As long as we’re sharing recently framed artwork (one of my FB friends recently posted an unusual find), here is my just-displayed project finished up ever-so-nicely by the Pro – Alisa, owner of the Rose District’s art gallery: Your Design.
Several years ago I was asked to find out some details about a fellow named Nils Thor Granlund. Part of a research project (I do contract research to help pay the bills (remember I’m a book dealer in an iPad world…). Granlund was a pioneer broadcaster who lived in New York City during the Roaring Twenties, at the time of the very first experimental radio broadcasting stations.
I had never heard of him.
Not much information could be easily found about him. That fact struck me as odd, since from all appearances he was quite famous in his heyday. I dug and dug, researched, wrote letters, copied from newspaper archives. Took over a year.
The research wound up as a biography, completed with pictures and footnotes (required by the publisher – a major pain). As part of the research, I ran across an eBay auction featuring a WWII era copy of Billboard Magazine with Granlund on the cover. Figuring there would be an article with some juicy insights, I bid it up enough to win it. (Broadcasting Magazine is still around, a trade magazine for the music and entertainment industry.)
Inside, on the table of contents page, was a little note to the effect that – on the cover was Nils Thor Granlund – currently extending his record run at the Florentine Gardens nightclub in Hollywood. Nada mas. Not even a little paragraph more. Oh, well.
I thought at the time that I ought to have the old magazine framed, and Lo! All these years later I finally carried it over to Ms. Inglett’s gallery (211 S. Main Street, in Broken Arrow’s Rose District). In truth, I thought the magazine looked pretty tacky, but since NTG (as he was popularly known at the time) was the subject of one of my books, I thought he deserved a spot on the shop wall.
Whoa!
Got the framed magazine back. The magazine is tacky no longer. The off-balance-out-of-whack front cover layout has been completely brought back into symmetry by Alisa’s artistic eye and framing skills. Some kind of magical scalpel-work on her part produced lines in the matboard that match the magazine. Unfortunately, my old phone-camera doesn’t do it much justice (you can click on it for a larger view), but the matboard art sets off the cover ink of the magazine, and it looks quite nice. Nah. It’s the Cat’s Pajamas, as Mr. Granlund would have put it, in his day.
Most importantly, I did not fall from the ladder while pounding the nail.
When I wrote the book, I had high hopes that I could rescue Mr. Granlund from his historical obscurity. Alas, the book sales did not accomplish that.
Perhaps the nicely framed magazine will have a greater impact regarding his fame.
Come visit!
McHuston
Booksellers & Irish Bistro
Rose District
122 South Main St. Broken Arrow OK!
