04/06/2026
For Museum Monday, we would like to express our appreciation to Mr. Paul Hartke. On Wednesday, March 25, Paul Hartke of Gladstone, MO, presented the Lordsburg-Hidalgo County Museum with a painting that was painted by an Italian Prisoner of War (POW).
Hartke’s father, Sgt. Clyde R. Hartke, was a guard at Camp Lordsburg during the Italians confinement during WWII. Sgt. Hartke became friends with the artist and provided him with paint and ci******es from time to time. In appreciation, the artist gave Sgt. Hartke this painting of what he described as his favorite place in Italy.
Before his assignment at Camp Lordsburg, Sgt. Hartke had been a prisoner of war himself, held briefly by the Japanese. While being transported on a Japanese ship, the vessel was torpedoed by Allied forces. Sgt. Hartke survived the shipwreck and was rescued by an American warship. The exact duration of his service at Camp Lordsburg remains unknown.
This painting had hung in Paul Hartke’s childhood home until his father’s passing in 2008 when Paul hung it in his own home. After doing research on Camp Lordsburg and discovering the Lordsburg Museum and the extensive research by Ms. Mollie Pressler on Camp Lordsburg, Hartke reached out and offered the painting to the museum. He made the trek from Gladstone, MO, to Lordsburg, NM, to present the painting to the museum.
He said he felt that the painting belonged in the Lordsburg Museum and made it his mission to bring it home. While in Lordsburg he visited with museum board members and even toured the Camp Lordsburg site.
Paul Hartke, and the painting he has donated to the Lordsburg Hidalgo County Museum, is pictured with museum board members John Hill, Mollie Pressler (on Face Time) Marsha Hill (museum director), Sundi Hendrix and Jim Culberson. The painting can be seen at the museum during regular business hours, Monday-Thursday from 10 AM to 3 PM, or by special appointment.
