Hughes Follows Griffiths On A Last Trip Up-Coast

E.J. Hughes is dead. I've long been a fan of his paintings. Captured the working-class landscapes of this coast like nobody else.

Much of Mr. Hughes's focus was on quintessential B.C. sights that are now vanishing -- fishing fleets, log jams and steamships.

Pat Salmon, a long-time friend of the 93-year-old artist, had planned to pick him up for lunch Saturday, but she instead sent an ambulance to his house when Mr. Hughes said he was having breathing problems.

He was rushed to hospital in Duncan, where he died of cardiac arrest.

Found out via Keefer.

Last month, my pal Grant Shilling, author of The Cedar Surf (#10 in my Transmontanus series), wrote a fine tribute to Bus Griffiths, the artist-logger and graphic-novel writer who died late last year.

Mr. Griffiths's work was first seen during the Second World War in an eight-page pamphlet about logging that was intended for children. Later, an editor at the industry magazine, The BC Lumberman, encouraged him to produce a series of comic strips on the subject. Eventually, they became Now You're Logging, first published in 1978 by Harbour Publishing.

They're not making them like that anymore.

Some of Hughes' work can be found here. A Labour/Le Travail overview of Griffiths' work is here.