The Ernest Hemingway Foundation of Oak Park

Hemingway, A Life in Nature: 2013 Summer Programs

It was in the Des Plaines River Valley in the early 1900s that young Ernest began acquiring the knowledge and skills he would one day need. Here his father prepared him to hike, camp, fish and hunt. He taught him to closely observe animals and their habitats. His mother made him aware of how life and art affect people’s feelings.

Later, Hemingway would apply these lessons in writing his observations to make people feel what he felt. Ernest learned about animals around the world from books and magazines at home in Oak Park and exhibits in Chicago’s Field Museum. At two, he drew a giraffe as a diagonal line crooked at the end--getting to the essence of his subject, as he did in his later writing. 

Decades later, he described his initiation into the natural world in this passage from a 1935 article in Esquire magazine:

You can remember the miracle it seemed when you hit your first pheasant when he roared up from under your feet to top a sweet briar thicket and fell with his wings pounding.

SCHEDULE OF EVENTS

June 22, 2013 1 PM

An afternoon walk with Ernest

A free family nature walk takes parents and children along the banks of the Des Plaines River with naturalists from the Trailside Museum, featuring discussions of the sights and sounds that influenced his work. Following the journey, families will explore writing about their observations of nature, just as a young Hemingway did! Limited: 20 participants.

July 21, 2013

Hemingway Birthday Celebration

Enjoy an open house at the Hemingway Birthplace, followed by an evening reception and lecture by scholar Liesl Olson at the Hemingway Museum on Hemingway’s time in Chicago and his influence from various Chicago sites of learning including the Field Museum and Art Institute.

August 24, 2013 10 AM

Hemingway in the Field

A tour of the Chicago Field Museum for the general public that explores the trips Hemingway made to the museum with his parents, showing people what Hemingway saw and how he incorporated those sights into his writing. Discussion by a Field Museum docent will focus on how those collections began Hemingway’s education as a citizen of the world.

WRITE IN HEMINGWAY'S HOUSE: Announcing The Ernest Hemingway Foundation of Oak Park's Writer in Residence Program

Up in the attic of a Victorian home in Oak Park, a young Ernest Hemingway played with his siblings, telling them stories, dreaming of a life of adventure. This summer, the dream that came to life for him will come to life for another writer, chosen as The Ernest Hemingway Foundation of Oak Park’s Writer in Residence.

The Oak Park-based Foundation, which owns the home where Hemingway was born, is seeking applicants for a year-long program designed to give writers what they most need in order to create great work: space and inspiration.

The attic of the Hemingway Birthplace Home is being transformed from a dusty storage space to the place where a great novel, epic poem, evocative short story or groundbreaking journalism project will be created. The writer chosen by the Foundation will work in a newly redesigned office, outfitted as a safari writing retreat by Thomasville of Oakbrook and featuring their Hemingway Collection of furniture and décor.

The writer will be given use of the workspace for one year at no cost (see application for details), and will be asked to provide cultural programming – lectures, workshops, presentations, or other programs – to the general public.

“The Foundation’s mission is to honor Ernest Hemingway’s legacy through the promotion of thoughtful reading and writing,” said Foundation Chairman John W. Berry. "We see this opportunity as a way to connect that legacy to new and creative written expression."

Interested writers may apply by downloading and filling out the following application:

Download EHFOP.WriterInResidenceApplication

Applications will be accepted through June 1, with the selection announced at the Hemingway Birthday Celebration July 21 in Oak Park. Start date will be determined by the writer and Foundation. 

Tea for Tuesdays: Visit Ernest For Free This Winter

Don't get cabin fever this winter! Visit the Hemingway Birthplace Home and Museum on Tuesdays in January, February and March for free!

Join us for tours of the historic home where Hemingway was born, along with complimentary tea from Forest Park's Todd and Holland Tea Merchants. Visit the Museum and learn all about Hemingway the high school football player and Hemingway the earnest young writer, all free of charge.

We'll be open from 1-5 p.m. No advance reservations needed. Consider it our gift to you this winter season. Warm up and join us inside!

Spend the Holidays with the Hemingways at Boxing Day!

Join The Ernest Hemingway Foundation of Oak Park in celebrating the Hemingway Family’s tradition of generosity on December 26th!

In medieval times on the day after Christmas, nobles presented gifts to people who lived on their land. Their gifts, intended to welcome outsiders as family, were presented in boxes, hence the name of the day.

Traditional English music and food will entertain guests all afternoon at the Hemingway Birthplace Home, 339 N. Oak Park Ave. Readers Theater will bring Hemingway to life! Bring a food item to donate to the OPRF Food Pantry and receive $2 off admission, and share your gifts this holiday season.

EHFOP Annual Holiday Fund Drive Begins

As 2012 draws to a close and the Hemingway Birthplace Home prepares for our Boxing Day celebration on December 26th, we reflect on the wonderful year we’ve had at the Foundation. Our programs drew more than 10,000 visitors for tours and events as diverse as major film screenings and intimate author talks. We hosted school and book groups and explored Hemingway the journalist, and Hemingway the poet. We said a fond farewell to the Hemingway Boyhood Home, and made a new friend in a playwright who brought Cuba to Oak Park one cold January night.

Next year, we turn our attention Hemingway’s Birthplace, the home that shaped who he was, how he wrote, and the way he looked at the world. We consider our stewardship of the house to be an honor, and we take it seriously.

Hemingway’s home needs to be maintained for future generations of writers and scholars. Repairs — from painting to landscaping to rebuilding the main stairwell — need to be made to finish the home’s restoration and make its depiction of the Hemingway family’s life complete.

We need your help to keep Hemingway’s story alive in this house and through our programming. No gift is too small to matter to us, as your involvement in this ongoing story means Hemingway’s legacy will never truly die.

Please take a moment to donate here:

And watch your mailbox and e-mail for our upcoming news and events. We’ve got a very exciting project going on right now in Hemingway’s attic, and we can’t wait to share all the details with you.

Your contribution directly benefits the Foundation. In a time when our world is changing faster than ever, the stories we tell matter. Be a part of ours this holiday season. Consider it a gift to Ernest. 

Sincerely,

 

Chairman

 

Redd Griffin, 1938-2012

The Ernest Hemingway community lost one of its strongest supporters Tuesday with the passing of EHFOP founding member and past president Redd Griffin, 73. 

Griffin was born and raised in Oak Park, worked at the Chicago City News Bureau and WTTW, and served as a state representative in the Illinois General Assembly. He served with the U.S. Army in Berlin and witnessed President Kennedy’s visit to that city, and the aftermath of the president’s assassination.

A tireless supporter of Oak Park and unabashed fan of Ernest Hemingway, Griffin served as the Foundation’s ambassador to the Chicago area, speaking at libraries, fellowship groups and meetings across the suburbs. One of his most recent adventures was conducting a tour of 40 people from a local Explorers’ club.