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Joan H. Wallace
Dec 09, 2024
LAKEVILLE — Joan H. Wallace, artist, political activist, and long-time resident of New York City and the Northwest Corner died at home in Lakeville, at age 93, on Oct. 30, 2024.
Ms. Wallace, née Joan Elaine Hochstuhl, was born in 1931, the daughter of Elsie Wibben and Ernest Hochstuhl, both the offspring of German immigrants. Much of her childhood was spent in Syosset, Long Island with a couple of years in the Adirondack town of Bloomingdale where she sought relief from severe childhood asthma. She attended secondary school at Friends Academy in Locust Valley, New York, and received an associate degree from Lasell College.
Fresh out of college, Ms. Wallace moved to New York City where she worked in public relations for The New Yorker magazine and dabbled in creative writing. A couple of her stories were published in Esquire magazine, something viewed by her parents as scandalous for a young lady. In 1956, she met a young engineer, George A. P. Wallace, and they married in 1957, had three children, and remained together for 54 years, until Mr. Wallace passed away in 2011.
Although Ms. Wallace returned to work in public relations for the Museum of Modern Art during the 1970s, she was above all an accomplished artist and lifelong student of art, specializing in oil painting, drawing, pastels, and photography. In New York City, she studied art history at Columbia University for three years, completed a four-year certificate program at the Art Students League, two years of study in composition and art analysis at the National Academy School of Fine Arts, and studied advanced photographic and darkroom techniques at the New School-Parsons School of Design. At one time, six mural-sized versions of her New York City cityscape photographs were on permanent exhibit in the New York City headquarters of Blue Cross Blue Shield. Her work was shown in various galleries and exhibits, and she sold works to private collectors.
Ms. Wallace and her husband were active art patrons during their time in New York, as well as the brief years they were residents of Portland, Maine, Boston, Massachusetts, and finally in the Northwest Corner where they lived permanently from 1998 onwards. In addition to fine arts, they supported theater, opera, and early music. Ms. Wallace was passionate about politics, the positive role of government, and a firm believer in active participation in the democratic process. She worked on several political campaigns, notably those of John Lindsay for mayor of New York City and Hubert Humphrey for president, including hosting campaign events in her home. She encouraged her children to also volunteer in political campaigns. Ms. Wallace was an ardent feminist and early supporter of National Organization of Women (NOW) and worked steadfastly on their behalf for many years. She was also a devoted pacifist and threw herself into opposition of the Vietnam War, including helping to organize the huge New York City march in October 1969 that made up part of the national Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam.
Certainly, a highlight of her life was her fascination with Italy, including its long history, art, architecture, religious evolution, and present-day society. In 1988, she and her husband purchased a property in the medieval hill town of Casole d’Elsa. Together they renovated the house, a slice of the wall built in the 11th century with the village on the inside and sweeping views of Tuscan farmland on the outside. Their many trips to Casole were the springboard for extensive travels in Italy, Greece, Turkey, many friendships, and a window into the rather frenetic, but wonderful, chaos of present-day Italian society.
Philanthropy was important to Ms. Wallace and, in addition to her support for the arts, she and her husband supported many national and local environmental organizations, including Salisbury Land Trust, Sharon Audubon, Appalachian Mountain Club, American Bird Conservancy, and Sierra Club.
She is fondly remembered by her family and friends as an active conversationist, an avid reader, and one who was always sensitive to the beauty around her. Ms. Wallace is survived by a son, George E. Wallace of Salisbury, a daughter, E. Ainslie Wallace of Cambridge, Massachusetts, and eight grandchildren, four of whom are the offspring of her daughter Elaine who passed away in 2019.
A private memorial service is planned. In lieu of flowers, please consider donating to the Union of Concerned Scientists either via their website at www.ucsusa.org or by mail to Union of Concerned Scientists, 2 Brattle Square, Cambridge, MA 02138.
The Kenny Funeral Home has care of arrangements.
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Phragmites australis australis in North Canaan.
John Coston
Finally rain. For weeks, the only place there had been moisture was in the marsh and even there, areas that usually catch my boots in the mud were dry. I could not see the footprints of the bear (or is it deer?) that have been digging up and eating the underground skunk cabbage flowers. Not that I could do anything to stop it. A layer of snow that actually sticks around for a while seems like wishful thinking these days.
Masses of skunk cabbage, Symplocarpus foetidus, appeared one spring, like magic, after we hired a team to remove the barberry from about an acre of the marsh adjacent to the driveway. Of course, it had been there all along, waiting patiently underground or hiding in the barberry’s thorny shrub-cages, but we had not seen it. That was about eight years ago; after the barberry’s removal there have been successive infestations of invasives but also, as with the skunk cabbage, some welcome new sightings of native plants.
I wrote in this column last year about Japanese stiltgrass, Microstegium vimineum, and the success in using the weed torch on a large patch of it in the marsh. It remained largely free of this annual invasive grass this year but we switched to hand weeding the area as, given the dry weather, we could not use the torch even in the marsh. Over the course of three weeks, we pulled out what amounted to 6 trash bins stuffed solid with the hairlike strands. As many of them have seedheads we will burn them once the ban is lifted. I should have paid attention to the stiltgrass infestation earlier in the season but walking near Route 7 is not the most peaceful thing to do so I tend to avoid it.
Twice a year I make my way into the marsh as far as I can go until halted by barberry and multiflora rose to hold at bay another grass, this one a giant compared to stiltgrass. Phragmites australis is a tall reed with a pouf of a seed head that is abundant in moist and wet areas everywhere in the US. It is so aggressive in wetlands that it quickly becomes a monoculture- a sea of swaying beige. It not only crowds out other plants but changes the pH of the surrounding soil and water so nothing native can grow in it. It is a real habitat killer. Drive on route 41 toward Sharon from Hotchkiss school and you will see a large field of phragmites on the left-hand side of the road. Once identified you cannot unsee how it has hijacked our landscape.
Thanks to my gardener’s help cutting down barberry, multiflora rose and honeysuckle in the marsh last winter, this year my access was greatly improved to a stand of phragmites-about a third of an acre of it. With each visit I cut down as much of it as I could to eliminate the possibility for it to grow a seed head. Though loathe to use an herbicide, last year I experimented on a small area, dabbing the cut ends with a wetlands ‘safe’ herbicide. (No herbicide is really safe for the environment but often the chemicals that are added to the herbicide to help it penetrate the leaves are especially damaging.) That application seemed to work so I may repeat it next year on another area.
With all invasives, getting rid of them when you see a first few pop up will pay off. That is what is happening on Cream Hill Road in Cornwall where a small stand of phragmites was recently cut under the water line, a natural technique that attempts to ‘drown’ the plant. The next step will be to cover with a black tarp any remaining phragmites that come back from this first effort. According to Heidi Cunnick, who chairs the Cornwall Conservation Commission, their new policy prioritizes the invasive plants for removal so that small infestations can be eliminated early. Cunnick reminds me that there is a biological control for phragmites that remains under review by a US government department but the future possibility of such an eradication method is not stopping activities to reduce populations- now - in Cornwall.
Another example of successful eradication comes from the Twin Lakes area; a couple who moved to a property that came with a quarter-acre of phragmites colonizing in and around their pond. They valiantly did the work themselves as they could not find anyone who would do it for them. A cut and tarp method was used here for the on-land plants; the ones underwater were cut a foot below the water surface over several years. While most is gone, the battle continues with stragglers; these are tackled with aquatic use herbicide using a dabber on the cut end of a stem or sprayed on a glove that is rubbed over the green stem.
It is hard to stay positive; the work can be hard and tiresome. And it is always a gamble that the area you are working on will grow in with native plants rather than with more invasives. Sometimes you clear a patch of barberry and it gets filled with stiltgrass; you try again. Sometimes you get a patch of goldenrod- nice to have but you don’t want it crowding out the other native plants. And sometimes you get a big reward- the discovery of natives so new to you that you can’t identify them without an app on your phone. In the marsh, where I worked as the weather turned cooler, I noticed quite a few new grasses popping out of the damp soil, especially where the weed torch had been used the prior year. So far, I have identified: Carex albursina, White bear sedge; Carex pedunculata, Longstalk sedge; Carex obnupta, Slough sedge; Carex pennsyvanica, Pennsylvania sedge; Carex frankii, Frank’s sedge; Carex blanda, Eastern woodland sedge; Carex eburnean, Bristleleaf sedge; Danthonia spicata, Poverty oatgrass; Deschampsia cespitosa, Tufted hairgrass; Glyceria striata, Fowl mannagrass and Leersia virginica, Whitegrass. The deer have already helped themselves to a few of these but I am hopeful to see most of them again.
Dee Salomon ‘ungardens’ in Litchfield County.
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'Cornwall reads Cornwall' returns
Dec 04, 2024
Roxana Robinson reads Cornwall, Nov. 30.
Natalia Zukerman
Bob Meyers, President and Publisher of the Cornwall Chronicle, kicked off the 5th annual Cornwall Reads Cornwall event at the UCC in Cornwall on Nov. 30 with a warm welcome and a gentle reminder to silence cell phones. Over the next hour, the audience was transported back in time as local writers, editors, luminaries, and students brought the Chronicle’s archives to life.
“This reading has become an annual event,” said Meyers, “as well as a welcome distraction from Thanksgiving leftovers.” He then noted that the event “was the original brainchild of Roxana Robinson.” Meyers added, “She also arranged to have this take place on the day of her birth,” at which point the audience wished the celebrated local author a happy birthday.
Before inviting Robinson to be the first reader, Meyers spoke a bit about the Chronicle’s history. The Cornwall Chronicle is a monthly, nonpartisan, nonprofit newspaper run by volunteers and funded entirely by reader donations. Founded in 1991 by Tom and Margaret Bevans, it was born out of Tom’s frustration with Cornwall’s lack of local press coverage. A graphic artist and former design head at Simon & Schuster, Tom shaped the paper’s timeless format and mission: fostering community understanding and civic engagement.
Over the years, leadership transitioned to Spencer and Bobby Klaw, retired editors from major publications, and later to an editorial board supported by a network of volunteer writers and artists. For 22 years, the Chronicle has been published without missing an issue, drawing contributions from both seasoned journalists and local voices like farmers and social workers. Delivered free to Cornwall residents and out-of-town subscribers, the ad-free paper relies solely on donations.
Robinson read the first piece, an article about snow plowing from December 1994. She was followed by Emmy Award-winning journalist and Cornwall resident Richard Schlesinger, who read a piece about grandmothers from a June 1992 edition. Robinson held the mic for local activist Nita Colgate as she read from a July 1998 issue of the Chronicle. Other readers included Gillian Blake, senior vice president, publisher, and editor-in-chief at Crown, a division of Penguin Random House.
Local students Willow Berry and Willa Lesch took turns reading a piece together, and recent Vassar graduate Gloria Trevor read a piece about snakes. Martin Chalk, board member of the Cornwall Conservation Trust and long-time Cornwall resident, read from a June 2017 edition of the Chronicle. Author Leigh Newman read a recent piece from August 2024, and CEO and founder of Five Acre Farms, Daniel Horan, read a piece from April 2024.
With each reading, the room was filled with the spirit of shared history, as tales of local lore, humor, and heartache unfolded. The event was a reminder of a simpler time and a celebration of Cornwall’s enduring love for its stories and the people who tell them.
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