Loring Wilkins Coleman

In 1939 Loring was my Dad's best friend when they were Middlesex School classmates before WWII. Motorcycles and boxing. Between 1969 - 1973 Loring became my student advisor, and also my best friend and confidante. An anchor of old New England history and culture, he radiated stability, continuity. I re-lived Loring's passionate lectures on Egypt each and every year when I returned there to wander around the museums and pyramids. I remembered Loring's cautionary tales on...

I was, at the age of seventeen, in one of Loring's summer plein air painting classes. I loaned him a book on art I liked and showed him an essay I had written on the life of a painter. This was 1951. In 2000, I saw a painting of his in a watercolor magazine, and on an off chance wrote to him via the Concord Watercolor Society. He responded, saying he remembered me and sent back the book and my essay! That started a busy correspondence of over ten years duration in which he gave me good advice...

I am so very, very, very sorry to hear this news. I loved Loring and Tinka both. They were so kind to me. Your Dad was such a special man. Kind, creative, funny, focused, and...did I mention kind? Hugs to all of you.

Loring and Tinka were longtime friends of my parents, Lois and Bayard Underwood, in Harvard. They both were wonderful people and great friends of the family. Loring was especially kind to me when I was a teenager. I took a watercolor class with him in 1974 at Middlesex School. I was 16 at the time. He wrote me kind recommendations for college. Few things have survived over 40 years in my life, but I still have one of the watercolors I painted in that class. It's not the greatest attempt (I...

Dear Linzee & Family I offer my sincere sympathies at this late date, although you have been in my thoughts and prayers since your father's transition to the next life. I did not have the honor of meeting your father in person or to see his art work or to read his autobiography yet. None the less I have had the pleasure of meeting his daughter and some of his offspring who are the finest testament and legacy of Loring Wilkins Coleman's life. I could hear the Father's words of welcome,"Well...

Dear Susan, Frank and entire Coleman family,
our sincere sympathy for your loss.
John Shanley & Nancy Pearson

What a blessing it was for Jack and me to know and love Loring and Katinka. We shared our faiths and enjoyed a good friendship. I felt privileged to visit Loring a couple of times recently and reminisce. He will be sorely missed!

Dear Linzee,Susan,Peter,and Andrew,

Please accept my sincere sympathies on learning of the passing of your dear father. Your father (and mother) was ever present in my life...yes because your parents were close to my parents...but your fathers work was so present in our home(s)...it was and is so so beautiful..so real in my minds eye...the work from the early 50's; a church, a barn,a trees, old rusted cars...all revealing age..gracefully...your father was a poet with a brush...I feel...

Loring Coleman was my godfather. He was a wonderful man, a loving husband, a dear friend to the Sillin family, and a great artist. My brothers and I are fortunate to have a sampling of his works. His autobiography is a rare treasure. Tinka and he will always be in my family's memories--never forgotten.