Stealing Wyeth

by Bruce E Mowday

Andrew Wyeth was one of the best known American artists in the world in the 20th century with his works, including the Helga series, being sought after by serious art collectors worldwide. His father, N. C., and son, Jamie, are integral parts of the best known American family of artists. They have an art museum dedicated to their works. A gang of thieves decided to steal an original Wyeth painting for their “retirement” and engaged a professional cat burglar (who was responsible for more than 1,500 crimes during his criminal career) to steal a Wyeth painting. The theft resulted in taking 15 paintings from the Wyeth estate in picturesque Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. Seven were done by Andrew, six by Jamie and the other two by California artists. Today, those paintings would be worth millions of dollars. The FBI and Pennsylvania State Police were the investigating agencies. Were the paintings still in America, Europe or Asia? Were the paintings pre-sold and in a private collection, being stored for future sales or destroyed because the artwork was so well known? The search for the paintings takes the investigators throughout the United States and involves dangerous thieves, gamblers, drug dealers and murderers. In the process of tracking down the thieves and the paintings, hundreds of other crimes were solved.

158 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 7, 2019

Reviews

[Nancy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Oh dear, where to start? I wanted to like this work because I’m intrigued by all things Wyeth and, because I live in Chester County, Pennsylvania, I’m familiar with the stories of the Johnston brothers. This work, unfortunately, lacks almost any editing/proofreading and was really just a list of people and events.

[Linda Braceland · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting neighborhood tale.

I used to live down the road from Andrew and Betsy Wyeth. It was in the ‘90’s after this art theft. The book was fascinating reading about my old neighborhood and a true crime story that took place a decade before I was there.

[Dalen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Content: Very interesting - especially if you live in the Wilmington, DE or southern Chester County area.

Writing: not so great - numerous grammatical errors.

Topical focus: not so great - the author tends to wander around a lot. The book would probably be half the size (already fairly short) if cleaned up.

[Diane Grow · Rating 1 out of 5]

One of the most poorly written books I’ve ever read. Grammatical errors everywhere. It jumps all around with no sort of structure. It drops a lot of names and congratulate a lot of people over and over and over again. I can’t tell you how many levels of terrible this book is. I picked it up because I’m fascinated with the Wyeth family and because I live in this area. I would not recommend this book to anyone.

[Dory · Rating 4 out of 5]

A quick and entertaining read that feels more like true crime podcast material than a book. The author is a journalist and this book has the feel of previously written news stories strung loosely together. If you’re interested in the Wyeths and don’t mind glossing over typographical errors, you may enjoy it.

[Melinda May · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book interested me because it involved an art theft from one of my favorite painters that I knew nothing about. As a Pennsylvania resident, I also didn't know there was a museum dedicated to the Wyeth family only a few hours from me. Written by an area reporter, it was full of many details about the crime and how it was solved.

[Helen · Rating 2 out of 5]

The problem with this book is that this particular Art theft wasn't very exciting and was solved quickly. The authors try to pad it with other crimes committed by these thieves and also more famous Art thefts. Writing was pretty dry as well.

[Bert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting and informative

[Donni · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting read.

[Linda Heiberger · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 for local history

[Lauren Carter · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well this is super disappointing... I read the entire book and not even sure what happened with the burglary... But yet learned about other crimes in the area ...

[Em · Rating 1 out of 5]

Interesting story ruined by poor writing and a complete lack of editing.

[Maria Raymond · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was so excited to read about this case because I had visited the Brandywine Museum in the 80s after the theft. I even had my local library purchase the book so I could read it. Disappointed… It read like a very long dry newspaper article. For a short book it seemed very long. Lots of side tangents about other crimes. At one point the author refers to himself in third person and talks himself up as a “known and trusted reporter”. That seemed strange.