That Old-Time Religion

The century-old Enstrom photo studio is located on an out-of-the-way street in the tiny Iron Range town of Bovey. An otherwise modest wooden building with a flat front and a new addition jutting out from one side, the studio’s most distinguishing feature stretches across its second story: an enormous hand-painted black and white mural of a bearded man at a table, his head bowed in prayer. Before him rests a book, a loaf of bread, a bowl of gruel, and a pair of wire eyeglasses. The painting is a little rough, the angles aren’t quite right, the loaf is too big and the book too small. But none of that matters. The image is unmistakable, iconic, a familiar fixture in the kitchens and living rooms of grandparents everywhere. Underneath the mural are the words, in careful cursive, “Home of the Picture Grace.”

For a town of around six hundred people, Bovey has drawn more than its share of publicity over the years. Its former police chief, Terry Wilkey, who died in 1998, wrote a column for the local weekly called “Streets of Bovey,” in which he recounted the goings on of the town. There were entries like, “Found an unlocked door at a business. We locked it.” The column was cheeky, funny, and widely circulated. For a while in 1994, it was broadcast as a regular series on MPR.

But, by far, Bovey’s greatest fame has come from its affiliation with the Picture Grace, a painting that began as a photograph. In 1918, an elderly man named Charles Wilden came by the studio of Eric Enstrom, a dapper photographer who favored a bowler hat, in hopes of selling a foot-scraper or two. The salesman intrigued Enstrom. As he later explained in an interview, “There was something about the old gentleman’s face that immediately impressed me. I saw that he had a kind face … there weren’t any harsh lines in it.” Enstrom, it turned out, was preparing a collection of work for a state photographers’ convention. “I wanted to take a picture that would show people that even though they had to do without many things because of the war, they still had much to be thankful for.”

Enstrom’s was an old-fashioned brand of Christianity, rooted in humility, a far cry from what often passes for the religion today, especially among right-wing evangelicals—a Darwinian incarnation that says the rich are rich because they are favored by the big man upstairs. Enstrom intentionally posed Wilden before a meager offering. The bow to prayer came easily. “The man doesn’t have much of earthly goods,” Enstrom explained later, “but he has more than most people because he has a thankful heart.” The photograph spoke elegantly and powerfully, first to the citizens of Bovey, a community of loggers and iron workers.

“I grew up in this area,” said Mark Hanson, the current co-owner of Enstrom Studio. “My mother was from Bovey. The Picture Grace has been a big part of my life.” That’s not simply due to its celebrity, Hanson said. “It captured the feeling of the area, this town’s Christian background. Bovey is a very blue-collar community, and what Enstrom captured was someone being thankful for a very humble meal.” Being grateful, he added, “resonates with the people here.”

Admirers from all over the country began buying the photograph. Demand grew for a color version, so Enstrom’s daughter Rhoda made an oil painting based on the portrait. Today, that’s the image most people recognize. “I have seen the photograph,” said Hanson, who supposes the originals to be quite valuable. “People in Bovey have them, old people in this area.” Hanson said that, color aside, the photo and the painting look almost exactly alike. “You have to understand that she had Enstrom there to talk to. She could ask him what color the guy was wearing. Both of them convey the exact same message. She did a great job on the painting.”

By the 1940s, the picture had become so popular that Enstrom Studio could no longer satisfy demand. In 1945, it sold the copyright to Augsburg Publishing House, though people still stop by the studio, especially during summers, to admire the mural and purchase the print, which hangs among photos of high school graduates posed on logs and wielding electric guitars. Because the picture was taken so long ago, the copyright has since lapsed and ownership has moved into the realm of public domain. There is no telling how many prints exist out there. The Picture Grace, appropriately, now belongs to everyone.—Jennifer Vogel


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