John Keim, Du Quoin's Master Painter & Sign Maker Remembered

</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[Somewhere between his love of playing the saw and juggling eight oranges at a time, the late John Keim, Sr. of Du Quoin helped create the world class images and identities of great companies like Shell Oil Co., the Coca-Cola Bottling Co. and Osh Kosh, Inc. here in the Midwest.

He was one of a dozen great Du Quoin painters and signmakers in an era of perfection whose work would never be spoiled by the digital age.

You can see it in the gold-leaf on the plastered "buttons" in the dome high above the First Christian Church sanctuary or when you pull down a ceiling panel in the historic Elks Lodge building on North Washington Street.

If you go to his son's house on South Peach Street you can still hold the tools of this master painter's life in your hands--his original gold-stripe handled Pittsburgh Paint & Glass brushes (paint companies used to make their own brushes), a box of powdered "lamp black" that turned black into "real black" or the original pounce patterns for the gold leaf signs on the windows at Higgins Jewelry Store.

A pounce pattern is a detailed traced version of a letter or logo that needs to be applied to a window from the back side. The pattern is traced on paper with a "pounce wheel" which makes tiny perforations in the outline of the design. A wheel with 15 teeth per inch was common.

Once the pounce pattern is complete, you lay it face up against the background and dust with powder or chalk, either by hand or with a pounce bag. Too much powder will make a mess, may create an uneven outline, and may mix with paint causing clumps.

As the pounce pattern is dusted, the powder seeps through the tiny holes. This creates a light outline that marks the exact placement of gold or silver leaf, letters or logos, allowing them to be applied exactly the way the painter wants the finished sign to look.

The work is painstaking.

You can see his life in the squeeze tubes of lead mixing colors--the richest colors you have ever seen. He once showed them to a painter redecorating the Sacred Heart Catholic Church. The painter's jaw dropped and he told the young Keim he was holding gold in his hands.

You can see his life in the 1938 book of expenses he kept: 26 cents for lunch, 30 cents for supplies, $4 for room and board, 50 cents for laundry, 35 cents for "painters" and 55 cents for a "show." These expenses were for a trip to Lima, Ohio. You can see his life on the pages of his October 1955 time sheets where he paid Robert Black, E.E. Eubanks, Joe Degenhardt, Finis Bell, Otto Voyles, A.L. McAlister and H.G. McClure and Joe Degenhardt, often members of his painting crew.

And, you certainly get a sense of his life in the memories of his son, John Keim, Jr., who keeps himself surrounded by the things that belonged to his dad.

The First Christian Church in Du Quoin was good enough to open its doors to us. We found the electric breaker box that turned on the lights in the sanctuary and what John Keim, Sr. was about came alive when the lights came on--the gold leaf, the hand-rubbed surfaces on the sculpted column treatments, the soft colors surrounding the sanctuary's signature dome, the indirect lighting that kissed the painted surfaces of his father's work in the cornice that surrounds the sanctuary. The rosettes and the spokes are perfect. They had to take out every third row of pews to get the scaffolding to fit.Every inch of the sanctuary's appointments were treated as individual works of art.

"Dad did this in 1949. He was a master," said Keim.

"You had to prime the surfaces, then stipple the background, then wipe the highlights,' said Keim's son. Ut was the attention to detail and perfection that Keim insisted on before his passing in 1983 from colon cancer at the age of 74.

The 23-carat gold leaf work alone took endless hours to complete.

When Keim stained woodwork he mixed his putty by hand to cover nail holes. There was never just "oak" or "walnut." He might have six shades of each.

Keim graduated from the famed Commonwealth School of Sign Painting in Chicago in 1927 and the Hastings School of Gold Leaf. His workbooks--Level I to Level 16--are still neatly boxed at the Keim home. His talents were obvious in the Old English lettering he penciled in the books.

He was also a graduate of the New York School of Interior Decoration and a school of air brushing.

Keim got his first job from Tom Laffoon and in time the Shell Oil Co. would ask Keim to become one of their sign painters and station refurbishers. Shell repainted stations every second or third year in rotation. Keim never had to rebid the work because he always kept notes on each station--the measurements, the number of gas pumps and the number of Shell's signature milk glass "shells" atop their pumps. So, he always knew what the job would cost. Keim and crew also painting many of the growing company's huge oil tank farms from here to North Carolina.

Every now and then young Keim would tag along and his job was to add the detail to many of the shells.

"He worked for Shell for 39 years," said young Keim.

Keim had a fun side. He like to play the saw, juggle and--on occasion-- "mess" with his customers. While working on a Shell sign on the roof of a station in Tamaroa (to company specs) he couldn't resist painting the outhouse next to the station hot pink.

So what? A gallon of high quality lead paint back then was "only" $3.25. The cans had deep grooves back then so the air couldn't get in.

Keim even tracked lot numbers on the paint. "He got hold of a gallon in one lot once that would never dry," his son remembers. It could sit in the sun for days. He could add drying agents. It NEVER dried. Finally, he made the company come and see for themselves.

He was meticulous at keeping books. And, he could handle men as well as he handled his finances. If he had made too much money in one year, he may not bill a customer until next year for work he did this year. "His customers were always looking for a bill from him," his son remembers.

In the winter months he would paint inside Geiger's Bakery or refinish the bar in Alongi's or perform maintenance on his truck--which had over 400,000 miles on it.

You can still see evidence of his work around Du Quoin--the faint image of the signs on Owens Transfer on Hickory Street or the Schleper Grocery in downtown Du Quoin. The colors from Devoe Paints and Lincoln Paints and Benjamin Moore and Smith Alsip1 were good at withstanding time.

And, so is the memory of this master painter.