James Ormsbee Chapin was a lifelong liberal in politics and occasionally a radical, supporting causes that were at odds from time to time (like racial equality) with that of his government. He is best-known for the empathetic and thoughtful paintings he made in the 1920s and 1930s of workers, farm laborers and their families. A Medal for Johnny is an astonishing icon of antiwar vitriol that derived from his involvement in pacifist groups and his particular anger over the United States’ involvement in the Vietnam War. Chapin was so upset over the climate in the U.S. that in 1969 Chapin sold his small farm in New Jersey and moved his family to Toronto to protest the United States involvement in Vietnam and to insure that his two sons would not be called for military service.
