Maxfield Parrish, William Howard Hart and the Plainfield Village (NH) Town Hall

By Jack Jacobsen
Author of “Maxfield Parrish: The Man Behind the Make-Believe” and an art researcher on all things Maxfield Parrish

The stage in the historic Plainfield Village Town Hall has been called the most beautiful stage north of Boston from the time it was built in 1916 because it was designed and equipped by New York stage designer, William Howard Hart, with a woodland stage set painted by Maxfield Parrish. Some theaters had stage screens painted by notable artists, a few had backdrops painted by notable artists, but only one had an entire set painted by a famous artist, the Plainfield Village Town Hall. Plainfield had mostly become known because of its association with the Cornish Colony of artists, but the Town Hall belongs to Plainfield, and has lasted far longer than the Cornish Colony. The Plainfield Village Town Hall was originally built in 1798, and moved, twice, before settling in its current location in 1846.

Maxfield Parrish’s Early Theatrical Connections

If someone would want to trace Maxfield Parrish’s connections to the theater, they would have to start very early in his life, with his very first artistic sale. As a boy, Mr. Parrish sold a Punch and Judy type toy theater he had made to the duPont brothers for $1.00.

The next time we find evidence of Maxfield Parrish being involved with the theater comes in 1891. Mr. Parrish’s life-long friend, college roommate, and apartment roommate in Philadelphia by this time, Christian F. Brinton, convinced him to head out to West Chester, PA, to assist members of the West Chester Cricket Club in the production of two plays to be held at Library Hall (now part of the Chester County Historical Society). The first, “Snowed In,” was presented on July 2nd and 3rd. The second was “Our Boys,” presented on December 29th and 30th. Mr. Parrish created the programs for both events and had them printed, he also designed the sets, oversaw their construction, and painted them. He even acted in both productions, having one of the leads in the second. This was also the first time Mr. Parrish publicly presented himself as F. Maxfield Parrish instead of Fred M. Parrish.

The Mask & Wig Club Commissions

Maxfield Parrish’s next theater affiliation came with his first major commission in 1894. He was hired by the Mask & Wig Club of the University of Pennsylvania to decorate their new clubhouse. He painted decorations for the proscenium arch, the lobby, the ticket window, and the grill room. For the large decoration in the grill room, Mr. Parrish painted his second Old King Cole mural. The first version, long since lost, was for his Haverford College dorm room in Barclay Hall that he shared with Christian Brinton. Mr. Parrish created the programs for several of the Mask & Wig performances from 1894 through 1896. It has been assumed that Mr. Parrish received the commission for the Mask & Wig Club through the architect who designed the building, Wilson Eyre, who was a friend of Mr. Parrish’s father, the artist and etcher, Stephen Parrish. While that is certainly possible, it is also true that no fewer than seven of the people who were in the two plays performed in West Chester in 1891 were students at the University of Pennsylvania, and involved with the Mask & Wig Club.

In 1894, Maxfield Parrish’s father, Stephen, moved to Cornish, NH, to join the artists’ colony and build his home, Northcote. Maxfield would follow him four years later and built his home, The Oaks, in Plainfield, NH.

William Howard Hart: The Other Half of the Story

The history of William Howard Hart is a bit more obscure than that of Maxfield Parrish. He went by Howard Hart because the Hart family had a habit of naming their male offspring William Something Hart for well over a century by that point, so the men all went by their middle names. Howard Hart was known as a landscape and portrait artist. It is known that he studied at the Art Students League in New York City, and was part of the art colony in Giverny, France. He was a close friend of Herbert and Adeline Adams, and followed them to Plainfield in 1896. While spending his summers in Plainfield, he worked on his paintings and became involved with the Plainfield Players. Together with the Adamses, he designed and built the Herbert Adams Outdoor Theatre. What is far less known is that while Howard Hart spent his winters in New York City, he was employed as a scenery designer and painter, most notably for David Belasco, and for the Belasco Theatre after it was built in 1907. The Belasco Theatre became known as the premier theater for the Little Theatre Movement in New York City.

Collaboration and Community in Plainfield

In 1905, both Mr. Parrish and Mr. Hart were involved with organizing, and performing in, the celebration for Augustus St. Gaudens, “A Masque of “Ours:” The Gods and the Golden Bowl.” In 1914, both men were instrumental in organizing “Sanctuary, the Bird Masque,” in celebration of the establishment of the Meriden Bird Club. Both men, along with others, had become active members of the Plainfield community, not just the Cornish Colony. The Plainfield Players was established mainly for the young people of the community, and their performances were held at the Herbert Adams Outdoor Theatre.

The problem with the Herbert Adams Outdoor Theatre was that its use was limited to only a few months out of the year, and even then subject to the weather. In 1915, Howard Hart had the idea that a professional type stage could be added to the historic Plainfield Village Town Hall. He presented the idea to the Town of Plainfield, which agreed to put it up for a vote. Article X from the 1916 Annual Report for the Town of Plainfield states: “To see if the town will vote to raise the sum of three hundred dollars to build a foundation at the east end of the town hall at Plainfield in accordance with a proposition of William H. Hart.” His proposition was, if the town would pay for the foundation, he would pay for everything above that, including a professional stage lighting system. The town agreed, and construction of the stage began in February of 1916. According to the 1917 Annual Report for the Town of Plainfield, the town’s part of the cost ended up being $405.00, following the initial disbursement of $270.00, then an additional $135.00 to E. C. Waite, Jr. for the balance on the foundation.

Building the ‘Most Beautiful Stage North of Boston’

With Howard Hart, Plainfield had a professional stage designer who had the contacts to obtain professional stage equipment. All that remained was stage scenery. Mr. Hart was scenery designer and painter who would design and paint an interior set for the Plainfield Village Town Hall stage. He would approach his friend, Maxfield Parrish, to provide a woodland scene for the stage, which he graciously agreed to provide at no charge to the town. Mr. Parrish knew how to design, build and paint stage sets. He also had a mural studio where something the size of a stage set could be built and painted, plus a workshop where the framing could be cut and assembled. Mr. Parrish’s studio had a trap door in the floor where he could lower murals to a garage to be shipped out. That trap door was just long enough that would allow the backdrops for the Town Hall to be lowered and taken away.

In 1909, Maxfield Parrish had accepted a commission from Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney for four large murals for her studio, each approximately five feet high by eighteen feet long. That’s approximately 360 square feet. These were ordered before Mrs. Whitney’s home was built, and not only did she keep changing the plans for the house, but she also changed its location. To say the least, Mrs. Whitney was a difficult client. In 1910, Mr. Parrish accepted his largest commission, eighteen murals for the Ladies Dining Room of the Curtis Building in Philadelphia. These were oddly shaped murals, fitting around existing windows and doorways. The smallest was about three and a half feet by eleven feet, and the largest about ten feet by seventeen feet. Approximately 800 square feet of murals that Mr. Parrish began painting in 1911. Both of these commissions were painted with oils on linen, stretched on wooden frameworks that Mr. Parrish built in his workshop. This is exactly the same way the Plainfield Village Town Hall stage set is constructed, the only difference being that the stage set is painted with a much faster drying gouache instead of oils. Unfortunately, with the Curtis Building murals, the constantly changing temperature and humidity conditions of a dining hall on the top floor of a building in Philadelphia during those years caused the murals to sag, which was remedied by backing those murals with lead, which now precludes the possibility of checking to see if they were painted on the same Indian Head Mills linen as the stage set.

During this time, Maxfield Parrish was commissioned for one painting per year for Crane’s Chocolates. The first three murals for Mrs. Whitney were finished by 1915. Mr. Parrish finished the last of the Curtis Building murals in May of 1916. Even though this was at the height of his popularity, he only completed one oil painting in the summer of 1916, a never published portrait of Sue Lewin that was later titled Deep Woods: Moonlight.

The question becomes, what else was he working on at this time? The last mural for Mrs. Whitney was painted in 1917 and installed in 1918.

Contemporary Accounts

There has long been speculation on whether or not Maxfield Parrish actually painted the woodland stage set, or if he only designed it and professional scenery painters rendered the finished set. Mr. Parrish may not have signed the woodland set, but he may have left a few clues. Others have told us what happened…

In her article, “The Art of Maxfield Parrish,” in the January, 1918, issue of The American Magazine of Art, Adeline Adams wrote:

“One of the finest expressions of his power in landscape is the large backdrop designed by him for our Cornish theatre – just a thing of mountain, river and foliage, with memorable great rocks fronting you, the whole striking you silent with delight in pure loveliness. The Cornish teahouse has its swinging sign, on each side of which Mr. Parrish has painted in delicately ironic vein a pair of lovers at tea. Here we have the craftsman, painting for permanency, his pigments up against the elements themselves. He cannot afford to scoff at chemistry. As Kenyon Cox lately said, “In the generation just past, the student was taught nothing whatever about the nature of pigments and their combinations, disastrous or otherwise. On the contrary, he was led to despise such knowledge as common stuff a genius needn’t bother with.” It is through such men as Parrish that a sounder tradition will in the end prevail.

The backdrop and the sign were gifts from the artist to the colony, and were painted with the same enthusiasm that he would give to a monumental decoration.” Adeline Adams was the wife of Herbert Adams, and a long-time friend of Mr. Hart and Mr. Parrish.

In her 1917 book, “The Community Theatre in Theory and Practice,” Louise Burleigh wrote:

“The stage of the Town Hall, reconstructed by the cooperative effort of the selectmen and Mr. Howard Hart, is used for frequent village entertainments and for productions by the summer visitors as well. Has a curtain painted by Mr. Maxfield Parrish.”

In her 1917 book, “The Little Theatre in the United States,” Constance D’Arcy Mackay wrote:

“THE LITTLE PLAINFIELD (N. H.) THEATRE”

“POSSIBLY the most beautiful Little Country Theatre in America is the Little Plainfield Theatre, at Plainfield, N. H. It was remade from the Plainfield town hall, a building of sturdy colonial type. (See illustration, page 246. ) It has neither balcony nor boxes, but its seating capacity is 250. Its color scheme is green and white; its proscenium arch is flanked by gray-green lattices that lend a rustic note. The curtain is ruby velour.”

“The Little Plainfield Theatre is equipped with lighting facilities and scenery that many a city theatre might envy. The interior scenes have been painted by Mr. Howard Hart, who originated the idea of this theatre, worked out its possibilities, and then turned it over to the Plainfield community. Its woodland scene has been painted by Mr. Maxfield Parrish.”

“The repertoire of this theatre is not a lengthy one since the theatre itself has been recently established. Its first production, The Woodland Princess, by Mrs. Max Perkins, marked an innovation in Little Theatres in that it was for children, acted by children. The next production was a three-act charade, written by the people of the community around the name of the theatre’s donor, Howard Hart. After this came a brief farce from the German; and now a series of Yeats-Gregory plays are under consideration for production.”

Perhaps the best description comes from another Plainfield resident who knew both Maxfield Parrish and William Howard Hart, Lucy F.R. Bishop, who in 1974 wrote a never published article: “MY NEIGHBOR, MAXFIELD PARRISH”

“Mr. Parrish, in his quiet modest way, considered himself to be one of us, here, in this little town of Plainfield, N.H. He went to all the town meetings, and he was genuinely interested in all of the town activities. He came to the village suppers, to plays, and to musicales at the Town Hall. We were given some very fine stage scenery for our Town Hall by one of the summer residents; later Mr. Parrish painted a beautiful backdrop for the outdoor scenes. It was a painting of Mt. Ascutney, which he viewed from his house on the hill. We are so proud of this great gift from the artist who lived among us.”

The Legacy of the Plainfield Stage

The first production in the new theater was “The Woodland Princess,” written by Louise Saunders Perkins, an already established playwright, whose husband was the publisher, Maxwell Perkins. They were considered members of the Cornish Colony, even though they lived in Windsor, VT. William Maxwell Evarts Perkins is best remembered for his days as chief editor for Charles Scribner’s Sons, where he published such well known authors as Edith Wharton and Henry James, as well as discovering authors like F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, and Thomas Wolfe. It was because of Maxwell Perkins that Edith Wharton and Maxfield Parrish collaborated on the Scribner’s Magazine serialized articles, “Italian Villas and Their Gardens,” which was later published in book form.

“The Woodland Princess” was first performed on Friday, August 11, 1916, just six months after construction of the stage began. Mr. Parrish did not finish his work on the Curtis Building murals until May of 1916. That left two and a half months for him to design the woodland stage set. There would not have been enough time for professional scenery painters in New York to construct and paint the stage sets, then ship them to Plainfield, especially if there had been any problems. It is known that Howard Hart painted the interior stage set, and he could not have done that in his cottage on Stage Road. He would have needed a mural studio nearby. Luckily, there was one handy on Freeman Road, at The Oaks, Maxfield Parrish’s home and studio. Those two and a half months would have been enough time to construct the sets and paint them, using the gouache paint, in Mr. Parrish’s studio.

Maxfield Parrish may not have signed the woodland stage set, but he did leave us clues, in his own typical and humorous fashion. One of the things Maxfield Parrish was known for throughout his career was putting himself in many of his paintings. For the woodland stage set, he included a perfect profile of himself, albeit somewhat well hidden. Whether it was so he could be part of every production, or to look in on every production, is anyone’s guess. There are other images hidden in the stage set, which is something professional scenery painters would not have done. Part of the fun is finding them, and that was probably the intention.

The Howard Hart Players

Howard Hart passed away on February 20, 1937, while staying at his winter home in New York City. The Town of Plainfield, Herbert Adams, and Maxfield Parrish, responded on August 7th of that year. A meeting of “The Plainfield Players” was called on Aug. 7, 1937, at the Town Hall. Anyone interested in the promotion of music and drama were also invited to attend. There were only five (5) of those members present, so the meeting was turned over to all present for a general discussion of organizing a club that would include both music and drama. This club to be in memory of the late W. Howard Hart. It was unanimously voted to name it, – “Howard Hart Players.”