RUBY BRIDGES VISITS T-TOWN >>>

Ruby Bridges was a quiet and courageous hero almost overlooked by history. Few people remember her name, but vast numbers of Americans remember the painting by Norman Rockwell of the little girl being escorted to school by U.S. marshals while vicious bigots threw tomatoes at her.

It didn't happen quite like that. Rockwell fictionalized actual events to tell a story that needed to be told.

Bridges was 6 years old when the federal government ordered schools in New Orleans to integrate. She was one of a handful of little black children who went to previously all-white schools. Marshals did escort her that first day. So did her mother. Bridges said the crowd that taunted her that morning "wasn't any noisier than Mardi Gras."

"I held my mother's hand and followed the marshals through the crowd, up the steps into the school," she said.

The marshals kept escorting her day after day until the crowds of bigots shouting at her dwindled to insignificance.

Bridges was truly a hero. Now, 50 years later, she spends much of her time visiting schools across the country speaking with students about her story. May 21 at 2 p.m., in conjunction with the Norman Rockwell exhibition at Tacoma Art Museum, Bridges will be in Tacoma to speak at UW-Tacoma about those tumultuous times.

The painting based on her experience is called The Problem We All Live With. It is one of the most powerful works in the exhibit.

Another unique area connection with the exhibit concerns a model that posed for one of Rockwell's Saturday Evening Postcovers - who now lives in Chehalis.

James Stafford posed as the window-washer for Rockwell's September 17, 1960 cover of The Saturday Evening Post. At the time, Stafford was a young soldier stationed at what was then Fort Devens, just west of Boston. An artist himself, Stafford wrote a letter to Rockwell and to his surprise, Rockwell wrote back. The two men had some common friends in the art world and before long Rockwell invited Stafford to come out to his home in Stockbridge. After three days spent talking, sketching, and playing badminton together, Rockwell asked Stafford to pose for the latestcover he was working on.

As they say in the infomercials: But wait, there's more. TAM is recreating Rockwell's artistic process thanks to local painter Peter Sheesley who is not only doing painting demonstrations at the museum throughout the run of the exhibition, but who is also leading a painting workshop on May 14 and 15 to teach others the process by which Rockwell worked.

The show is called American Chronicles: The Art of Norman Rockwell, and the museum is going all out to make it as welcoming and informative as possible.

American Chronicles

Through May 30, Wednesday – Sunday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
third thursdays 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
admission $8–$9, children free, Third Thursdays free during ArtWalk
Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma
253.272.4258