees the work they did there. There were no Japanese on Amchitka as I said. We expected them but they weren't there. They were on Kiska and Attu. For 30 days they worked in putting down the steel sections and made this airstrip. One day nine or ten Japanese planes came over to bomb and our air cover you see would go back to Adak to get back before dark. So they would come over late thinking that the planes must have gone back to Adak. This time we fooled them. They came over and our planes came up off the Amchitka field and shot them all down, every one. So they didn't -- they realized then there was an airport, which was right very near Adak and Kiska. So we had -- I mean, near Kiska and Attu. So that helped later in covering the landings, which I didn't go on those. I went back on a transport. Now I'll tell you on this, trying to get off Adak after I got back this little captain or little executive officer -- I don't know whether I told you how he pulled my beard. I had grown a bear in Amchitka and when I came back I went in to report to him. He yanked me by the beard and said, "Why have you got that beard? You shouldn't have a beard. You know it's against regulations." And everybody who had been in Amchitka had grown a beard because you didn't -- you weren't allowed to shave and -- well, you weren't allowed, you could shave but it was so difficult to get the hot water. We were all living in tents. It was the most insulting thing that could happen. If I had gone to Harvard and known Navy regs I would have known that anybody who touches you physically, whether it's an admiral or anything you can hit them. I being a boxer anyway could have really -- could have knocked him down, smashed his face. I don't know why it was so insulting. Well anyway, I was there for about three days and my orders, I got orders to return to Washington. So there was a big transport out and refueling out in the bay, out in -- about 12 miles out in the Bering Sea. I asked if I could go out, have a boat bring me out there. He said, "No, you'll have to wait for the mail boat." And I said, "Well, that's ridiculous. I may miss the transport." "I don't care, Draper. You're going to have to miss the transport then. You'll have to wait for the regular mail boat." Oh, I was furious because he could have sent me. The captain of the port he told me that this boat was there. So I finally got on the mail boat when it took off and it went out, chugging out to sea on these tremendous waves, I mean big swells. They must have been 20 feet high, wide you know, big as you got out into the Bering Sea. I saw this big transport and a big, whatever they were, oil refueling ship. Just as we were coming up to it the lines dropped and they got finished their refueling and the transport started getting underway. So we came along side the transport, and this was in February or March. I mean, it was very cold. MR. MCNAUGHT: Of 1943? MR. DRAPER: Nineteen forty-three.. Well, the landing at Amchitka had been in January, so this must have been in February after I got back. I got up alongside and they threw over a little rope ladder over the side of the transport. I had on heavy sheepskin pilot's boots and a big heavy sheepskin coat and Army gear, and my paintings and down a little boat. So I saw this ladder and I grabbed at it and got the last rung in the ladder. Then of course the little boat I was in slipped away from under me, I mean because it just went down. Here I was hanging on the side of the transport and I couldn't -- I never was very good at chinning myself anyway but with all that weight, hanging on the side, and I was really -- I could have -- if I -- I could have dropped into the sea you see and gone back under the propellers. They never would have found me and that water was just like it was in January and those sailors, less than five minutes when that destroyer broke apart. Well, I hung on for dear life and looking down hoping that the boat would appear underneath me. When I saw it right underneath I let go and dropped back into the boat, which was lucky. Then they sent over a cargo net, swung it out on a boom with a net and lowered that. I stuck myself through like toothpaste into the cargo net. And then, zoom, I came up and landed on the deck. Then I remember saying, "Where are my paints? My paints, where are my paints," yelling around for all the paintings I had done. MR. MCNAUGHT: They were still in the boat? MR. DRAPER: Still in the boat. Well, then I saw them -- and Grady Cochrane who was the captain of the ship I had come to Adak with said, "What did you do?" He said, "What are you doing here, Draper," having seen me come over the side. And I said, "Don't talk to me now. I have a splitting headache and I'm looking for my gear." I remember that. Then suddenly over the side it came in the net, the paintings and all my gear. MR. MCNAUGHT: Where did you keep getting canvases and supplies? MR. DRAPER: I brought it all with me. MR. MCNAUGHT: You did? MR. DRAPER: Oh, it was a big -- MR. MCNAUGHT: It must have been big. MR. DRAPER: Oh, yeah, it was a terrible nuisance. Well, then I got back to Washington and this I think is the most amazing thing. I was walking down a corridor in the Navy Department, talk about fate. I was walking down the corridor and as I went by this door I heard this phrase, "But Draper is not a portrait painter," just as I went by the door. So I opened the door and looked in and saw two commanders talking and I said, "My name is Draper and I am a portrait painter," not taking it as a criticism. So they said, "Let's see some of your work." And I said -- showed them portraits I had done because I had shown none when I wanted to get in as a combat artist. They sent me down on temporary additional duty to paint Admiral Beardall at the Naval Academy. After I had done that they gave me specific orders to paint Admiral Nimitz in Pearl Harbor and Admiral Halsey in Newmire you see. So that was very lucky. Well, then I did, then I went on out to the Pacific and saw Admiral Nimitz in Pearl Harbor and I painted him. He posed for one hour for five days. It turned out very well at the time until I later saw it at a distance and it sort of fell apart. I'll tell you it was -- well, later on I was having a show in Boston and I had Admiral Nimitz's portrait hanging in the hallway and people said, "Why do you got Admiral Nimitz's in the hallway?" And I said, "Oh, well, you know the war is over and we don't want to concentrate on these things." There was one of Admiral Halsey in the big room so this one I had left here. The real reason I did that, if you get away -- MR. MCNAUGHT: People couldn't see it. MR. DRAPER: And you couldn't see it far away because I painted him, I had to sit down and paint him being away, about four feet away, and he was sitting at his desk. There's no room to back up and see what it looked like. MR. MCNAUGHT: On the ship? MR. DRAPER: No, this was in Pearl Harbor, on land. But he was too busy. He wasn't going to make a model stand and do all of that, which Halsey did in the South Pacific. So it looked fine to me but I never could get off to see what it looked like at a distance and people would come in and look over and say, "Oh, that's great." Well, in five days I did it but it wasn't one of my best because you had to look at him so close. But then Admiral Nimitz told me all kinds of interesting things. I used to do target practice with him. He told me there were going to be these two landings in November. This was about October I guess I went out again to the Pacific. He told me there was a landing in -- I may have gone in September, but he told me there were two landings taking place in November, one in the South Pacific at Bougainville, I believe it was the 12th of November, and one in the Central Pacific at Terawaw [phonetic] on the 1st of November. You see I was in public relations. I had to sort of get all this information myself. So he told me this and I said, "Well, I would prefer to go to the one in Bougainville so I can go down to Namur beforehand and paint Admiral Halsey." It's a lucky thing I did because if I had landed at Terawaw I wouldn't be here to tell the story because that was a terrible landing as you know. I would have waded in from the landing boat up to my neck and had to walk in for half a mile and then I would be shot as you walked in. If you turned around to swim out to the ships you would be shot as a deserter. So it was a terrible landing. And so then I went to Namur, painted Admiral Halsey with the Japanese -- in the Japanese consulate's house where he had a studio built, I mean had a model stand built and posed an hour each day too, but he would sit up in the model stand and I had perfect light. I had a Japanese screen I remember that was there of these Japanese running for shelter from the storm and the storm was Halsey I said. So I put that in the background. Life Magazine wanted it for a cover and the Navy wouldn't release it to them when it got back because they couldn't understand why I put a Japanese background behind Halsey. I suppose they wanted the American flag, I don't know. But I didn't explain to them. I thought it was quite obvious what it was all about, you know. So -- MR. MCNAUGHT: When you would finish a portrait, say the one of Admiral Halsey, what did you do with it? I mean, did you -- MR. DRAPER: I would let it dry and I had to write a report every day more or less or every week. I would send a report to Washington of what I had done that week. MR. MCNAUGHT: Did you send the work, the painting actually to Washington or did you take it with you? MR. DRAPER: Oh, yes. I would have it sent. It would be -- they would be flown every so much. About every month a group of eight or ten pictures they would be sent into Washington. MR. DRAPER: Eight or ten pictures I would send them back and each time I would -- well, I had to write a written report also every week of these things, of what I did every day, if I painted such and such you see. MR. MCNAUGHT: Oh, I see. How many other people in the Navy were doing what you were doing? MR. DRAPER: There were five others in the beginning. MR. MCNAUGHT: Five others. MR. DRAPER: No, four others. MR. MCNAUGHT: Four others. MR. DRAPER: And then later on two other guys came in or three other guys. Do you want to know the names of the people? I'll tell you. Dwight Shepler -- the first one who -- Admiral Hepburn started it with Griffith Baily Coale, a lieutenant commander who was the first combat artist. He was a mural painter. Then Dwight Shepler who was a Boston artist who was a very famous water colorist, very good; then Albert Murray who was a portrait painter and excellent; then Mitchell Jamieson who was a Washington artist and myself. Those are the five. Then later on they took in a guy named Millman, I didn't know him very well, and Stan Backus from Santa Barbara, and John Whitcomb who was an illustrator who was a very good illustrator but this wasn't his dish I didn't think at all. He did glamorous ladies from Saipan. They looked like the cover of Redbook or something you know. Well, then I landed -- then I went on and painted Halsey, and then I went up to Guadalcanal. Then I went up from Guadalcanal, looked around there, and then I went to Munda. By that time the landing at Bougainville was taking place, was to take place. So I was put on the ship called the George Klimer [phonetic] with General Vandegrift in charge, Admiral Wilkinson who is in charge of the operation of the Navy, and it's amazing to me when we landed in Amchitka there was a volcano erupting at the time. It was -- we were climbing down in the boats and there was this pink sky and this flame coming out, smoke coming out of this volcano. Well, I had planned to go in on the third wave so I would be sort of established and I could go in and see what was going on you see. Well, unfortunately the first wave was sent off and went in and just at that point all these planes came over from Rabaul, Japanese planes, and so we had general quarters and all the ships went out circling around at sea. By the time we got in again it was the time for the third wave to go in and I was a little bit confused, and so I didn't realize I was -- I climbed down the boat and I was in the second wave which I hadn't planned to go in at all. So suddenly I had to go in -- MR. DRAPER: So I got back on the, back on the third wave -- I thought I was on the third wave but I was on the second wave. I jumped in the landing boat and we went in under machine gunfire from [inaudible]. MR. DRAPER: Well, I went in under machine gunfire from Perry Water Island [phonetic] and another island and I can't right now think of the name. I don't know. And I saw boat number five next to me, which I painted the picture later, being hit by a bomb and blowing up. I ran in and jumped into a foxhole. So there's a strip that the Japs had to defend. We had pushed them out. So I jumped in there and waited until things quieted down. Then I wandered back afterwards, maybe an hour later, and I found a little Jap hut that I think must have been where the Japanese combat artist lived because I found a book on Toulouse Latrec written in Japanese, which I still have. I think it's at the studio. Well, then that was all very exciting and I stayed there for a few days and came back to, I guess back to Namur eventually. There I had orchids -- well, I had gathered these orchids around from different places. I think this is an interesting story. As I had gone through Munda and Dover, places, I had gotten some orchids. I used to have them behind the hut at Guadalcanal. I had a lot that I had collected. As a matter of fact I used to get some enlisted men to climb up to get the orchids by bribing them because I didn't dare climb up. I got vertigo and got very dizzy. I would see an orchid up in the jungle up in the tree and I would say, "Do you think you can get up to get that up there?" And they would say, "Sure, we would do it, but if you do a picture or a drawing of my wife in the nude." So I would -- they would show me a photograph of the wife and I would draw it in, a little face in pencil and then just take the clothes off and they loved it. I started that in my early career. My first money I made was at Pomfret when I would charge a dollar for each picture of Jean Harlow. She would be in a sexy white dress and I would just paint it leaving the dress off MR. DRAPER: Well, back to the war. Then I collected all these orchids and I brought them down to Namur. Then I would run out of paint and I was putting the orchids up in a tree at Quonset Village. I believe that's where it was. Perry Rathbone was out there who was a first priority officer in the Pacific, giving orders -- I mean, giving priority to those who had to go fly to this place and that place. He had started out in the combat ops section but there was a guy who -- Perry had been the director of the St. Louis Museum and Bob Parsons was only the curator at the Cochrane was above him. So Perry didn't like that particularly and I don't blame him. So Perry finally left the combat ops section and went out to the Pacific as a priority officer. Well, I got back there to Namur and put the orchids up and then I had run out of paint. So I decided to -- I'm going to let the dog out. MR. DRAPER: And so I went to Perry, Lieutenant Rathbone and said, "I have to buy some paints." And he said, "Well, I give you first priority to fly to Sydney, Australia to get some." MR. MCNAUGHT: Perry said that? MR. DRAPER: Perry said this. And so I had orders to go to Australia because I could -- he wasn't going to send me back to California or to Hawaii. So I flew to Australia with Perry. Perry gave himself first priority too and we had great time in Sydney. There I saw two good friends of both of us, Randy Kidder and his wife Dottie who they were out there in Canberra. We were there for a week-and-a-half and had the best, relaxing time as you can imagine. Then coming back we missed the boat, missed the plane three days in a row and finally Perry was given orders to bring back some pay to Namur and so he had to come back here. Orders said he couldn't miss the plane. I think it was pay, what do you call it, the pay account, just to pay the men, money. Not -- being an artist, I don't know too much about those things. Well, so then in Namur I got back an went to get my orchids and they were gone from this Quonset hut. I went in and there was -- the housing officer was in there who was a lieutenant commander and I was merely a JG at the time. I went in and said, "Have you seen any orchids around? They were up in that tree there." He said, "Orchids? Why, lieutenant, no, I haven't seen any orchids at all." So I left and then I had orders to go up to Afadi [phonetic] to catch the Yorktown. Well, I got on the Yorktown. It was to catch the Independence I think first. Independence doesn't sound right. I can't remember. So I had to go tell him I was leaving. So I went in and I couldn't find him in the front of the Quonset hut. I went back looking for him and I walked into the back the Quonset hut in this room and there were all my orchids and pots and dirt all turning yellow, dying. I said, "Oh, there are my orchids." He said, "They're not orchids and they're not yours. Period." And then at that time he was being a lieutenant commander and I was a JG without any information. I just took it, but today I would have said, "Now, look here" -- I told Admiral Halsey when I was painting him all about the orchids I had brought back, which I hadn't -- I had painted Admiral Halsey before but I'm sure he would have given them to me and I would have had them growing today. If I could have gotten them back I would have brought them back. I would have the suitor bulbs and had them now. I discovered one orchid, which I found now that was named the 101st Regiment. It's a Drandobian [phonetic], a white Drandobian with a perfume and a purple lip. It was a beautiful orchid, which I could have named Drandobian Draper. But anyway after -- then I went on to Afarti and then back to Espiro Santo [phonetic]. I did the command of the base at Afarti and painted there. Then I went to -- I got aboard the Yorktown, which was Task Force 58. We went to the second striker truck and I was to take off with this commander of the squadron, a bomber squadron, named -- over the second strike truck named Upson [phonetic]. I was in the plane at pre-dawn take off. This is another time fate is amazing. I got in the plane and we were just about to take off when word came over the loudspeaker from Admiral Ginder that Draper was to get out of the plane. He had just heard that Raymond Klapper had been killed, he was in the reserve, and a plane had crashed with him, and he didn't want anything like that -- only those who were absolutely essential to the flight. So I got out and Upson was shot down. He didn't come back. That I felt, well, God, isn't that extraordinary. Well, I felt as if I had just been yanked away. I was on the Yorktown for quite a time after the strike at Hollandia. When I first got aboard I roomed with a guy named Joe Christophek [phonetic] who was a pilot, the fighter squadron, or maybe the bomber squadron. I think it was the bomber squadron. Then I found I was -- Upson, this was before he was killed, told me he was the head of the squadron. I would work in the war ready room painting and working with my things. He said very nicely, "Oh, Draper, you know, the Admiral has moved and why don't you take the Admiral's wardroom and you would have more room there and it's air conditioned." So I said, "Fine." So I moved in there and had my own entrance to the flag deck. Then later on -- I'm not sure Upson told me this and I'm thinking it -- I think he had been killed because I think that Admiral Ginder was there to get me out of the plane. But the Admiral had moved off and somebody told me I was in the way there. So I moved into the Admiral's wardroom. And then another pilot came aboard and they needed my bunk. So they said, well, since you have the Admiral's wardroom why don't you take the Admiral's bedroom. So I was in the Admiral's bedroom, a great double bed, and I had my own head with a livery shower, all these things, and my own Marine guard and entrance to the flag deck, the best quarters on the ship. It was terrific, so I tried to say on as long as I could. Then finally we came back to Pearl Harbor. There I wanted -- from there this Captain Drake who was the head of public information was sort of jealous of the way I was moving around with these orders, just detach this date, continue with your verbal orders. He wanted to put me on a cruiser, a fast cruiser with Task Force 58 and I didn't want to go on that. I wanted to be with -- I met this old roommate of mine who was in charge -- did I tell you this? I don't think we've done this. He was in charge of -- was going to land at Saipan. He was in charge of support aircraft to shore, Price Baron. He was -- I used to room with him at Harvard. I wanted to go with him and Commander Cooper and cover the landing at Saipan. But Drake said, "No, Draper, you're supposed to go on this fast cruiser with Task Force 58." I said, "But I've already been with Task Force 58 and I must say there's nothing much to paint on a cruiser when you have -- compared to a carrier. It would be like being on a destroyer." And so I finally -- another friend of mine, Frank Littlefield who was aide to Admiral Kauffman arranged that I have lunch with Admiral Kauffman because he had a son Draper Kauffman and thought we might be related. So I had lunch and Kauffman, Admiral Kauffman said, "Well, of course Draper you ought to cover the landing at Saipan. You're the only artist out here in the Pacific." And so he gave orders that I should go to Saipan. So I was very pleased and was given these orders. Drake was a sour face. So I went off to Saipan on the Tennessee and I played the piano aboard the Tennessee with happy hour. The captain evidently knew I could play or found out I could and he asked if I would play happy hour. They would wheel the piano out on the deck for the enlisted men. MR. MCNAUGHT: Oh, I see. MR. DRAPER: And then I played the piano and sang songs. And another funny thing was that on the same ship when I was 12 years old in the Boston Navy Yard father's -- let's see -- Admiral -- well, he was my first cousin and he married Edith Blair. I've got to think of his name. It's ridiculous, my first cousin, because I'm so excited by trying to remember things, Adolfa Statin [phonetic]. He was captain of the Tennessee when I was 12. Mother and father and myself and Lilla and Harry all went to the Navy Yard and went aboard and had lunch on the Tennessee. After lunch mother said, "William, dear, will you play the piano for the officers?" So I played a Chopin waltz or something. Then it was sunk at Pearl Harbor and pulled up again and fitted out. You could never go back through the Panama Canal because it was two feet too wide. Here I was on the same ship and playing the piano. Well, I think that's quite a coincidence. Then we finally came to Saipan. D-Day I was ready to go ashore with my camouflage uniform, which was a mark of distinction because it came from the landing at Bougainville you see and I was offered $300 for it by other people, some other men, who only had green -- the green was issued at that point to the Marines. I was ready to go aboard, I mean go ashore. I was told you can't leave the ship. Your orders say you're attached to the ship's company and when you leave you're to report to the commander for what area who was Admiral Hoover who was 2,000 miles back at Anawetok. So Price and Commander Cooper went ashore. I was on the ship and I was furious because I was -- maybe mine stopped to. Mine has.
off the ship to report to Admiral Hoover. Well, I was furious because I couldn't go ashore and so I painted on the way. I had done this charcoal sketch of Admiral Kingman who was aboard the Tennessee. So I went up to Admiral Kingman and I said, "Admiral, I can't get ashore. The Captain won't let me off the ship. He says I'm attached to the ship's company. Can you do anything about it?" He said, "Draper, do you expect me to send a dispatch to Admiral Turner to get you off the ship and attached to General Harland Smith?" I said, "That's exactly what I expect you to do." He said, "Well, I can't do that." Then he said, "Yes, I can and I will." He sent a dispatch to Turner and orders came back for me. But this took all day and finally around 5: 00 I got orders to be attached to General Harland Smith, the Marine who was in charge of the landing ashore. I was then ready to go ashore and I had to go over to the Appalachian or the ship first to bring these orders so I could go in. I went from the transport over to report with these orders so I could go ashore and I was -- had all my insignia hidden you see because you don't wear your rank aboard. So I looked like an enlisted Marine and this ensign came up behind me and they waved my boat off and brought the ensign aboard. Then by the time I was coming up to get aboard the ship went out to sea. I mean, there was an air raid and all the ships went out to sea. It was about 5:30, 6:00, getting dark as I remember and I found I was the only officer in charge of all these landing boats. There were about 15 landing boats around circling and I was the senior officer present. They all went out for the night these big transports and boats. So I didn't know what to do. The chief petty officer, one of them, he told me one thing only a sailors [inaudible] that I should go out to a buoy seven miles out and tie up. I said, well, that would be a perfect -- we will never find the buoy. How do you find a buoy seven miles out and then get lost. So I said -- we all tied together making a nice target. Meanwhile, before we tied together, as soon as the big ships went out they got the range of where the ships had been. All day they must have been working at that. Then suddenly these bombs started falling from shore around where we were, so we just went out beyond. But they had -- all day they could have -- it took them that long and then the air raid came from planes, so the ships went out and then of course they escaped being hit. Then we stayed out beyond the range in sight of the island. I set watches for each one to keep the boats in a certain section. MR. MCNAUGHT: How big were these boats? MR. DRAPER: Landing boats. They dropped the front and you would go run off. So the next morning I went ashore and then I found Commander Cooper and Price in an old Japanese village, moved in. I had to move into the kitchen and there was a blind duck with sort of infected eyes that used to roost in there every night. I had a hammock to lie in and this duck would come in. Finally he disappeared one day and I think the Marines must have eaten him. But I went around sketching there, and there I had my paints. Going, landing, I didn't have any paints. I had -- well, for instance when I landed in Guam, Bougainville, I just had a pad and I lost the one at Guam anyway in the landing. But -- MR. MCNAUGHT: You did have your things? You did sketches of things and waited until later to do the painting? MR. DRAPER: And then I would write blue or purple blue and do a sketch of the shore, a lot of sketches. Then of course later I would -- MR. MCNAUGHT: In other words making sketches and notes for future paintings? MR. DRAPER: Notes. But the main thing was that I had studied with Corbino as I said and I could make up figures doing things. I would have to compose them and put them in -- my figures were mostly all just made up the way they would be. But, okay, I stayed -- I got I think Dengue Fever in Saipan. I was there for almost a month. I got very sick. I lost a hell of a lot of weight and I threw up everything. I couldn't eat anything but liquid things. Any other thing -- the rations were terrible rations. Well, rations or rations, they were disgusting. I couldn't keep them down. Well, then I went back, finally got back to Anawetok to report to Admiral Hoover and I was on a boat called the Lone Star, I can't remember, for a while. Henry Fonda was aboard that. I got to know him quite well. Then I reported to Admiral Hoover and then he said your orders say after reporting to me you're to return to CINCPAC, which is back to Hawaii. I said, "But there's a whole fleet leaving for Guam out in the harbor." And he said, "I don't care. You have to go back to CINCPAC. These are the orders." Well, when I got out I was again frustrated. This captain said, "Let me look at your orders, Draper." I showed them to him with 45 endorsements from around the South Pacific and everywhere. He said, "Listen, take my advice. Forget going back to Pearl Harbor. Just go out and get aboard one of those transports. They're leaving before dawn tomorrow for Guam and just sleep on deck and you'll get to Guam." And so that's what I did. We took off for Guam. This was a month later. I think I'm the only person to land in both Saipan and Guam because they were supposed to take place two days from each other. MR. MCNAUGHT: Oh, I see. MR. DRAPER: But they had to pull in a lot of Guam troops because at Saipan it was such a hard landing that it was put off. And at Guam I had landed with the assault troops practically. I was -- this is one thing I do not remember and I can't remember how I was on this transport and I remember talking with a group of officers and it was sort of a meeting and people asking me what type of ship I was going to be on and I said I'm going to be on a destroyer. My mind is blank but I remember this fact that I said, oh, I'm going to be on a destroyer and watch a thousand yards out. This guy said to me in front of a lot of people, "You can't -- you won't be able to see anything from there, Draper. You ought to come in with me. I'm leading the assault troops in." And I said, "Do you think I'll get a better view?" And he said, "Yes." So I said okay and went with him. But I don't understand how, and then I got -- I was on this sub chaser going on and one was hit. I got on -- we got to the line of debarkation where they had the first in the landing -- they first had these tanks go in through, right over -- over water tanks. They would go right over the reef and on in. Then they had tanks filled with soldiers open that would go in and over the reef and in. Then they had landing boats, the next wave was landing boats who went up to the reef. They couldn't go over the reef. But then the boats -- the tanks that held the men would go out again to the reef and then they would hop over and climb in and go ashore. They kept ferrying them because the landing boats -- because of this reef that they couldn't go in. Well, I was at one end of the reef and I saw these -- I thought, well, heavens, I would have jumped up into one of the things and went ashore thinking, well, it won't be that bad. As I got closer it was and I saw some Japs running around in flames and flamethrowers. I had a 38 pistol which I fired as we went ashore. Then -- so I did shoot a pistol in the war. I jumped down into a foxhole and I stayed there, scared to death, until it all quieted down more or less. At that point suddenly somebody said they're using gas. All the Marines were fighting for the gas masks. I luckily had my mine right with me. They weren't using gas at all but it was quite frightening to see how -- because when they landed they left their gas masks on the beach. They all ran to get them and they said this is mine. No, this is mine. It was really quite an amazing thing. So I was at Guam making sketches for seven days. There were so many people killed that finally I had to help, stop painting and help collect them and dig them in because they were a health hazard. It was really -- and I got very emotional seeing these -- they would pile these bodies into these command cars and take them off to be buried and plow them under. The ones that had crew haircuts really upset me terribly I suppose and the other ones who had long hair like we wear today just looked like Japs to me. I had no emotion. But the ones with the crew haircuts reminded me of my college friends I think because we all wore crew cuts then. I guess I just couldn't take the whole thing. Seeing a crew cut head hanging over just, was sickening to me. Well, then I got off Guam having painted. MR. MCNAUGHT: Did you have time at Guam to actually do paintings or was it sketching all the time? MR. DRAPER: I painted there too. MR. MCNAUGHT: Well, when you -- MR. DRAPER: I didn't bring -- oh, I'll tell you what happened at Guam. When I came in I had lost my sketchpad in the landing and I didn't have anything. In the excitement I left it in the landing boat and ran ashore. So when it quieted down I went over to where the medical unit was and there were doctors. So they had paper and I got some paper there. Then the next day I got my things off the transport. MR. MCNAUGHT: Oh, you could go back and get your paints? MR. DRAPER: Yeah, I went back and got it. MR. MCNAUGHT: Exactly. MR. DRAPER: Then also when the transport was leaving to go back to Pearl Harbor I got on that and flew, went on that to someplace and then flew from there to Pearl Harbor. Then Drake said, "Oh, Draper, you've done a magnificent job." And I felt like saying no help to you. You really fouled the whole thing up, but I didn't. I thought -- I went against his orders the whole time. MR. MCNAUGHT: This is William McNaught talking to William Draper, our third session. It's June 6, 1977. Mr. Draper, you were talking just about the -- with no help to which Admiral was it, Drake? MR. DRAPER: No, I was talking with Captain Drake -- MR. MCNAUGHT: Captain Drake. MR. DRAPER: -- and telling him with no help of his I had performed my duties by painting at Saipan and Guam. But anyway, after that I got back and things of course were reproduced. All my paintings were reproduced in the National Geographic magazine in four different issues. The first issue on the Aleutian was in March -- no, it was in August 1943. Then there was the landing at Bougainville in April of '44, then all aboard the Yorktown and Task Force 58 in October of '44, and finally in November of 1945 the landings of Saipan and Guam came out with a story on each one that I had given to the National Geographic. As a matter of fact the portrait I did of Halsey in the South Pacific, I had a picture -- I think maybe I told about that I think with the Japanese running for shelter from the storm and Halsey was the storm and Life wanted to use it on the cover. MR. MCNAUGHT: Yes. Yes, you did. MR. DRAPER: And of course the Navy wouldn't release it because they didn't understand it. And yesterday I got this whole thing from Life magazine advertising 2,000 covers of Time magazine and I said, hell, I don't want any of these but I had the cover I would have bought them you know. MR. MCNAUGHT: Exactly. MR. DRAPER: Well, anyway -- MR. MCNAUGHT: But did the Navy release the portrait for use in the National Geographic? MR. DRAPER: Not the portrait. I mean, no, it wasn't. They released -- I mean, they released all my work to the National Geographic. They reproduced 69 pictures in all of my paintings of the war years. Then I -- then after that -- I got back in August. I was married in October '44 to Barbara Cagiati, C-a-g-i-a-t-i, whose father was librarian of the Vatican. MR. MCNAUGHT: Really? MR. DRAPER: Yes, she was half Italian. MR. MCNAUGHT: How fascinating. MR. DRAPER: And I -- well, she met me and we fell in love. I had known her before but we got married in October. We lived in Washington. Then I got temporary additional duty. I was still -- I think I was a lieutenant commander by then. I had been raised in rank from a JG to lieutenant, a lieutenant commander. Then I went -- was commissioned to do three murals for the Naval Academy in Bancroft Hall in the dining room. MR. MCNAUGHT: In Annapolis? MR. DRAPER: In Annapolis. I was sent on temporary additional duty there. But I painted them in Washington, which was great. So I could go over to studio, I rented a studio in the Northeast part of Washington, a big studio. General Vandegrift gave me a platoon of Marines to pose for me. They loved their duty. They were sitting outside drinking beer and I would get each one at a time to pose for different subjects. My murals were of the landing at Guam. So I had all these characters running in and sat and pretending they were falling down, dying. It was great fun. My sketches were -- I still have the sketches -- were one inch to the foot. So I had 18 inches, each one was 18 inches long, but they really were 18 feet long you see. An inch, the heads were about an inch in size but in the final thing they were big you see. So they were quite heroic in size. MR. MCNAUGHT: There were three of these murals? MR. DRAPER: Three of these murals which I thought were going to live forever in Bancroft Hall. They were the best position. There were three as you came down -- MR. MCNAUGHT: Were they painted in fresco or canvas? MR. DRAPER: No, they were painted in canvas and they were in the best position. There was a long, very long thin, like a ruler. The mess hall was shaped like a ruler and there were -- two of Dwight Shepler's at one end and two of different Baily Coale at the other, and I had three in the center of the ruler you see as you came down the steps. But then they made a T shape to the ruler because they needed to enlarge the dining hall. So just where the T would come in on the T shape, that was the -- that was where my murals were and that wall came down. Then they rolled it up and put it in the Naval Academy museum, and some foolish captain gave them to some commander and they were put up by a local artist and cut up and plastered around and it was just too bad. I wasn't going to make a big fuss. I just didn't -- why bother. Well, anyway, then that -- then I got out of the Navy and started my career. We lived in Washington. MR. MCNAUGHT: What year was it you got out of the Navy? MR. DRAPER: Nineteen forty-six, I would say. MR. MCNAUGHT: You were still living in Washington? MR. DRAPER: Yeah. Willie was born in 1946 and then we moved up to Ogunquit. I think we moved to Hamilton, Mass and then to Ogunquit for the summer. Then we moved down to New York. No, we were at Cedarhurst the first summer and then a couple of summers out in Oyster Bay. Well, I can't remember. It's all very difficult to get, but I know in 1948 we were in New York and I was living in Daniel Chester French's house at 125 West 11th Street. The landlord wouldn't let us leave the baby carriage outside in the hall going out near the second and third floor of the house you see. So we would have to carry it. I would have to drag the baby carriage up to the second floor and that drove me wild. So finally we bought this house here that we're in now in 1949. That's why you see all those bikes in the hall. I'm not going to object to them putting bikes in. So from then on then I had -- the same year I got the studio at 535 Park that used to belong to Lydia Emmet who was a great portrait painter and I think a great painter of children. I was very lucky to have gotten it. MR. MCNAUGHT: It's a marvelous space. MR. DRAPER: It's a great space and beautiful light. MR. MCNAUGHT: It's marvelous. MR. DRAPER: I've had -- MR. MCNAUGHT: So you've had both the house and the studio since 1949? MR. DRAPER: Nineteen forty-nine. MR. MCNAUGHT: How lucky you are. MR. DRAPER: Well, I was. In the summer we bought a house in Wainscott about the same time, maybe about 1955. So then I had Debar [phonetic] which was a studio right there. So I've been very lucky to have my studios and a place to work because I found it very difficult to go out someplace like Minneapolis to do a portrait. Then you can't find the correct light. I remember going out to paint Lucy Dayton whose husband was the head of the Dayton Department Stores and I went out there and we searched all over the place trying to find a light to paint her in. Out in Minneapolis it's so cold there anyway to find a north window in this place is impossible and to find one big enough to paint from. So I started this portrait and then -- started it Monday and they had a big cocktail party on Friday to invite everybody in to see the finished product. It was a great cocktail party. MR. MCNAUGHT: But no painting. MR. DRAPER: But no painting. There was no face. The first day I painted the hands, the head, everything, and spent three days on that head. So I said finally you'll have to come to New York to pose. She came one day to New York and I painted her head in and it was fine, a great success, because the light was just so awful with the snow on the ground and reflecting all around, the white walls. I couldn't do a thing with it. That's true of almost everywhere I've gone unless I make a big fuss and have ceilings 10 to 12 feet high facing north, you know. MR. MCNAUGHT: So you have a perfect situation with your studio. MR. DRAPER: I'll tell you one time I went up to paint the headmistress -- not the headmistress, the president of Wellesley, Margaret Clap. This was probably about eight or ten years ago, maybe 12. I can't quite remember because they all go -- I can't remember the time. Maybe it was only six years ago. But she was a lovely person. She died recently. They had just built this $2 million building, art building in Wellesley, with all the studios supposedly for the artists. It was the most terrible light. Evidently they built this building and then put cement shades in the south to keep the lights out, big cement blocks to shadow the windows. Then to balance it they put it on the north side too, to make the building look equal. Then they had the skylights. They were six feet thick and slits in them. So all you would get was sun reflecting on the six foot of -- shining on the six foot of cement going down these slits, reflecting down on the floor. It was the most dreadful light I've ever seen. So I finally had to go around to a gym across the campus and paint Margaret Clap there. Well, she was hysterical about it. She thought it was funny to put $2 million into architecture and not talk to artists about a studio. Well, that's happened all my life, poor light. MR. MCNAUGHT: But then did you find -- when you were finished with the Navy you moved to New York, you bought the house and the studio. Was it easy making a transition back to civilian life in terms of your art, getting -- did you start out right away getting commissions? Did you teach, did you -- MR. DRAPER: No, I was very lucky. I found right away I got commissions. I know that Al Murray stayed in for two or three years painting a lot of admirals and people in the Navy and he would call me and ask me how it was in civilian life. I said great. MR. MCNAUGHT: It was fine, you had lots of commissions? MR. DRAPER: Well, they had this big show at the Metropolitan Museum of combat artwork of all the five artists and then "Men At War" in Washington. I was suddenly known from all of that. MR. MCNAUGHT: They included your name in the [inaudible]. MR. DRAPER: And then I was in Who's Who in America, whatever that means, but about that time in 1949, '45, '46, and of course that helped me, although I had to produce the goods. I started out doing that. I had been with Portraits Incorporated and I had -- MR. MCNAUGHT: Before the war? MR. DRAPER: Before the war. It was called the 460 Park Avenue Gallery and I had show there of portraits in 1940. MR. MCNAUGHT: During the war you had done portraits of civilians, friends, et cetera? MR. DRAPER: Not during the war years. I would do sketches everywhere I went. I would get a jeep. I don't know that I was told. You just would get a jeep. In the Aleutians I couldn't get a jeep at all. I would have to wait two or three days and get something from the transportation officer and I would be idle all that time. But finally when I did Admiral Nimitz in Pearl Harbor he said, "Well, Draper, anything I can do to expedite what you want -- what you're doing?" And I said, "Well, I would love a jeep." So I got one right away. So everywhere in the Pacific when I was ashore I would go to the commanding officer and say, of the base and say, "I have orders here to paint you for the historical record." And so he -- not to paint them, to make a drawing of them. I would do a charcoal drawing in an afternoon and then he would say what can I do to help you. I would say I would love a jeep. So I got a jeep everywhere I went. Go to the top I always say. MR. MCNAUGHT: Tell me about life in New York when you got back, who you painted, when you had exhibitions, and so on. MR. DRAPER: Well, I started out earlier by painting -- I had done portraits before and I think the first portrait commission was of Bill Fen. I don't know whether I told you that I had had this painting that -- did I say what I studied and had this painting in the National Academy, did I say that? It was a still life that I sold for 750 on it. MR. MCNAUGHT: Yes. MR. DRAPER: Through that guy, Bill Fen, I had painted George Merck children. He knew Bill Fen so I painted Bambi and Judy Merck about 1937. MR. MCNAUGHT: Yes. MR. DRAPER: And then when I came back -- I had been doing quite a few portraits and I guess -- I'll tell you the most significant portrait about 1950. I was asked to Bill Salkstall [phonetic]. It was here with Henry Cabot Lodge and Eisenhower. Bill Salkstall came up to see me. I asked him to come up and see me. Portraits Incorporated said why did you ask him to the house, Bill? You shouldn't have. That wasn't right. And I said, "Well, it certainly was right. I got a commission." So it turned out to be fine because he wanted me to paint him for -- I think it was Exter Academy, which I did. MR. MCNAUGHT: I see. MR. DRAPER: He was the headmaster. Then that started some more and then I went out to do the Pillsburys in Minneapolis, and from there I did Dr. Mayo. I mean, it all grew. I did John Foster Dulles. MR. MCNAUGHT: This was all early on? And obviously one brought another. MR. DRAPER: I'll tell you the funny thing about John Foster Dulles -- MR. DRAPER: The funny thing about John Foster Dulles, it's not so funny it's sort of pathetic, it was quite a few years ago. I had painted Douglas Dillon commissioned by his father Clarence Dillon to paint him when he was -- he was ambassador to France and I painted him up in Dark Harbor. Clarence Dillon then asked me to do John Foster Dulles who was dead by that time. This was for the Princeton Memorial Library in Princeton. It was called the John Foster Dulles Memorial Library of Diplomatic History. But they hadn't built it yet. So I was commissioned to paint it and I worked on it from photographs and this and that. I was rather -- I felt very lucky because I had a marvelous photograph -- I hate to work from photographs, but I had gotten his will, I got a chair from Washington sent up by Mrs. Dulles, his clothes, everything, and a lamp. I set it up in my studio with a fake thing looking like his table. I got a model and really recreated the photograph except the face in the photograph was lousy. It had no light and shade. It had nothing. Then I thought I would write to Kosh [phonetic] and ask if he had any pictures. He said, well, for $25 he would send me a lot of little blurbs. Kosh Canada, you know. MR. MCNAUGHT: I do know him. MR. DRAPER: I found one in almost exactly the same position, beautiful light, paid him the $25 or $50, whatever it was, and then I got this thing and enlarged it and put it on his head. I never told anybody. That was -- this is the first time it's on record. Everybody who looked at it said, my God, how did you do this from that dreadful photograph. It worked out very well. Well, anyway, I finished it and they put it away for a couple of years until the building was finished. I thought -- then I didn't think anything of it. Suddenly I woke up one morning and looked in the New York Times and there on the front page was my picture of Dulles with Eisenhower, Drohene [phonetic], Alan Dulles and Mrs. Dulles all -- and Eisenhower was the President then -- all standing in front of the picture and it said the picture in the background is of the late statesman. It was the unveiling of the diplomatic library in Princeton. I hadn't even been asked to it. But the picture was unveiled and they had forgotten all about me in the two or three years and never even asked me to come. Well, I think that was ridiculous and I was quite upset because it would have been nice to say the portrait in the background of the late statesman is by William Draper you see. That happens quite a bit with architects and artists. Then let me see. That's going back quite a ways. Well, you can ask me some questions. MR. MCNAUGHT: Now you're in New York, it's the late 40's and the 50's. So you're getting very well established, getting lots of important commissions not only in New York but around the country and internationally as well. Now tell me more before we go on and talk about some of these important people that you've painted and your reactions to them, tell me a bit more about your family. I believe you have daughters as well as your son, Willie, who you mentioned who was born in 1946. When were your daughters born? MR. DRAPER: My daughters -- well, let's see. Well, Willie was born in 1946 in Washington. Then Francesca came about three years later, I think 1949 -- '48 or '49 and was born in New York. Maggie came about three years after that. No, more than that because she is 23, Francesca is 28. Three, four, five -- five years later. They're all very great kids and I love them very much. MR. MCNAUGHT: Your life was really established in New York and has remained in New York. MR. DRAPER: In New York and the kids went to school, Lee and Chapin, and St. Paul's, and Farmington, and Milton, et cetera. MR. MCNAUGHT: Did you begin to exhibit on a regular basis too in New York? Did you have any more exhibitions of portraits? MR. DRAPER: Yeah. Well, I did there and then I had a show at Mirdler's [phonetic] in 1950. MR. MCNAUGHT: In 1950. Of your portraits? MR. DRAPER: Of portraits and landscapes. Then I used to send to the National Academy, but I would send portraits and it made me so mad because having been invited by them in the early years, since 1933 having one of three sold in 1993 and in those shows I would be invited. My picture was about a third of the show and would be invited out to Chicago Art Institute, The Carnegie Institute and this and that. Then when I would come back to New York and I'm a success then I would send the portrait to the National Academy and was turned down, zing, because there were portrait painters who were in the National Academy who were jealous. I know this is a fact. I'm not going to go any further and say any more. I can say a lot but I won't. So that -- so I've never shown at the National Academy of Design and I don't think I ever will. MR. MCNAUGHT: In 1950 your exhibition at Mirdler, you said that you had not only portraits but landscapes as well. MR. DRAPER: Yeah. MR. MCNAUGHT: When did your interest in landscape painting or had you been painting landscapes right along? Certainly during the war there was -- MR. DRAPER: Oh, I had been painting landscapes all my life and always have. MR. MCNAUGHT: Had you ever shown them before the Mirdler? Session 3 HOME |