WWII ICONIC

Art has been a part of Al Smith’s life since he was a child, but he stopped doing pencil drawings when he was about 16.

It wasn’t until 65 years later, when a friend asked him to do a portrait, that he picked up a pencil and rekindled his enthusiasm.

He has done many pencil drawings since then and most have dealt with soldiers and veterans. Smith is a veteran who served in the Army National Guard. He has donated some of his drawings to the Owatonna American Legion Post and added several more last week as he presented his World War II Iconic series.

It all began when fellow veteran Jim Klukas asked him to do a portrait similar to a well-known painting of a man praying over his meal. The picture Klukas wanted, Smith said, would have him praying over the Bible and the AA Big Book.                                                      

Smith said he kept putting Klukas off, but “he kept bugging me.” Finally, Smith said, he agreed to do it but on his terms. It would not be an oil painting, he said, but rather a pencil drawing. As he did the drawing, he said, the love he had for pencil drawing as a boy resurfaced.

“When I finished the drawing, I was amazed, it far exceeded my expectations,” Smith said. When he ceremoniously presented the drawing to Klukas, his friend didn’t say a word, but the tears began to flow.

The number 58202 on the bottom of the drawing is the number of U.S. military personnel killed in Vietnam. Klukas served in Vietnam. Smith said the painting also includes a cap like the one Klukas always wears. The Bible represents his faith and the Big Book, his 31 years of sobriety.

After that experience, Smith said, he began to draw with a new passion.

He then made a series of 38 drawings of soldiers from Vietnam. It was to say to the vets, “welcome home,” something many of them never heard when they returned from the war. Then came 35 drawings called “War Heroes.”

Smith’s wife, Pat, kept asking if he ever thought of drawing women, something he had never considered. When Pat Smith’s friends would see his drawings, they would also ask, “Have you thought about drawing some women?” He'd say he was “thinking about it.”

Then, a woman at the Faribault History Center asked if he would draw pictures of women. Without really giving it a lot of thought, Smith said he would. He called the new collection, “Women of War.”

At the Nov. 18 program, he unveiled his tribute to women pilots–WASPS. During World War II, 1,180 women earned their wings. They flew over 60 million miles ferrying aircraft for the Army Air Corps and Navy. They could fly any Army or Navy plane, he said.

Some of Smith’s other works had local or regional connections.

A drawing of the submarine USS Snook and a copy of a photo of a young boy and his older brother depicted John Billingsley, a long-time Owatonna resident, and his older brother, Richard.

Richard was serving on the USS Snook when it was torpedoed and disappeared. The exact location of where the submarine lies has never been discovered, and John Billingsley always hoped that one day he could go to the spot where his brother lies and place a wreath there.

Smith said he gave the original drawing to John, who died earlier this month, and the drawing was right next to Billingsley’s casket at the funeral.

Smith's drawings also include the five Sullivan brothers from Waterloo, Iowa. The brothers decided that all five of them would join the Navy if they could all serve on the same ship. As it turned out, all five were assigned to the USS Juno.

In November 1942, during the battle of Guadalcanal the USS Juno was torpedoed twice. Only 10 men survived, none of the Sullivans among them, Smith said.

“I can’t imagine what it would be like for your five children to die in one day,” he said.

A drawing he wanted to do involved a photo of Gen. Dwight Eisenhower, Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin at the Yalta Conference. He started drawing Churchill’s face, Smith said, redrawing it eight or 10 times because he could not get it right.

“I told Pat it was just too hard to draw,” he said. Her response was “I never saw you quit anything.”

All of a sudden, Smith said, he remembered what he didn’t do when trying to draw Churchill.

He said every time he does a drawing, he gets all the things he needs together and then he says a prayer asking for help and guidance. He prayed, he said, and “couldn’t believe what my pencil was doing.”

Other drawings in his World War II collection include the raising of the flag on Iwo Jima, the Navaho code talkers, Ira Hayes, Ernie Pyle, 8^th Army Air Corps Pilots, and the Dogs of War.