A few years ago Charlie Purinton ’67 contacted the Archives about a watercolor he’d painted as a freshman in a Loomis art class. It had hung for years in the Burton Lounge at Erickson Gymnasium, and with the construction of the Olcott Center in 2002 and the dismantling of the original lounge, Charlie inquired about the painting’s whereabouts.

A bit of sleuthing in the Archives turned up photographs of the painting, including one showing Loomis’ legendary teacher and coach Stanley Shimkus seated in Burton Lounge with Charlie’s watercolor in the background. Another archived photograph shows Charlie taking suggestions from art teacher Charles Ferguson while the painting sits on an easel near them. This image appeared in the Loomis School catalogs of the late 1960s.

A different black-and-white photograph inspired the painting. The young Charlie found a landscape in one of Mr. Ferguson’s art magazines and set about doing the assignment by bringing color to his own painting. He decided on an autumnal palette in part because the spare landscape suggested the fall season. Perhaps more importantly, it was fall, his first on the Island, and these were the colors he saw and felt in the Loomis landscape. Charlie, a novice art student, recalls that the painting took at least six weeks to complete.

Dean of Students Charles Pratt made an unannounced visit to the art class one day. The presence of the dean left many in the room feeling, as Charlie Purinton later recalled, “thoroughly intimidated.” After carefully examining each student’s artwork, Mr. Ferguson and Mr. Pratt left the room, a move that did little to calm the fears of the boys.

Mr. Pratt returned and motioned to Charlie Purinton to join him outside the classroom; the freshman could not have predicted what happened next. Mr. Pratt asked if the school might hang the watercolor in Burton Lounge once Charlie finished the assignment. Charlie remembers with a chuckle that the dean emphasized the reason for the request —not because of any artistic talent the painting might reveal, but simply because the colors of the painting complemented the decorating scheme of the room.

Charlie and his wife and children made numerous “pilgrimages” over the decades to see the painting in the original Burton Lounge. In May 2010, we sent news to him: His watercolor was safe and sound in the Archives’ storage area. At the time, Charlie was stationed at Bagram Air Field in Afghanistan, serving as chaplain with the 86th Infantry Brigade Combat Team (Mountain), Vermont National Guard. With its artist thousands of miles from the place and time of that freshman art class, the painting and its story had been discovered, again.