Clay model of panel "Anthropology," on building's exterior. 



"I [looked at] the first four figures* of the main 

 pediment in Bering's studio in order that they might be 

 gotten in work without delay. ... It seems to me that 

 these models are one [sic] of the finest pieces of decora- 

 tive sculpture that have been produced in modern 

 times." 



Field pencilled on the hack of Anderson's letter: 

 "The 1st 4 figures of the main pediment. . . meet with 

 my entire approval. I am. . . delighted with them." 



Things moved along smoothly until April 24, 

 when Stanley Field in a state of agitation wired Ernest 

 R. Graham, the architectural firm's senior partner then 

 visiting New York: "Henry Herring [sic] is talking of 

 joining the Officers Reserve Corps. . . and wants your 

 consent general contractors consent and our consent. 

 Please see him to-day sure and discuss this matter." He 

 also wrote Graham that Hering was "evidently going 

 ... to take three months of intensive training, and 1 do 

 not see how he can possibly do it without neglecting 

 the museum work." 



Graham apparently talked Hering out of his plan 

 — for the time being at least. But the following year 

 Hering yielded to his patriotic conscience and joined 

 the 40th Engineers Corps. 



In the final letter of Hering's to be found in the 

 Field Museum archives, dated August 6, 1917, he 

 wrote Field: "I am sending you. . .fourteen photo- 

 graphs. . . .Twelve of these represent the sculpture of 



28 " These were among the eight that were never delivered. 



E 



Field Museum completed up to date. There still remain 

 two more panels Anthropology and Geology and four 

 interior figures. . .and will send you photographs of 

 them when completed." 



Stanley Field replied, "Those [photographs] of the 

 museum models are superb. I cannot begin to tell you 

 how fine I think the work is .... I have taken up with 

 the architects the matter of the stone cutting. There 

 will be a meeting here next week. . .and it is hoped 

 that the work can proceed immediately afterward." 

 With Field's letter, the Museum's file on Henry Hering 

 comes to a close. 



Hering went into semiretirement in 1940, ex- 

 changing the sculptor's chisels for a set of golf clubs. 

 Golf, in fact, became the ruling passion of his later 

 years. He designed the Scarsdale (N.Y.) Golf Club 

 championship medal and even tinkered with a new 

 type of club which, he argued, conformed better to 

 aerodynamic principles. 



It was Henry Hering's love of the sport that prob- 

 ably saved his life one July day in 1945 and, perhaps for 

 the first time, put his name on the front page of the 

 New York Times, rescuing him briefly from the pall of 

 obscurity. Following an afternoon on the golf course, 

 Hering returned to Manhattan to find the smoldering 

 wreckage of a U.S. Army bomber in his penthouse stu- 

 dio on west 33rd Street. Lost in fog, the plane had 

 crashed into the Empire State Building, parts of the 

 bomber plummeting through Hering's skylight. Ac- 

 cording to a contemporary account, Hering's first con- 

 cern was not for the works of art that cluttered his stu- 

 dio but for the safety of his experimental golf clubs. FM 



