“Many families have skeletons in their closets. I prefer to keep mine in my studio,” my father used to say.
My father, William Louis Thackeray, was an well-known artist and medical illustrator. He had a disarticulated human skeleton that he utilized as he crafted his crisp drawings of all elements of human anatomy. When I was a child I marveled to watch him turn these bones into the inspiration for his intricate art.
In the late 1970s, my father purchased a fully articulated human skeleton from the Carolina Biological Supply Company, which he hung centrally in his studio. I am not sure whether he was more proud of acquiring his new Volvo station wagon, or that skeleton. He explained that the skeleton had belonged to a man from India who was, based on teeth and bones, in generally good health when he passed away in his 40s.
My father named his new skeleton Harvey, and Harvey hung in the studio for the next four decades. With one exception, that is… one Halloween in the early 1980s, my father dressed Harvey and put him in a hat, smoking a pipe, in the living room. A young boy asked my father if the skeleton was real, and he affirmed it was. The child told his mother, she called the police, and soon they arrived. My father explained himself, the police inspected Harvey, and they issued the artist a $50 fine for “inappropriate use of human remains.” Harvey went back to the studio.
This skeleton has provenance, since it was the basis for the many drawing my father contributed to medical textbooks and surgical guides over the years.
William Thackeray passed away aged 89 on Christmas of 2017, and I inherited his treasured skeleton. I unfortunately did not inherit any of his impressive art skills nor medical knowledge, so I have no good purpose for Harvey. My challenge is to find a new home or homes, where these bones can hopefully serve people who value them and have a good use for them.
Yes, it is legal to sell and to own human bones. But you can no longer sell them on eBay or Craigslist, as you once could, so marketing them becomes a word-of-mouth enterprise. “Hey, anybody know anyone that wants to buy a lightly used, carefully tended human skeleton?” Market value is said to be up to $8,000 but reasonable offers and barter offers are welcome.
My father may have anticipated the challenge human bones can present. The good man himself, per his preference, was cremated.
The writer, Brewster Thackeray, can be contacted at BrewThack@gmail.com. When he is not tending to his father’s art and estate, he likes to play with vintage cars.
ThackerayArt.com 