[The following sketch was distributed at the July 28, 2001 Louisville Legends All-Star Basketball Game -- J. Arnett]
The Artist
Walter Wendell Arnett was born in Salyersville, Magoffin Co, KY on May 12, 1912 and died July 10, 1998 in Louisville, KY at age 86. He expressed an interest in art at an early age and attended the Cincinnati Art Academy 1932-33. He became an advertising artist in Nashville and served during WWII as a camouflage specialist in Bradley's 1st Army seeing action during the invasion of Normandy and the Battle of the Bulge. He was nearly court-martialed for cartooning Army officers, but like Bill Mauldin was rescued by the good humor of General Eisenhower. When the war ended Walter sought to develop a career as a cartoonist and developed several strips which he was unable to sell to a national syndicate. He joined The Courier-Journal and Louisville Times in 1945 as an artist for the Promotion Dept. and later did illustrations for the Advertising and Editorial News Art Departments before his retirement in 1977 after 32 years.
As a hobby Walter began in 1957 painting 20 x 30 inch biographical portraits and caricatures of prominent citizens. Over the next thirty years he painted over 300 individuals and their families. In the 70's he got interested in sports paintings. Among his subjects were the ABA Kentucky Colonels, Secretariat, Chris Collinsworth, Adoph Rupp, John Wooden, Joe Hall, Bobby Knight and various UK and IU teams, the Redbirds baseball team, and Denny Crum and two of the U of L squads. He would have painted more but the restrictive NCAA rules of about 1981 dropped a wet towel on his enthusiasm
Walter painted Denny Crum and the 1980 U of L team with acrylics on canvas board before they won the NCAA championship and had several hundred posters printed at his own expense as a promotional venture. When the team won the 1980 NCAA Championship game he added a banner stating such at the bottom of the poster and had several hundred more posters printed which he sold for $10 ea.
Following Walter's death in 1998, I ran across about 40 of the posters with the NCAA banner and 100 of the posters without the banner. Most of the NCAA banner posters were sold through ads in the Louisville Sports Report these past two years, and most of the rest, as well as those without the banner, will be sold or distributed at the Legends of Louisville All-Star Game tonight.
10% of the proceeds of sales of these prints go to the UL Sports Dept,
10% to the Legends of Louisville All-Star Game charity designation,
10% to Walter's Crescent Hill Baptist Church (www.crescenthillbaptistchurch.org)
and the remaining funds after taxes and fees go to manage the WWArnett Collection.
Contents of the Collection will eventually be listed on the WWA website: http://members.aye.net/~carnett/wwarnettcollection.htm
John W. Arnett
July 28, 2001
WWArnett Collection
P.O. Box 6593
Louisville, KY 40206-0593