Oil painter Linda Coddington features 10 local cows in children's book
There are some famous cows who live on the Salco Road near Berlin.
That's because oil painter Linda Coddington who lives near Macdonaldton wrote and illustrated a children's book called "Cow Tales," which features 10 cows living on Pennwood Farms owned by the Stoltzfus family. Now, these bovines' portraits have been memorialized in a special, fantastical way with bonnets, sunflowers and even a flag and butterfly. In order to bring their images to life, Coddington spent time at the Stoltzfus farm taking photos and spending time with the cows.
Georgian Place to become Somerset Trust corporate headquarters
Coddington will be attending the Christmas on the Corner event at Cup of Soul Cafe on the Upper Diamond in Berlin on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and will be doing a book signing from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday at the cafe.
"I painted a cow for my daughter for Christmas last year and it was fun," said Coddington. "Then, the first cow in this book is 'Rosey' and I painted her in March. I was only going to paint one and I probably painted six before we started thinking a calendar would be cute and when I got to the tenth cow, we said, 'let's do a book.' It all fell together after that."
Coddington had illustrated another book entitled "The Forgotten Bear" by Penny Knobel-Besa of Flintstone, Maryland. Knobel-Besa had written the book a very long time but it wasn't until she had seen Coddington's painting of a Berlin Christmas that she decided to complete the project.
"When Penny had seen that painting, she realized that it was the Christmas village she had envisioned for her book," said Coddington. "I did a series of paintings for her and we put them in her book."
In the past few years, Coddington has painted many local sites, like Pack Saddle, Burkholder and New Baltimore covered bridges here in Somerset County, as well the old barn at Ponfeigh Farm and Mount Olivet Church, both near Glencoe, Uptown Somerset decades ago, the Town of Berlin and even historic homes.
Why a Conemaugh Township Area High School senior organized a mental health conference
Her artwork has generated quite a following on her Facebook site at Back Road Reflections and she has gone to some gallery shows selling her paintings and prints as well.
However, a random cow painting she did years ago had always been popular and she thought about doing more at some point. After starting this series of cow portraits for a calendar, the idea of a book and the words for rhymes just started to flow. One day after a walk, she came home and started thinking of poems to go along with cow painting and words just came to her. Then, she started painting more cows and started writing more poems. Palmetto Publications in Charleston, South Carolina, has now published her "Cow Tales" book.
In the past four years, Coddington has dedicated herself to a passion that started in her youth but then was put aside to work and raise a family.
"My mom (Helen Hoyman of Salco) bought me my first set of oils at the former Newberry's (department store in Uptown Somerset) when I was 13 years old for Christmas," said Coddington. "I was hooked ever since but sometimes life got in the way of my art."
Do you know your local history? Test your knowledge with Vintage Somerset trivia
Linda graduated from Berlin Brothersvalley High School in 1988 and started working for the National Bank of Western Pennsylvania in Berlin until she was 25 years old and then quit work to stay home to raise a family.
Her children are Heather Little, 33, of Michigan, and Courtney Engleka, 29, who is married to Aaron Engleka, of Berlin, and they have two children, Ellie, 5, and Chase, 3.
"I painted whenever I could," she said. "I painted gifts for people by painting slates and one image I painted with a buck got a lot of attention and everyone wanted one. But then, there would be years that would go by and I wouldn't paint anything because I was busy raising children and working again. There were always soccer games and activities for my daughters and there wasn't enough time but I always missed painting in my heart."
Linda had married Jeff Coddington in 2005 and the couple reside on Slate Hill Road off Huckleberry Highway near Macdonaldton.
In 2019, Jeff and other family members encouraged Linda to quit work and pursue her passion to paint so she left Sube Insurance where she worked at the time and started painting. She never looked back and says things are starting to fall into place now.
"What I love most of all is when someone is touched by one of my paintings," she said. "Sometimes I wake up at 4 a.m. and I am in my studio when my husband goes to work. I try to limit myself to five hours a day and then I go be with my grandchildren. With everything going on in the world today, I paint and what I love the most is when someone understands my art and it has meaning to them. The cows make people smile. It's a children's book but it makes adults happy too."
Linda's artwork and contact information can be found at Back Road Reflections on Facebook.
This article originally appeared on The Daily American: Oil painter Linda Coddington features 10 local cows in children's book
