Linda and Grace is an exhibition that includes contemporary oil painter Linda Sorensen and famous Sebastopol watercolorist Grace Allison Griffith 1885 - 1955. Both celebrate Sonoma County landscapes in styles uniquely their own. Grace spent her youger and older years slightly north alongside her family's "Griffith Woods," and Grace and several of her family members are interred in Gilliam Cemetary on Sullivan Rd at Dyer Rd, overlooking Graton and Atelier One. Linda Sorensen has her artist studio at Atelier One in Graton. Having so many wonderful artist studio neighbors makes for a stimulating Atelier One atmosphere, and Graton itself has long been an artist colony.

Atelier One is a brick-tile building in Graton and is an old apple warehouse which has been seismically retrofitted and divided principally into individual artist studios. Originally, Atelier One's building was home to O.A. Hallberg & Sons Apple Products in Graton. The Hallberg facilities were the core, if you will, of the Sonoma County Apple industry. Today, it is wonderful to have this historic building retrofitted and repurposed as a home to Sonoma County artists.

This year, the Graton Annual Open Studios Sale at Atelier One has at least twelve participating artists. Between 11am and 5pm, Saturday and Sunday, November 18 and 19, the public can come and feel part of this wonderful artistic community, visit with the artists in their working environs - including across-the-corner Studio 9000 collective - and even acquire a treasure to take home.

Grace was a prominent artist of her time. She was invited to become a member of the Royal Academy's Watercolor Society in London, a very high honor for a visiting American artist. In Hawaii, she was dubbed by a local art critic as "the Wizard of Watercolor." In California, she exhibited widely and sold her paintings through the prestigious galleries of her day: the Claremont Hotel Art Galleries in Berkeley, Gumps in San Francisco and the Kanst Galleries in Los Angeles. She and her sister Alice had an art gallery in Petaluma for a while. Even these days, her paintings are in some demand in art auctions, although they do not do as well as the somewhat similar watercolors by Percy Gray.

Her father was pioneer fruit rancher Nathaniel Griffith, whose contribution to Sonoma County was the introduction of the Gravenstein Apple, and who is featured in the permanent exhibit at Sebastopol's museum. Nathaniel was a close friend of Santa Rosa horticulturist Luther Burbank. As a young artist, Grace painted illustrations of hybrid plants for Burbank.

1985, Santa Rosa Post Democrat columnist Gaye Lebaron reported that Grace's watercolor Burbank's Gardens and Burbank's Santa Rosa Greenhouse hung in Santa Rosa's City Hall, and others of her works graced the walls between the City Council Chambers and the City Manager's Office. At that time, prints of Grace's paintings were available at the Burbank Museum gift shop.

Grace was one of three extraordinary daughters born to Ida and Nathaniel Griffith who raised apples on Vine Hill north of Sebastopol. Grace was a painter, Alice was interested in plants and a staunch defender of her family's grove of Redwoods on Vine Hill, and youngest sister Nell was a well known published poet.

Her father brought the flavorful Gravenstein Apple to Sebastopol, and shared a passion for horticulture with his good friend, Luther Burbank. As mentioned above, Grace painted biological illustrations of hybrid plants, required for patent applications.

In 1919 when Grace was 34 years old, she married Charles B. Allison. While married to Charles, Grace signed her paintings as Grace Allison. That same year, the family house burned down, taking with it many of Grace's early works. It is believed Mr. Allison was in some way connected to the fire, and in short order, the marriage was dissolved.

Grace Allison Griffith, Spreading Oak and Path, private collection

In Hawaii in 1919 and 1920, Grace and her sister Alice established a studio in Honolulu. Grace achieved some critical success in the islands, showing Hawaiians about daily tasks in their lovely island landscape. At the time, the Hawaiian Islands were a frontier, and they became a popular destination for San Francisco artists. Hawaii was first popularized by the writings of Mark Twain. Adventuring painters soon followed, including Jules Tavernier, Theodore Wores, Hugo Anton Fisher and Grace Hudson.

In San Francisco, Grace would have heard stories of these artists' travels and adventures, stimulating imagination. Although she arrived in Honolulu decades after earlier California painters, she was early enough to see Hawaii long before the tourist deluge after World War II. Grace was in Hawaii 22 years before the attack on Pearl Harbor. The Hawaiian culture and scenery she saw had not yet been replaced by the highrise vacation paradise we see today.

After returning to Sebastopol, Grace's next adventure took her to England and Scotland where she studied, painted, exhibited and sold. She accepted an invitation to become a member of the Royal Watercolor Society, an organization associated with London's Royal Academy of Art, a very high honor for a visiting American artist.

In the 1920's and 1930's, Grace painted in Sebastopol and enjoyed life with her two younger sisters, Alice and Nell.

Her sister Alice was interested in horticulture and was an avid defender of Griffith Woods, a grove of redwoods on her father's ranch. When the bones of a mastodon were discovered there, Alice staunchly refused permission for excavation of the entire skeleton, choosing to defend the grove. The Grove still stands, and the bones remain buried.

Alice eventually married, at age 75. Her husband, was Jess Ingle, but as Gaye LeBaron wrote, Alice was "nearly 75 and he (Jess) was the same and a widower." LeBaron also reported that. even at that age, Alice wasn't very happy about being "tied down."

Grace's younger sister Nell may have seemed an ordinary housewife, but was way beyond ordinary as a noted and published poet. She authored five books of poetry and published individual poems in magazines such as Good Housekeeping, Better Homes and Gardens, and Reader's Digest.

Nell's World War II poem, A Blood Donor's Prayer, was reprinted worldwide and was included in Eleanor Roosevelt's syndicated column. One of her books was entitled, Our Valley of the Moon, and included an illustration from her high school classmate, Robert Ripley, of Believe It, or Not fame.

In 1939, at the age of 54, Grace married again, this time to Archibald O. Harris of Berkeley. She and Archie lived in Berkeley for 11 years. When Archie died in 1950, Grace returned to the family farm in Sebastopol. There, she lived with her sister Alice until her passing in 1955. She is buried in the Gilliam Cemetery near Graton. We visted the cemetary and have located Grace's grave and nearby, the graves of her mother Ida and her sister Alice.

From Eleonor Roosevelt's column, Nov 9, 1943

The other day, I was sent by Judge William Denman, of San Francisco, a poem which was published in the San Francisco "Call-Bulletin"

"A BLOOD DONOR'S PRAYER." by Nell Griffith Wilson, Kenwood, CA
Grant me no lesser favor, God, than this
That by my giving
Some war-spent but courageous eager son
May keep on living.
Grant that the faithful rhythm of my veins
And my heart' singing
May bring an urgent quickening, and stay
His soul's far winging.
Because I have no stalwart lad by birth
To call me mother,
I ask this small maternal share in one,
Dear to another.
Then I shall walk a quiet but exalted way
Glad in the knowing
I fed the flame—and for some unknown son
Life is still glowing."

(Mrs. Roosevelt goes on ...) The author is not a well known poetess, but perhaps we may hear more in the future of Mrs. Nell Griffith Wilson of Kenwood, Sonoma County, California. In any case, I think there is many a woman who feels, whether she has a son of her own or not on the fighting front, that she is grateful to have a share in saving other mother's sons.