Emlen Etting
Emlen Pope Etting Jr. (August 24, 1905 – July 20, 1993) was an American painter, sculptor, filmmaker, and member of Philadelphia's elite Main Line Society.
Both his parents and the first Emlen Jr. are buried in West Laurel Hill Cemetery in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania.
St. George's, an Episcopal boarding school, was considered at that time to be one of only two suitable options for a young man from Philadelphia's upper crust.
He frequented the most exclusive art shows and enjoyed the avant-garde films screened in Paris Studio 28.
But Lhote would barge right in and the students, the whole class, would follow round behind, and he would take one easel, one painting at a time, and whatever he was emphasizing that day, he would rub it in, and how!
His duty was to disseminate the news of the progress of the D-Day invasion and, more importantly, to reassure the devastated villagers he encountered that they could rely on the assistance of US forces in rebuilding their war-torn lives.
He wrote, presented, and recorded a series of daily news programs for the American Broadcasting Station in Europe in the towns he visited to accomplish this.
Etting's responsibilities included recording the experiences of the newly liberated French townspeople he met in the wake of the military sweep of their occupied country for the US Army and reporting on what he observed in the field.
He felt ashamed that there was such an outpouring of gratitude for him and his party when the appreciation, in his opinion, should be offered instead to the men who fought and died there.
Etting documented these historical events in The Liberation of Paris, a recording collaboration with Orson Welles, directed by Pierre Schaeffer.
In addition to recording this experience professionally for broadcast and publication, on the day of the liberation of Paris, Etting also made a personal journey into the past, and perhaps, into his aesthetic and artistic process.
The painter wrote in his journal that once the Allies had secured the city and he had fulfilled his military obligations, including requisitioning a jeep to confirm the welfare of Pablo Picasso, Etting made his way to Lhote's studio on the Rue l'Odessa.
Lhote had to know whether the Luftwaffe had damaged the priceless Delacroix murals in the Palais du Luxembourg, which the Nazis had seized and occupied during the war, and evacuated in the preceding days.
After returning from World War II Etting immediately worked as an illustrator, but continued to paint and sculpt.
In 1938, Etting was married to Gloria Braggiotti, the daughter of an Italian aristocrat and a Boston Brahmin mother,[4][5] at the Church of the Transfiguration in New York City.
