No Swimming

 Norman Rockwell might have been thinking of his boyhood summer vacations in upstate New York as he captured a simple joy of country life in No Swimming. Rockwell was branded as a kid illustrator during the early years of his career, which were dominated by his association with Boys' Life magazine and then another children’s magazine, St. Nicholas. He perfected documenting life from the point of view of boys and girls in genre paintings such as this one, capturing slices-of-life just as a camera might have. But such images, just a click away for photographers, were a challenge for artists. Before Rockwell began using photography to aid his painting process, his models had to hold their poses for lengthy stretches, sometimes with limbs propped up by stacks of books or held with ropes and pulleys. Rockwell kept a pile of nickels on a table next to his easel. “Every twenty-five minutes," he recorded, “I’d transfer five of the nickels to the other side of the table, saying, ‘Now that’s your pile.' ”

I love this one as it reminds me of a story my dad told often from his childhood.  He and other boys growing up in Logan, Utah would often go swimming/ skinny dipping in the Logan river.  They chose a secluded spot and often met there to swim and swing on a rope over the river.  One day, a policeman came and told them someone had reported them and that it was illegal to skinny dip.  He put them all in his patrol car and took them down to the police station.  It turned out it was just to scare them- and it was successful.  They just let them all go home.  Dad always ended the story by saying they got the policeman back by dripping as much water all over his backseat as they could.