November 3, 2026
To: John Stevenson, Paris, France
Dear John,
Last night I was thinking about today, Election Day, and how important this process is for all of us. I was looking back at photos of when you visited during the summer of 2024. That 4th of July weekend, we took a group photo of the folks who had come over to barbecue and celebrate. The flag behind the group was the original 38-star flag that was flown when Comfort was first built. I found it when I bought the house and put it up that summer.
The 38-star flag was official from July 4, 1877, through July 3, 1890. It would have been the official flag during the presidential elections of 1880, 1884, and 1888. These were elections involving Garfield, Cleveland, and Benjamin Harrison.
That flag has survived nearly a century and a half of American political change. Administrations have come and gone, parties have won and lost, and the country has continued to evolve.
When I was thinking about this letter to you, I looked back through the hundreds of letters from the Clark family to find any mention of politics or elections. Unlike us today, they were remarkably discreet in their letters.
I did find one mention, however, from a letter dated November 26, 1913. Alson Clark, the artist, was writing to Amelia Baker, who owned the studio where he painted. She acted as his sometime artist broker as well. Here is the excerpt:
Have a lot of new frames which cost a fortune and hope that we sell enough pictures to pay for them, but times seem hard everywhere since Mr. Wilson’s reign.
Funny how then, like now, we blame the guy in the White House for our economic woes. America in 1913 was in the middle of a recession that would last 23 months. Six years earlier, in 1907, there was a disastrous near collapse of our banking system, and J.P. Morgan had to intervene with other wealthy financiers to save it.
Weeks after this 1913 letter was written, the Federal Reserve was established by an act of Congress, to help prevent further banking collapses.
Looking back at 2008…seems like the banks need a little more work.
Whether you are a Republican or a Democrat or an Independent, many of us vote our pocketbooks…and from my work producing the daily Battleground, Midterms show, I know this election is no different.
Things were tough, even for a painter from a wealthy family back in 1913.
They’re tough for many people now.
I hope people go out and vote today. It’s our right. It’s our responsibility.
You, in France, will have your election soon…and have many of the same problems. Here, like there, I wonder what the people will choose.
I was so glad you and Edouard came to visit this year. Let’s make it an annual event from now on instead of every TWO years.
In the meantime, I can’t wait to see you both in a month and a half!
Much love, Stephen