With the passing of our colleague Jonathan Wells, we’ve received tributes to Jonathan from around the world. A special one came by email from Jody Sjogren, who contributed the original illustrations for Dr. Wells’s classic book Icons of Evolution. The cover image, above, is itself iconic. Jody writes:

I have always had the highest respect and admiration for Jonathan. He was truly a prince among men, an unsung hero, and a warrior of unusual courage and humility.  It was one of the greatest honors of my life to have the privilege of illustrating Icons of Evolution. Those illustrations were probably one of the most significant projects (in eternal terms) that I ever did. It is a long story, how my husband and I came to be living in Kansas just at the moment when the Science Standards battle broke out there. Jonathan was writing Icons at just that time in 1999-2000, and our collaboration on the book happened because of that battle in Kansas. Looking back on it now, 25 years later, the whole wonder of that situation strikes me as something that only God could orchestrate.  In spite of the struggles of those years, I am grateful beyond words that I had the privilege of working with Jonathan Wells on that project. But I just don’t have words for my sadness at his passing. He was absolutely one of the finest people I have ever known, as is his dear wife, Lucy.  We shall all miss him very much.

Indeed.

“Right and Accurate”

Jody added in a subsequent email:

Incidentally, I was thinking about the time back in the year 2000 when I was working on this ape-to-human drawing for Jonathan’s book. Having been trained as a medical illustrator, and having worked in that field for many years, I was accustomed to researching everything for scientific accuracy as I was constructing an illustration. This one was giving me fits, because I wasn’t sure what was “right and accurate” in the various figures that make up this metamorphosis.  So, I called Jonathan and explained my dilemma. His response was “Oh Jody, just make something up. It’s just a figment of their imagination anyway.” So, that relieved me of the need for technical accuracy, and I went ahead and made up the ape figures and the “golden boy.” To my deep regret, I succeeded in creating such a piece of art that various evolution-friendly propagandists have found it useful, and have used it liberally without my permission (in violation of copyright, I might add). Later it occurred to me that the evolutionists have been propagating, as fact, ridiculous figments of an artist’s imagination, ever since the time of Darwin. In fact, all of the “icons of evolution” are just that — the work of an artist’s mind and hand! The Darwinists have used artists incredibly effectively to promote their theory, and they couldn’t have done so without those visual images — and the artists who created them. Jonathan’s great genius was in recognizing the power of these “icons of evolution.” And he called their bluff.

Thank you to Jody Sjogren for the kind permission to share her work here (the photo and the image are her own) with our readers. If you don’t own a copy of Icons of Evolution, with her wonderful cover and interior illustrations, or the sequel Zombie Science, now is a good time to place your order.