Back in 1976 I met Florence Real Bird at the Custer Battlefield during a movie shoot. Shortly thereafter I painted this portrait named “Farewell My Son” evoking the feeling (within me at least) that her sorrow was shaded with the hope that he would return. Then in 1991 my 19 year old son was an infantryman in Iraq in the war they called Desert Storm. Pam and I spent many sleepless nights while that war raged, hoping that our son would survive and return. God granted us that prayer.
Florence Real Bird’s portrait hung above the TV set that kept us glued to the CNN coverage. Glen Travis Hopkinson was a machine gunner on top of a humvee. We found out later That as he and his fellow soldiers waited on the border of Saudi Arabia for the order to attack and enter Iraq the sergeants and leaders told them the average life of a machine gunner in Vietnam was a few seconds. Travis went into battle thinking that might be his fate.
