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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 10, 1983)
features Battalion/Page 5B February 10, 1983 Jewelry craftsman started small, grew United Press International I KERRVILLE—James Av ery leans back in his chair, throws his feet on his desk and dedares he is not interested in making a profit with hisjewel- ry business. I “The basic thing about me is that I’m not driven by reed, by accumulating great wealth,” he says. “I don’t know whether that’s security or a weakness.” Sales of Avery’s meticu lously crafted jewelry raked in $1 1.5 million in 1982. But he considers 45 percent growth for Janies Avery Craftsman Inc. the past two years to be no great shakes. The white-haired, blue- aned Avery has gotten used to exponential growth since he first sawed and polished a couple of silver crosses in his Kerrville garage in 1954. I “I don’t consider myself first a businessman,” he said. ^Fortunately, I was brought up with some common sense, ■ou have to know how much ■lings cost and how much to get for them.” But he would rather talk philosophy than numbers. The business, Avery said, rew out of his personal arch for meaning in life. First a humbling divorce led him back to the church and a Christian commitment that still survives, he said. ‘T’d been an agnostic for years, pretty egocentric,” he said. “A lot of artists tend to be this way and can be pains. I came back in the church and “The basic thing about me is that Tm not driven by greed, by accumulating great wealth. ” — jewelry craftsman James Avery got really involved and thought now was the time to get my life simplified a little bit.” Then he acknowledged his professional dissatisfaction af ter eight years of teaching in dustrial design at universities in Iowa, Colorado and Minne sota. The snow in Minnesota finally drove him south to the Texas Hill Country, his second wife’s home. “I got to thinking maybe it’s important to choose the place you’re going to live rather than let your vocation pick the place you live,” he said. If Avery had had any money to invest in Kerrville, he would have gone into furn iture manufacturing, he said. But he settled for a jewelry bench, some hand tools and the idea that maybe he could make some jewelry. His first customers were the young daughters of Texas’ wealthiest families who came to Kerrville for summer camp each year. He also be gan selling his crosses through Episcopal book stores. “I knew there was a market there of something I felt very strongly about,” he said. “There was integrity about the whole thing.” He grossed $>5,500 the first year working out of his gar age. Compliments and letters of appreciation kept him going, he said. The second year he gros sed $7,500 and had enough basic math that he could real ize the percentage was good. Letting the business grow naturally, Avery incorporated in 1965 and finally moved from the garage to a 26-acre office and factory complex just outside Kerrville. Its stone buildings are angled among the gnarled live oaks he will not cut down. Avery now presides over three plants, 420 employees, 22 retail stores in four states and the sale of nearly I million crosses, chains, charms, rings, bracelets, pendants, key chains, tie tacks, belt buckles and earrings a year. prepanl ed this la iw no siil Chicago collector finds telegraph inventor’s art )I1. ' United Press International in,™ WASHINGTON — Leaning , against a basement wall in a y ( |building at New York’s Syracuse ItonSflUniyerisity, wrapped in brown (Japei and virtually forgotten, f r0IJ Samuel F.B. Morse’s painting lewari® 16 Gallery of the Louvre” was I rediscovered by Chicago collec tor Daniel J. Terra. addfJ Morse, whose fame as a pain- .,1 ter was dimmed by his develop- t ment of the telegraph, painted I f l thl huge oil in Paris in 1832. But when the artist brought it back t to America for exhibition, it was yj,,greeted with indifference, e aliltl ^ to Syracuse Unversity, / where it once hung in the lib- nry, it was a virtual castoff in 1948 when Terra stood before it with his wif e, Adeline. Last year N i‘ i Terra purchased the oil from I the university for $3.25 million, ' the highest price ever paid for an American painting. 5 | “I have never forgotten the I look on Adeline’s face,” 1 erra II BiJ» alled on a recent v 'i s i l to ' Washington when “The L 0 . Louvre” was displayed at the National Gallery of Art. “There /’" was a tear that dropped out of l " u one eye. She said ‘That’s an icon lin 3 of America.’” |The huge painting depicts the grand gallery of the Louvre and : 38 of its paintings by such mas- , 1 tens as Rembrandt, Rubens and Da Vinci. A young American girl is shown copying one of these works, aided by Morse, with his friend James Fenni- more Cooper in the back ground. It symbolizes America in the presence of its European cultu ral heritage. Daniel and his wife built an impressive collection of Amer ican art that eventually will be housed in a new $25 million museum Terra is building in Chicago. Terra is President Reagan’s ambassador at large for culture and was the presi dent’s chief fundraiser during his campaign for the White House. Terra is a slight but spry 71. He has snow-white hair, a neatly clipped white moustache, and luminous gray eyes that reflect the excitement and pride of his achievements in business and the arts. As a young man and with a $2,500 loan from a friend, Ter ra developed a printing ink mechanism that accelerated costly publishing time. It is the basis of the vast success of his synthetic products printing en terprise, Lawter International. The Terras’ first painting was an English landscape that cost about $60. Terra was out of town and sent the money to his years,! may protein * or consul ricken®" licken®*. rich isi"' 1 ] ckens. lo’s) PAVILION SNACK BAR Located on Spence street next to the CREAMERY Hamburgers, Sandwiches, Drinks, and Snacks Breakfast Donuts, Eggs, sausage and Hot Coffee Open Mon.-Fri. 7:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m / / QUALITY FIRST" Valentine: Be my gorilla? United Press International BROOKFIELD. Ill. — Sam son the gorilla is not known for his monogamous relationships with females, but he has a prop osition for anyone who will lis ten: “Will you be my prime- mate?” Samson, a 450-pound silver- back gorilla, holds a special place in Brookfield Zoo history. The big ape, on breeding loan from Buffalo, N.Y., in 1979 became the first father in the zoo’s Tro pic World gorilla mountain. To honor Samson and his first steady, Babs, the zoo announced it has named the pri mate pair its Valentine couple of the year. As for Samson and Babs, the romance has ended. Soon after their close encoun ter, Samson turned his atten tions to Babs’ mother. Alpha. Their union also was blessed! with an offspring. And now Samson is courting Mesou, a female on loan from the Detroit Zoo. So far, no baby gorillas are expected. But the zoo is optimis tic — when Samson met Mesou, he just went ape. bride to buy furniture for their new home. Instead she bought the painting. As their affluence grew and their tastes developed, they ex panded to Flemish works, to French Impressionists and, ulti mately, American art of the 19th and 20th centuries, including the valued “Jolly Flatboatmen No. 2” by George Bingham. Ultimately they established a small museum in Chicago and thought of the painting lan guishing in Syracuse. “Adeline said we must have the ‘Gallery of the Louvre,’ ” Terra said. “I said, ‘My dear, how can you buy anything from a university? It is not in private hands.’ She said, ‘What do you have to lose? Why don’t you go see them?’ ” A university official told Ter ra he doubted the painting would ever be sold. Terra per sisted. “Around Labor Day of 1981, somehow, at one of their meet ings, they decided that maybe they could dispose of that paint ing,” Terra said. “It was a good time to sell American paintings; they had become so valuable. And they needed something for their library.” AMERICAS FAMILY DI^UG STORE ECK c Remember c Your \ Valentine *» - on Teb. 14 * WHITMAN'S NYLON PLEATED HEART BOX CHOCOLATES 1-LB. #516/543 YOUR CHOICE * Reg. 10.50 ELMER'S SATIN DECORATED HEART #60132 14-OZ. Reg. 8.25 4 97 PALMER’S GIFT BOX OF CHOCOLATE HEARTS 3.5-OZ. Reg. 1.49 99° 15% OFF REGULAR PRICES OF ANY FRAGRANCE, GREETING CARD, JEWELRY or WATCH WITH PURCHASE OF ANY HEART- SHAPED BOX OF CHOCOLATES. BORDEN MARSHMALLOW or BRACK’S CONVERSATION HEARTS Reg. to 29 c ea. YOUR CHOICE FOR 1 00 PANGBURN'S MILLIONAIRES HEART 8-OZ. Reg. 5.50 3 47 PANGBURN'S RED & WHITE BOW HEART BOX CHOCOLATES 26-OZ. 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