The House of Aingell – Circa l938 - 8″ x 10″ Watercolor & Ink

“When you get into a tight place and it seems that you can’t go on, hold on — for that’s just the place and the time that the tide will turn.”
– Harriet Beecher Stowe

Copyright Beth Parker Art 2012

The House of Aingell – Circa l938 - 8″ x 10″ Watercolor & Ink

This is the home of Rita Bradley.  She commissioned me to paint this and she gave me some wonderful history on it.  After I painted it, my husband gave me some more insight.  His dad, Fred Parker, who grew up in Eufaula, always thought this was the most beautiful home in Eufaula.  It is wonderful.  The grounds are so well kept and lush that it was hard to get an angle that showed this much of the house.  Off behind that tree is another building, a garage with an apartment over it.

Here is some of the history I got from Rita Bradley:

“It was built in l938 and was home to The Aingell Family. They owned a Drug Store on Main Street and Mrs. Aingell was the Granddaughter of a well known Native American, George Washington Grayson (Chief For The Confederacy).  

Beth, many elderly folks from Eufaula have pointed out to me: The circle of rocks in the front yard. They mean something–I just don’t know what! They have been there from the beginning of property being a Home and secondly The Flagpole (which should be taken down, but not by Me)! I was told, before moving in, that the Aingell’s had on son that was killed in The Invasion of Normandy. To celebrate his life and in remembrance of him, the flagpole was erected and shall stand until a higher being takes it out and or down. I was also told that the old iron railing was from a Historic Building in Eufaula. Just saying. Newsy Notes coming Your Way! Well, it has been there since l938 too. I am told a Jewish businessman rented it for many years from The Aingell Family.”

It was an honor to paint this home and I am really enjoying all I am learning about Eufaula, as I paint all these buildings.  I have only lived here for 20 years and Eufaula emerged as a town in 1872.  The building my sign shop is in is somewhere around 100 years old.  I have never really known exactly, as I lease the building.  I have been in it for 15 of my 20 years in business.

About Harriet Beecher Stowe

American author Harriet Beecher Stowe is known for her novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, a rallying cry for the abolitionist movement. When she met Abe Lincoln in 1862, he said, “So you’re the little woman who wrote the book that started this great war!” She was born in Connecticut in 1811. Her brother, Henry Ward Beecher, became a renowned minister. After an unusually thorough education for a woman of the time, she began her career when she won a magazine prize contest. She died in 1896.