Grace

Grace is a photograph by Eric Enstrom. It depicts an elderly man with hands folded, saying a prayer over a table with a simple meal. In 2002, an act of the Minnesota State Legislature established it as the state photograph. History and background The original photograph was taken at Enstrom's photography studio in Bovey, Minnesota. Most sources indicate 1918 as the year, though Enstrom's daughter Rhoda, born in 1917, claimed to remember being present when the photograph was taken, which might have been around 1920. The man depicted in the photograph is Charles Wilden, who earned a meager living as a peddler and lived in a sod house. While the photograph conveys a sense of piety to many viewers, according to the Enstrom family's story, the book seen in the photo is actually a dictionary. However Wilden wrote "Bible" on the waiver of rights to the photo which he signed in exchange for payment, giving credence to the idea that, even if the actual prop used was a dictionary, it was a proxy representing a bible in the photograph. Likewise, local stories about Wilden "centered more around drinking and not accomplishing very much", than religious observation. What happened to Wilden after the photograph is unknown. In 1926, he was paid $5 by Enstrom in return for waiving his rights to the photograph; he disappeared thereafter. After the photograph became popular, Enstrom attempted to track Wilden down but was unsuccessful. Numerous family members and local historians have also attempted to determine what became of Wilden, but have not been able to locate definitive evidence.