Mr UD and his sister own acres of snaily fields near Rezekne, Latvia.
It’s the site of the house where their father grew up, and, post-Communism, they were able to recover it for the family.
UD‘s never been there, but Mr UD has gone a couple of times, and has described to her its many snails.
I bring this up because there’s a story out of Yale involving similar efforts to recover stolen property. This is from the Yale Daily News:
Yale filed suit Monday against Pierre Konowaloff, who claims to be the rightful owner of Vincent van Gogh’s renowned 1888 painting “The Night Café,” which is housed in the Yale University Art Gallery.
According to the suit, filed in the United States District Court in Connecticut, Konowaloff claims to be the heir of Ivan Morozov, a Russian aristocrat who owned the painting in 1918. Last July, Konowaloff’s attorney sent a letter to Jock Reynolds, director of the Yale University Art Gallery, threatening legal action, according to the suit. Yale will fight to keep the painting, Reynolds told the News on Tuesday night.
“It’s been in our collection for 50 years,” he said. “There is no wrong to be addressed.”
In December 1918, Vladimir Lenin… nationalized most private property, including Morozov’s art collection. His seized collection included “The Night Café.”
To raise money, the Soviets sold the painting to a German art museum in 1933, which then sold it to the Knoedler Gallery in New York City.
Stephen Clark 1903, who began to collect art after serving in the army during World War I, purchased “The Night Café” from the Knoedler Gallery in 1933 or 1934, according to the suit.
When Clark died in 1960, he bequeathed the painting to the University. Yale added the painting to its permanent collection in 1961 and hung it for public view in the gallery, garnering widespread media coverage about the donation.
Konowaloff contends that the Soviet nationalization of property was illegal and, therefore, the painting should be returned to him, Morozov’s rightful heir…
Yes, a mite more valuable than an abandoned snail farm in Latvia…
March 25th, 2009 at 6:47AM
Even in tough times, that’s probably a $50 million painting at least.
March 25th, 2009 at 7:48AM
Harvard had an old biological research station in Cuba that was lost to Castro. I imagine there are a lot of former Cuban property owners keeping an eye on things, hoping to reclaim their equivalent of a snail farm..
—RJO (reporting this week live from Vassar College)
March 25th, 2009 at 8:11AM
Interesting you mention Cuba, RJO. I’ll be catching a return flight to DC in a month or so by taking the Key West ferry to Ft Myers — a ferry my dinner partners last night — old KW hands — speculate will shift to Havana when travel restrictions end…
March 25th, 2009 at 10:33AM
"I hat a fahm, in Latvia . . ."
[crickets chirp]
Come on, you know, Meryl Streep, Out of Africa
[gloom]
March 25th, 2009 at 10:37AM
LOL.
March 25th, 2009 at 6:29PM
In an interview after receiving the Nobel Prize, Hemingway said, "As a Nobel Prize winner I cannot but regret that the award was never given to Mark Twain, nor to Henry James, speaking only of my own countrymen. Greater writers than these also did not receive the prize. I would have been happy–happier–today if the prize had been given to that beautiful writer Isak Dinesen. . . ." [The New York Times Book Review, November 7, 1954]