Hi all, the former MR. EWILLYS is here with a couple updates. First, a quick look at my newest jeep Otis (more info and pics at the bottom of the post).
2025 Review: The year 2025 proved both busier and bumpier than expected. Some of you may remember that I listed all my jeeps for sale last fall. Of those, only Lost Biscuit, the 1949 fiberglass CJ-3A, sold. Patterson, the 1956 Convertible DJ-3A, looks like it will sell shortly. The FC Tour Jeep and the Parkette-bodied racer remain in my possession. But, I did receive a new flat-fender jeep, an unexpected treasure.
The new book – Henry Farny: For 2025 I planned to get more rest. The plan quickly detoured. Shortly after the ‘ball’ dropped on 2024, I received an email from Justine Keller, Assistant De Production for Supermouche, a French video production company. In her January 2 email she explained that French television was funding a documentary dedicated solely to French-born Henry Farny, best known for his paintings of Indians in the 1890s and 1910s. She explained that the director of the documentary used to work with a friend of mine (non-jeep) in Henry Farny’s hometown of Ribeauville. Since Henry Farny, who went simply by Farny, happened to be my great great uncle, Justine hoped that I might have some art, information or useful connections to Farny and Wurlitzer family relatives! (You can learn more about Henry Farny at a web site I built)
I began hunting down referencing to Henry Farny’s life. I immediately envisioned a possible book. I didn’t know much about him; in fact, I thought his story had been told in several biographical pieces in books about his paintings. I was wrong. His life hadn’t been fully described.
Farny was a large, broad man with a personality equal to his size. He looked nothing like an artist (some funny stories there). He had an adventurous upbringing, but then spent most of his life in Cincinnati. I thought there might be a few hundred references to Farny in old newspapers, but eventually discovered more than two thousand. It took me five months working part time every day (yes, I can be obsessive) to document them all (the other half my time was replacing the interior trim, something Ann hoped to have done).
The documentary crew appreciated the information I shared with them to the point that they requested an interview. In May I spent a week in Cincinnati. It was an adventure reminiscent of our eWillys trips. One contact, opened the door of another and soon I secured a special visit at the Cincinnati Art Museum to view their collection of Farny’s works. I got to eat meals at several private clubs, obtained access to view rare documents and paintings, attended a local German festival (food and drink on the house) and, finally, spent several hours with the French video crew, who were an absolute kick. I walked from the Farny family home on McMicken to downtown Cincinnati, the same one and a half mile walk my great great grandmother, Leonie Farny (later Leonie Wurlitzer), made daily when she worked in downtown Cincinnati during her early twenties. I spent time downtown where Farny spent time. I got an exclusive invitation to attend a Cincinnati Literary Club meeting, a club of which Farny was a member for several decades. That they, a bunch of readers, recognized the biography’s value is a good sign for the book. Now I just have to write it well!
By June, all seemed to be going very well. I just celebrated my 60th birthday with my kids and was prepping for a summer of projects and working on the FC when one morning I stopped being able to urinate … such a strange feeling. My flow had been slowing for a while and, after turning 60 that June, I’d planned to get a new primary doctor to address that issue and others, because I had become “a man of a certain age”. Eventually, I went to our local ER (I’ve never been so thankful that our local ER never has a line) seeking help. I returned home wearing a painfully stiff catheter.
