Walter Wharton's WoodCarving Blog

2011 in review

waltswoods — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 01:00:54 +0000

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

A San Francisco cable car holds 60 people. This blog was viewed about 2,500 times in 2011. If it were a cable car, it would take about 42 trips to carry that many people.

Click here to see the complete report.

Thoughts about the Eagle Cane Project and Operation Cane of Texas

waltswoods — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 02:26:18 +0000

On one of the pages of this blog I give you the history of Operation Cane of Texas. I have just come to realize that I have not told the whole story. That page tells you about us and what we have done over the last seven years. It does not tell you what we have experienced and I want to share that with you.

Recently the Dallas Morning News, Neighbors Go section did an article on me which they titled “Labor of Love”. I had not thought of it that way but I realized that what they said was true. I was doing this as a mission because of my love for the young people that have been defending our country. Let me say at the outset I am an unashamed patriotic, and proud of this country. I am more proud of the young men and women wearing the uniforms of our military. And this is their story. I have talked to and shaken hands with hundreds of these young people and know some of their stories. Being of (almost) the “greatest generation” I can tell you with certainy they are made of the same stuff. Believe me you can tell what they are made of when you talk to a young man who has lost 3 limbs among other wounds and he is nothing short of upbeat and ready to get on with what ever the future holds. They are ready to look life in the eye and tell it like it is.

I am grateful to our country for the way we are embracing our military, giving care and support. It was shamefully different for those of us coming home from Viet Nam. We must never let that happen again, regardless of what we think of the situation. It is not the soldier that is at fault, our military do not start wars, our politicians do. Soldiers follow orders and are there, as before, to defend this country against its enemys.

In my history of Operation Cane I told of crying on the way home from my first visit to Brooke Army Medical Center. That trip home to Dallas from San Antonio of five and a half hours gave me a lotof time to think while alone with my thoughts in the car. My tears were not of sorrow, they were tears of pride and joy for our troops that I had met and shaken hands with. Pride for the staff on the wards that were taking care of these Wounded Warriors. Let me tell you a few stories, I won’t give you names as I don’t have the clearance to do so and it would mean nothing to you to have the names anyway.

On my first visit to the Warrior and Family Support Center, as I was taking a box of canes up to the second floor of the facility I observed a young man in civilian cloths with a young lady in BDU’s, she was a soldier. The young man was on crutches and missing one leg. They were going upstairs as I was. I was getting on the elivator with the box of canes and held the door so they could get on. He thanked me and said he would take the stairs. I met them on the second floor, he had come to get one of the canes. The young lady with him was his wife, they both were soldiers. I was able to have a long conversation with him. He was going to get his prosthesis soon as was working hard to get his body ready to handle it. What did he want for the future, to stay in the Army and get back to his unit. Also I met a young lady in the Rehab facility. She had lost both of her legs above the knees. We talked for a long time about a lot of “stuff”. Just before she left to go for her first visit on her prosthesis I asked her what the future was for her, she broke out into a big smile and said something like “..that is easy, I am getting my legs, going home, getting pregnant and raising a family.” I don’t think you can get more positive than that.

I made a total of 10 trips to Brooke, twice a year. Besides going to the Warrior and Family Support Center, I visited both the Ortho and the Burn Wards. On one particular visit when Diann Small, another woodcarver, was with me, we had the priviledge of meeting a young Black Marine, Cpl, who had been burned over 96% of his body. His injuries had happened early on in Iraq so when we met him he was back in the hospital for reconstructive surgery. He was not from Texas but had move his mother into a house he had purchase in San Antonio so he could be near BAMC for his treatment. This was one outstanding young man, very engaging in conversation and not the least concerned about his situation when carrying on a conversation with you. I learned from the Head Nurse that he had started a business and founded a Foundation to help the children of KIA Marines get an education. What an amazing young man he was, I say was because in April 2009 he died of cardiac arrest on the operating table during his 100 reconstructive surgery. It is a very sad ending to an amazing story. I am proud and honored to have met this young man.

There are hundreds of more stories that could be told by myself and the others that are carving canes under the Eagle Cane Project all across this country. This program, headed by Jack Nitz, of Tulsa OK, has carvers in about 28 states that have provided the commemerative canes to many hundreds of Wounded Warriors over the last 7 years. Go to eaglecane.com to see what has been done.

My final wish is that when ever and where ever you see one of our military, thank them for their service, shake their hands and wish them well. They deserve our heartiest support.

Walter Wharton, Chairman, Operation Cane of Texas

August 2011

waltswoods — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 00:54:48 +0000

This has been one busy, hot summer. As of today we here in the Dallas area have experienced 52 days of over 100 degree days, 40 of them in a row. The out look is for, as a minimum, 10 more and if it holds on until Sept 4 we will tie the record of 69 days set in 1980. Besides the heat we have had some fun, we took a 14 day cruise to the Baltic region and had a wonderful time. I always enjoy seeing all the art and architecture of the European countries and those on the Baltic were no exception. The only down side to the trip was not having enough time but that is the way it always is. As usual I took far to many pictures but it only takes a little time to take care of that by editing them out. Thank the Lord for digital cameras.

Have done a lot of carving this summer as well as the trip I mentioned in the earlier posting of going to Sedona and taking the course in sculpting. Well I put that class to the test by sculpting a pair of giraffes and then carving a pair in butternut using the sculpture as a “go-by”. I think it turned out pretty well, Jean (my wife) seems to think it is one of my best pieces. See it below. Let me know what you think. I am also posting the clay sculpture for you to see.

Clay sculpture, giraffe pairGiraffe Pair, carved in butternut.

I am well pleased with the results of this project. If you will note one of the giraffes has his/her nose in the air, a little snooty if you will. Hence the title “Don’t use that tone with me, Sister”. I thank my wife for that one. Below another view of the carving.

The horns are not white, that is the flash

For those of you that check in on the Operation Cane Page, I have posted updated data on that page today also

Almost forgot, there was an article done in the Dallas Morning News, Neighbors Go section on Operation Cane and my involvement in it. It was a good article and helped raise funds for the project, which was a good thing. It has also kept me busy for a while with events such as speaking engagements about the canes and the Wounded Warriors.

Now an appeal, several years ago I did a carving of a Shelty for a Lady in Iowa. I had a picture of that carving in my files and through my extreme expertise with the computer I managed to delete the picture. If that lady reads this would you please send me a picture for my file, Thank you, Thank you, Thank you.

Just Returned from Paradise

waltswoods — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 14:40:53 +0000

Yup! I just returned from paradise. More about that later as I first want to show you a piece I finished a month or so ago. I have been to lazy to do a posting so let it go but now I need to get busy. As I said I finished this piece a month or so ago and am particularly pleased with the results. The reason is that I do not do the human figure, let alone faces, much and so am really pleased with the result. This carving is a deep relief. By deep I mean 3″, done of a 3 1/2″ slab of butternut. The resulting carving shows up so well with the grain of the wood and color. I did stain the wood of the cross with an Early American stain to give a little contrast to make the cross stand out. I am particularly pleased with the result and hope you agree. Here is the result of this effort:

"Father Forgive Them..."

Now to the paradise bit. I just returned from Sedona, Arizona, a place where, if you have not been, is about as close to paradise as you can get without dieing. My wife and I had vacationed there last year and had a ball but this trip was not a vacation. I went to Sedona, along with a friend, John Holmes, to attend a week long clay sculpting seminar. Getting back to Sedona, if you have not visited you need to. While my wife and I were there we also visited the Grand Canyon. The Grand Canyon is grand, huge, and all those other adjectives but Sedona is just plain beautiful, I personally was more impressed with the beauty of the area than with the GC.

Enough about Sedona and on to the seminar. The seminar was Sculpting from Life. The class, sponsored by the Sedona Art Center, was put on by Ken Rowe, who has a gallery in Sedona. Ken is a wonderful wild life artist that works in bronze. His work is for the most part “from life”. What does that mean? Like painters who take their canvas out in the woods to capture a scene as it really is, that is what Ken does. He goes where he has access to the live animals and sculpts them from life. That is what we did, though fortunately or unfortunately, we did not have wild animals. We did get the point of the class, however.

The class was a very intense five days from which I can safely say I have never learned so much in one course. Ken is an excellent instructor and imparts his knowledge in an easy manner that makes learning easy. We had 15 students in the class, from a wide variety of art backgrounds, from jewelry making to chain saw art with us carvers in between.

We started in the classroom with our first subject being a dog. I have never use my pocket calculator as much as I did durning this course. We had to reduce actual dimensions of the dog to 1/3rd scale. We spent two days working on the dog and then went to the field for two days. The “field” was a 105 year old ranch about 25 miles from Sedona where we had the choice of a draft horse or a donkey to sculpt. Most of us chose the draft horse, mostly because of the size of the animal. These animals we sculpted a 1/5th scale, again the calculators went to work. We were all amazed at the animals, how docile they were as we measured and poked and proded them to feel muscles and contours. The final day was back in the classroom where we for the most part finished our dogs and discussed.

As I said earlier this was a very intense course but also a very great learning experience that I wish I had had years ago. I strongly recommend this course for any artist interested in wildlife art and animal art in any medium. Ken only gives this seminar once a year, in April, and the class fill everytime. You can learn about the class on the Sedona Art Center web site, www.sedonaartcenter.com. You can see some of Ken’s work on his site, www.rowegallery.com.

Our first model

Below are some pictures from this event.

"Sculpting from Life" Class 2011

Our second model

Dog, in progress

: Four Texans + Ken (left of table)

Up-date, Late

waltswoods — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 03:11:23 +0000

I know that I am in the “dog house” when one of my friends and frequent visitors to this blog told me that he didn’t go to my blog any more because there was never anything new in it. Alas, that is so true and there are reasons for it, not excuses, reasons. I am not a person you will find on Facebook or Twitter because I don’t care to bare my soul to the world and what I do minute by minute is of no importance to anyone but me. I feel that what I include in this blog should be of interest to everyone and of some use to someone. For that reason I have not been to forthcoming with news as there has not been a lot. My carving has been curtailed to a great degree by other events and activities. For instance I have been carving canes like crazy, more on that in a moment. My activities as Chairman of Operation Cane of Texas and President of the Texas Woodcarvers Guild along with doing some teaching in my shop have really cut into my time. This is not a complaint, just busy, and as a consequence have not developed any news that is worthy of your attention in this blog.

On the subject of Operation Cane, we have taken on an additional responsibility for the Eagle Cane Project. Jack Nitz, who has done yeoman service coordinating the carving of canes for our Wounded Warriors nation wide needed help. Operation Cane of Texas will be picking up responsibility for the Eagle Cane website effective the first of February. By sponsoring this web site ( eaglecane.com ) we will be releaving Jack of some of his work load. As you recall in my last update I mentioned that we had gone over the 500 mark in canes that we have presented to our Wounded Warriors, well that number has increased by several since November and we have reached 520 canes. I now have Ed Ramsey working with me so that has been a great help. We are both looking forward to the day that our work load drops off as that will mean fewer casualties, unfortunately that does not look as if it will happen soon. This program, started by Jack Nitz, has been a real morale builder for our troops. Unless you have met and talked to these young people you cannot know how important it is, and we just touch a small portion of these wonderful troopers, male and female. I have had people ask me how long it take to carve one of these canes and do you know I cannot answer that, I can only guess, as I don’t keep track of the time. Ed and I have discussed it and we estimate that we have maybe 35 to 40 hours in each cane. I don’t know, I get a request and try to get it out in 10 to 14 days. I have not been to successful at that lately as I get 3 to 5 requests at a time so they all run together. Suffice to say that we try to turn these cane around as quickly as possible for the requester deserves that service. Let me say that this in not work. It is, at risk of sounding corny, a labor of love. Those of you that are Viet Nam vets will understand what I say when I say I will not let one of our military go unappreciated.

I want to spend a moment talking about these warriors that are receiving our canes, they are from all over the country, from all walks of live, all races and religions, they are our Military, our protection. Until, as I said, you talk with them and look into their eyes you cannot understand who they really are. I have had the privilege, no honor, to shake the hands of hundreds of them, having visited Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas ten times over the last 5 years. What I have found is that they are loyal, dedicated men and women who love their country and are proud of what they are doing. Who are they, they are the young Marine that was burned over 96% of his body, the mother of two who lost both her legs and is working out to get the strength to learn to handle herself in a wheel chair and eventually on new legs, the Sergeant who also lost his legs and is now running in marathons. The young people are overcoming more than most of us can imagine and more importantly they are doing so with a smile, a positive attitude. You cannot get one of them to feel sorry for themselves, mostly they are worried about their friends and want to get back to them. I can still remember my first trip to BAMC. I spent hours in the hospital meeting and talking to these wonderful young men and women and then drove the 280 miles back to Dallas from San Antonio. As I told my wife when I got home, I cried most of the way home, not tears of sympathy or hurt, but rather tears of pride. I could not believe what I had seen and heard. I told myself that if this was the example of our military and more importantly of our young people, our country is in good hands for many years to come.

I will get off my soap box now but before I do I will only ask that when you see someone in the uniform of the United States military please tell them thank you for their service. There are a lot of vets around today who did not hear those words after Viet Nam and they are a little bitter and I know and understand why.

On another note I hope we will see you in Kerrville for the Spring Roundup, there will be lots of good carving with lots of classes. Hope to see you there.

Walter

Hoge-Poge

waltswoods — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 01:43:45 +0000

It has been far too long since I updated this mess and now I have a lot of ground to cover so I am going to do it in one posting. Here goes!

I will start with an update on Operation Cane. Operation Cane has presented over 500 canes to date with a group of 49 given to Wounded Warriors at Brooke Army Medical Center this past October. With that group of canes we are scaling back our operation. We are no longer doing the “Texas Eagle Cane” and concentrating on the special request canes that are keeping us very busy. It was getting impossible to keep up with the demands of furnishing cane kits and carve special canes also. The long and the short of it is that we carve 4 to 6 canes a month and that is for each of the two of us. I failed to mention that Ed Ramsey has started carving the special canes also and that is a great help. This is one job that it would be great to work ourselves out of a job, but it appears that we will be in business for awhile if things continue as they are in Afghanistan. It is, and always will be, a pleasure and honor to do these canes for our troops.

We have been attending shows for the last three months and have found that attendance is down all over. Talking to some carvers from Wisconsin who had attended several shows all over the country and they said that they found that attendance was down from 20 to 40 percent everywhere they went. I know that things are tight all over but do what you can to support these shows and events, a lot of people are working hard to keep the art of woodcarving in the eyes of the people and advance our art and favorite pass time.

Speaking of shows, I was fortunate to receive Runner-up Best of Show at the Texas Woodcarvers Guild show this fall in Kerrville. The piece that won was the “Circle of Life”, a mother giraffe and her baby.

Needless to say I was very pleased to receive this award and proud of the carving, the down side of that is that this piece is the only thing I have had time to carve in a year between teaching classes and carving canes. That is why, if you are a frequent viewer of this blog, you have probably noticed that the page with my class schedule is missing. Actually it is not missing, it is deleted, as I am not teaching any longer after my class in Aransas Pass in February 2011. After that class I will continue an occassional class in my studio but will not be teaching otherwise. I am going to use my time to carve and take classes myself. I love the art of carving and going to continue full-bore ahead!

I spoke of low attendance at shows earlier, such was the case for the TWG show in Kerrville this fall. Part of the problem was having the show before carving which was not a good situation but we had no control of that, it was the only time we could get a facility. That will not be the case for 2011 and beyond, in fact we will be having the carving and show in the same facility so we will not have the logistical nightmare of having to move from one event to another. I think we can say that problem is solved, we just have to wait to see what the next problem will be. The reason I am so interested in this subject and in what is going on is that I am now President of the Texas Woodcarvers Guild. I started my two-year term as of October 2010, wish me luck.

I know there is something else I want to put in this up-date, alas a senior moment has set in so will close by saying:

Keep carving and drop me a line when you can.

TEXAS STATE CHAMPIONSHIP SHOW AND SALE

waltswoods — Mon, 24 May 2010 15:41:42 +0000

The Texas Woodcarving Guild State Championship Show and Sale takes on a little different format this year due to some scheduling conflicts. For 2010 the Show is going to precede the carving classes. The reason for this is that the facility for the show was only available before our carving classes. The times and schedule of events will be available in the TWG Newsletter. Judging of entries will be accomplished on Friday October 8th with the show being Saturday and Sunday the 9th and 10th. The Show will be in the Hill Country Youth Exhibition Center. Carving classes will be held at the Inn of the Hills Resort starting Monday, Oct 11 for 5 days. This will be the last time we will use the Inn of the Hills as the carving venue. Seems their Corporate Offices do not see the value of us being in their facility without major additional funding on our part. Future classes will be held at the Guadalupe River RV Park in two indoor, airconditioned buildings. The cost of putting on these events is constantly going up making it a job for the Officers and event coordinators to keep things going on the tight budget TWG has. Full information on all events will be in the TWG Newsletter and on the TWG Web Site at the link in this blog. The web site will be updated as soon as the final information is available

This years events promise to surpass all previous events, with a good selection of class to attend with some new instructors, more money has been allocated for prizes, in short event organizers, for both the carving and show are doing what they can to enhance the whole event. What is needed now is your attendance, the spring event attendance was down a little so your support of the Guild is important. This and the spring event are the times for Texas carvers and all their friends to get together.

Hope to see you all at Kerrville,

March – April

waltswoods — Sun, 02 May 2010 18:27:39 +0000

I am very deliquent in getting this blog updated, it has been one of those things that I was going to do tomorrow, but tomorrow never came. Today is tomorrow and I will get on with business.

I am writing from Kerrville, Tx where the Texas Woodcarvers Guild Spring Roundup is well underway. There are lots of classes underway with some great instructors. Attendance is off a little from last year which is most probably because of the economy. One thing is certain the quality of the class and the enthusiam of the students is not off. There are students and instructors from all over the country. There are great vendors with plenty of tools, books, rough-outs, and wood. What you notice most is the quality of the instruction. Everyone seems pleased with the results of their classes. Another thing you notice is the friendliness and fellowship the is going on, great people doing fun things. TWG has run into some glitches in setting classes and show for the fall and on going. Those glitches have been over come and the schedule is set thru 2012 (check the schedules section for those dates). The final bit of business for the Guild this spring was to elect me President for the coming 2 years, I appreciate the honor and confidence. There is one problem in this, however, I have some very, very big shoes to fill. Bill Clark, the out going President did a really outstanding job and is going to be a tough act to follow.

A little Operation Cane News, I will be leaving here Sunday and going on down to San Antonio, Brooke Army Medical Center to present some more canes. If the count on canes presented holds to what previous trips have done we most likely will break 400 canes presented. This has been a long journey covering 5 years since the orgainzation of Operation Cane in late 2004. This trip will be our 9th visit to BAMC to present canes. I really appreciate all those Texas carvers that have helped with this project by carving and donating canes. You cannot understand how great a program this is until you look into the face of one of the recepients recieving a cane, they really appreciate them.

In the way of carving news I have completed a couple of new pieces. That is not much in the way of production since my last posting but a lot of time has been spent in preparing for and giving classes and in carving canes for Operation Cane. One piece completed is another pair of Giraffe’s, mother and baby again, that will be the basis of my fall and spring classes. The second piece is a single Giraffe done in Oklahoma Red Cedar. This piece is stylized and is not so much beautiful for its carving as it is for the color and presentaton of the wood. Pictures of both pieces are below.

I am cheating here, I am back from my trip to Brazoria which is several days after the Kerrville trip. I am just to lazy to do another page so I thought I would just add to this page and call it a day. I spent two days with the Brazoria County Woodcarvers, what a blast that was. I always look forward to meeting with that club, I think that is because they are nuts. They enjoy their meetings and work hard (one or two exceptions, of course ). They carved the “Honey Bear” (below) and for the most part got it carved. As that is a 3 day class and we only had two days no one finished but several were ready to paint. All in all it was a fun and, I think, successful event.

February

waltswoods — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 01:36:05 +0000

WOW What a weekend! If you have read the schedule of shows in this blog you know that last weekend was the first show put on by the Coastal Bend Woodcarvers in Aransas Pass, Texas. All I can say is that they really started out with a bang. Phil Roets and all the members Coastal Bend Woodcarvers did a wonderful job on their first outing. Oh yes there were glitches but nothing that was not easily over come. There were almost 30 participants displaying their work, with over 230 works of art for the Judge to look at. Needless to say the judge, Danny Reb, did not get through in the time alloted for judging and had to continue into the second day. He really had a tough job as the level of carving was outstanding. The level of traffic for the show was great as over 1100 paying guests visited the show. The vendors had a hard time keeping up with their customers. The venue for the show was outstanding, there was a lot of room, participants were not crowded and there was ample room for visitors to move around and see all the displays without being crowded. When you plan for shows for next year be sure to consider this show, there is plenty of RV space as well as reasonable motel accommodation. To say nothing of the great seafood available, cannot beat ocean fresh shrimp and fish .

Not only did I enjoy the show but we had 3 days of carving classes following the show. There were 10 or 12 instructors teaching carving in almost anything you would want to carve. Plans are to increase the number of classes next year. I taught a full-bodied elephant and had great students, including an 89-year-old “young lady” that put us all to shame for her vitality. After the 3 days of carving in Aransas Pass I traveled to Round Rock Texas where we carved for another 3 days with some of the Austin carvers. Again it was the full-bodied elephant. After 9 days on the road I was glad to get back home.

Now the problem is to get some sticks turned and head blanks cut out for the Eagle Cane Project. I had turned some in January and they are gone. I have a club waiting for 11 kits to carve. Must close and get on with the project.

Walt

January

waltswoods — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 21:39:39 +0000

Well it hasn’t been quite a month since I last wrote, may be I am getting a little better about keeping up with things. Want to remind you of the things going on at Port Aransas, they are having their first show and carving classes the first of next month. You can talk to Phil Roets about the details at phillip@philroets.com . The schedule is in the Show Schedule part of this blog. We need to help them get their program off the ground. I will be there, both showing and teaching. It promises to be a good time.

Operation Cane of Texas presented President George W. Bush with a cane in December. The cane was carved by Ray North and myself. It was carved, as all the canes we present to our Wounded Warriors were, except the the stick had the Presidential Seal carved on it. We included a certificate with the cane that was worded the same as the certificates that we send with all the canes. We thank all the recipients for their service to their country and their sacrifices. Below is a picture of the cane presented.

Of course, President Bush sent a note of thanks to Operation Cane of Texas thanking us for the gift. In that note he said “I am honored to have served as President of our Nation, and I am grateful for your support.” He was speaking of the support of Operation Cane to the Wounded Warriors of our Military. My thanks to all the carvers of Operation Cane as well as the carvers all over the nation that support The Eagle Cane Project, started by Jack Nitz of Tulsa. Unless you have had the priviledge of talking with some of the men and women that have received these cane you will not know how much they appreciate them. We have some very strong young people that are fighting for our country, they are very patriotic and dedicated. This country has asked a lot of them and they have produced. If these are the next leaders of our country, the country is in good hands.

I have added some pictures to the blog this time, I had promised to do that last month but just did not get around to it.

Walt