THRIVING ON THE FRINGE OF SOCIETY
Cincinnati Magazine’s
clean and orderly. Harlan wrote that
imagining life without Anna was “a
waste of time.”
The Hubbards were often alone, but
they weren’t recluses. They had friends
in Milton and Madison, were patrons of
the arts, and attended various cultural
May 1–31 events around the area, including at Ha-
nover College, just west of Madison.
Harlan painted murals for local
churches in Milton and held art exhi-
bitions. Later in life he began reaching
out to area institutions and museums
to see if they wanted a donation of his
art, including the Behringer-Crawford
Museum in Covington. The director at
the time quickly said yes and found his
way to Payne Hollow, where the artist
donated many pieces, says Jason French,
Behringer-Crawford’s current curator.
The museum’s collection has grown to
include Hubbard treasures from other
collectors, all of which are on perma-
nent display.
“The Hubbards have shown people
that a simpler life can be rewarding even
with all its hardships,” says French. “It
takes very dedicated and highly skilled
individuals to be successful in a world of
their own making. Harlan and Anna were
dedicated to living deliberately. Though
they may have spent years floating down
a river, they didn’t float through life as so
many of us do.”
Harlan’s studio in Ft. Thomas is also
open to visitors, maintained by the Ft.
Thomas Forest Conservancy. “If you
go, just keep looking around, because
there are always little artsy touches to
his buildings,” says Bob Canida. “It’s just
fun to look around and see where the art-
ist has been.”
Vote online for your
ANNA DIED OF KIDNEY CANCER IN
favorite Cincinnati
1986 at age 83. Harlan died two years
breakfast spot and later at age 88 of colon cancer, discovered
watch them advance after he was hospitalized for a copper-
through the bracket to head snake bite. They left the property
the championship. to a longtime friend, Paul Hassfurder.
Payne Hollow on the Ohio was able to
acquire it in October 2022. After the
cincinnatimagazine.
nonprofit stabilizes the property, it plans
com/breakfast-battle/ to create an artist-in-residency program
there and find other ways to preserve the
Hubbards’ legacy.
9 0 C I N C I N N AT I M A G A Z I N E . C O M M AY 2 0 2 3
“We are now actively in the process of
carefully cleaning up the property,” says
Steinbock. The home and studio, he says,
will be restored with input from experts
in historic preservation to maintain the
integrity of the property “while using it
to inspire artists, writers, biologists, na-
ture lovers, and the general public about
the beauty of simple living in close con-
nection with our surroundings.”
Turcotte is glad the property is being
preserved, saying the Hubbards’ way of
life can inspire others as it did for her.
That less is more, and there is peace in
simplicity. “If you had asked them, they
would have told you they weren’t try-
ing to prove anything to anyone else,”
she says. “They never sought attention
or accolades. They were just living the
way they wanted to, the way that felt true
to them. They were partners, bringing
out the best in each other. Their love
was sweet and productive and harmo-
nious. They valued their life on the
river enough to write about it, welcome
guests, and paint and sketch it.”
Turcotte says she and her husband
don’t live without electricity, running
water, or automobiles, but they do chal-
lenge one another when they see them-
selves tending toward excess or compli-
cations. After 32 years of marriage, she
still lights candles every evening at din-
ner, no matter the meal.
It wasn’t until Harlan was almost 80
that he allowed Canida and some young-
er men to help him chop firewood. After
Anna died and Harlan could no longer
live at Payne Hollow, he moved into the
Canidas’ house overlooking the Ohio
River. For the last six weeks of his life, he
painted, accepted visitors, and read with
the family. They didn’t own a television
because of the Hubbards’ influence, and
Canida thinks Harlan liked the place for
its quietness.
Harlan once wrote, “No accomplish-
ment can offset bad living.” His and
Anna’s lives offered plenty of examples,
says Canida. “Part of the process is just
evaluating every choice that we make.
Do we need this thing or that thing? He
wanted us to look at the world through
the eyes of an artist who saw beauty ev-
erywhere around him.”