Gary Alan Henson

Etchings Gary Alan Henson

Alan James, a history professor at Colorado University and his wife Lizzie, a well respected artist, often visit small town cemeteries on weekends. Some of the towns still bustle with people, but some have long since lost the energy of life, sitting empty and alone. Alan rubs a charcoal stick over thin paper pressed against the grave markers, to make 'etchings'. Then he uses these etchings to teach his history class how to deduce what happened in those small towns. Lizzie takes her paints on these outings to capture the beauty, though sometimes poignant and sad, of these small towns and places. Lizzie also has a talent for using her imagination on the etchings to create portraits of those lost souls. When they travel to the ghost town of 'Hardscrabble', they are drawn to a special resting place, hidden in a small grove of aspen. Why are there three graves locked behind a gate that cannot be opened. And why is there a tiny crumbling chapel next to the plots?