Lucien Oudin

When a Century monthly meeting had adjourned, when members of regular habits who had checked off the evening for election of candidates had gone home to bed, and when members whose habits were irregular drew their chairs together in the reading-rooms, it was always the group in which Lucien Oudin sat that radiated cheerfulness. No one could ever know beforehand what turn the talk would take. It might be the latest novel or the latest picture; it was very apt to be travel and reminiscence; it was never politics or shop. It was impossible to say whether Oudin led or followed the conversation. He certainly gave a flavor of his own to it, and it rarely failed to touch with perfect spontaneity on his beloved France.

Oudin’s personality was interesting. A well-grounded lawyer, an exceptionally hospitable host, a generous friend, a lover of the beautiful in art and literature, his home was a little museum of his own fine taste. In his annual summer jaunts abroad, he managed to collect each year something new and attractive to the artistic eye. No one was better versed in the history of French monuments, of the whereabouts of those fascinating bits of architecture that the roving traveler in France finds in its out-of-the-way corners. Speaking French like a cultivated Parisian, he was able to ferret out everything that could interest the antiquary, the artist, or the architect. He was as good a musical critic as art connoisseur, regular attendant at the Metropolitan Opera, the Philharmonic and the Symphony, besides always being alert to listen to the latest musical talent that came to us from abroad. Back of all these accomplishments were the never-failing cheerfulness that knew no moods, and the thoroughly human point of view that lent to Oudin’s sociable presence a charm which was quite his own.

Alexander Dana Noyes
1930 Century Association Yearbook