NEXT SATURDAY MEETING:

WHEN: Saturday, May 17, 9:00 AM

WHERE: Ed Wood T&A Center , Southeastern Techinical Institute, Sioux Falls

WHY: Carve ornaments for sale at the Side Walk Arts Festival

Meet the Members

William Dickey:

Bill Dickey's first carving experience was in 1980, when he and a friend attended a woodcarving class taught by Bill Slater. Carving has been a "fascination" for him ever since.
Bill and HIS wife, Mary, LIVE IN Brandon and have three children. Two SONS (Gene and Bill) also share in his carving interest. Mary is a florist and had her own shop until 15 yearS ago when she sold the business. Today, she does day-care in the Sioux falls cleveland school, but Flowers continue to be important to her as a hobby--as well as collecting her dolls. Something we might not know about bill and Mary is that They enjoy spending quite a bit of their time at the cabin they built on lake herman 30 years ago.

After working 31 years at John morrelL & Co., Bill is employed today by the Brandon valley school system. He was an active volunteer in the Brandon fire department for 33 years, but retired from that last year. To complement his interest in fire fighting, he has been collecting antique fire extinguishers.
Because of a friend's request, bill's first carving projects were owls. Bill still has the first one, a 12"-14" carving. Except for selling a few Santa carvings and contributing carvings to cancer Charities and other benefits, he keeps most of his carvings. Favored projects for bill are bark carvings, caricature carving, small ornaments, and fish. His fish carvings have done well for him in competition at the Sioux Empire fair and at the Spencer, Iowa, fair. He will spend 6-8 months on his fish projects. Expect to see another walleye at this year's fair!

Another favorite activity enjoyed by bill and his two sons during the past ten years, is joining several of their friends in weekend carving classes and seminars. We APPRECIATE THAT they also frequently attend Third Saturday meetings of SDWC, Thank you, bill, for your interest in carving and for your participation in our club activities.

Gene Dickey:

Gene is the youngest offspring of bill and Mary Dickey, and while he credits his father for getting him carving "as a kid", those annual classes and seminars at Waldorf college in Iowa with instructors like John Burke or Lloyd Meng were "great weekends."

Gene's first carving was a cross on bark. This he gave to his grandmother and received it back at her passing. Also, gene carved a tulip on bark. He likes to carve the lloyd Meng caricatures and eagle feathers with an eagle head on one end. Gene still has most of his carvings.

One thing we may not know about gene is that He collects pillsbury dough boy statues, a hobby he began as a youngster. Currently, gene is carving a "boy baker"; also Bill sr. has carved several statures for gene's collection.

Today, Gene lives in sioux falls and has been working at wells fargo for nine years. He Earned his BA in "business management" several years ago. He likes to travel, and, quite Often, it is his whole family that vacations together in places like branson. Like his parents, gene also enjoys their lakeside cabin. Gene says he and bill fish for walleye and northerns from their dock, while dad carves. "Bill and I are whittlers and dad is a carver"

All of us are aware of gene's health problems. Today he needs another kidney transplant. He will enter the hospital in April for final exam to be a "suitable recipient" for a transplant. Then a search for a living donor will happen and could take three to five years. An Aside: Gene's paper for his BA degree was on "living donorships", a well recievced thesis.

Thank you, Gene, for your company in carving and for being a great inspiration for all of us. (An interview with Bill Dickey Jr. will be coming soon!)

April - May Newsletter

The "Art" of Violin Making

The members and guests at the March meeting of the
South Dakota Woodcarvers enjoyed a special treat as Arthur Ramse gave a talk about violin making. Art retired from farming twenty-five years ago and moved to his current residence in Canton, SD. Wondering what he might do to occupy his time, he paid a visit to retired pastor John Watne, who had resumed the vocation of violin making as he had previously done in Norway.
After a second look at the "how to do" manual Pastor Watne encouraged him to read, Art decided to go ahead and give violin making a try. He learned the basics by assembling his first violin from a kit, and now he is working on his 40th instrument made almost entirely from scratch. Each step of the process, from carving the backs and fronts to bending and gluing the sides, requires painstaking precision, but one of the biggest challenges, Art says, has been learning to apply the perfect finish.
Art told some interesting stories about sales he had made and answered a lot of questions about the various techniques, but of course there were some trade secrets that he was not willing to divulge. In order to compete with the Made-in-China market and Internet sales, he might be willing to part with one his hand made violins for less than $1000.00.

Next Meeting: Saturday, April 19, (9:00 AM at the STI Ed Wood T&I Building)

We still have to decide whether or not to go ahead with plans for a booth at the SideWalk Arts Festival. Once a definite commitment to this project is made, we may have to dedicate some of our meetings to carving those ornaments and such that we intend to sell. (There are already some ornaments and carvings under way.) In the meantime, however, a little bird carving exercise has been planned. Band saw blanks for carving a profile sample of the bird heads will be available as a carving project for this meeting.

February - March Newsletter

Hats off to Bob Locken!

Thanks to Bob's initiative and willingness to get things done, advertising for our Annual Christmas Show and Sale at the Parkridge Galleria appeared in two issues of the Shoppers News. Even though Bob did not have a table to show off his carvings, either for show or for sale, he paid the bill for the ads and has refused to accept any reimbursement from the club treasurer. Too bad the show had to be canceled because of the weather! We'll probably never know how much good those ads might have done. Thanks anyway, Bob!

News that appeared in a few Internet Events Calendars about rescheduling the show for the next Saturday was completely worthless-- (judging from the few people who showed up that day to shop for woodcarvings). In fact, getting enough traffic at the Park Ridge Gallaria on any given day to make it worthwhile enough to attempt a sale of woodcarvings may be expecting too much--regardless of the amount and type of advertising we could muster. Maybe it's time for a change! (Where have we heard that before?)

The possibility of setting up a booth at the Side Walk Arts Festival next September in down town Sioux Falls was discussed at the annual meeting last month, and Vice Pres. Dick Sabers offered to investigate that possibility. It will be interesting to see what he has to say about that at our next meeting, Feb. 16th.

Who can doubt Paul Harvey?

A new sharpening tool recently advertised by Paul Harvey prompted me to check it out on the Internet web site. They had video demos for two models, the 2000 for $130, and the 3000 for $250. I thought the see-through disk and air cooling features of both models were quite interesting--not to mention lightweight portability. I began to wonder if it would be worth spending that much money for still another sharpening tool.

Then one day I happened to be shopping at Menard's (again) and noticed a large display of the model 2000 on sale for $99.99. I began to wonder if we could get Treasurer Huntimer to part with another $100 and buy one for the club to use at meetings.

A week later, needing still more material for a kitchen cupboard remodel (and to get away from "Super Tuesday" TV), I returned to Menards with a fairly sizable Big Card rebate check. After loading my cart with a sheet of oak plywood, I went to look again at the Model 2000. There was only one left on the shelf and a guy was watching the video. I grabbed the box and said, "Excuse me, I need this for a product evaluation.."

I'll have it available for anyone to try out at our meeting, Feb 16th. There's a link to the website at www.sdwoodcarvers.blogspot.com
~~~Sec. Arne

Meet the Members

Rollin Manning has been a member of our club since 2000. During the 37 years he worked as a meteorologist, ("Weatherman"--for those of you from Nunda), he lived in North Dakota, Michigan, Indiana, Georgia, Arizona, and finally in South Dakota, where he concluded his career. Rollin admits it was frustrating at times, working against all the weatherman jokes, but he was correct 60-70% of the time--which, he said, wasn't all that bad. He retired in 1990. A year later Marian, his wife, joined him in retirement after years of serving as a dietician in hospitals and nursing homes.

Together, they have four children and ten grandchildren, and they spend a lot of time traveling between Tennessee and Colorado to visit family members. From January 10th through May of this year they will be enjoying the warmer weather in Arizona.
Rollin is a late bloomer in carving. His first wood projects were building bookcases for himself and for family. Then he "graduated" (one could say) to carving. Good Move! His favorite projects are bears, birds and other wild life.

Things we don't know about Rollin are that he is a stamp collector and a presidential gold coin collector. A third thing we don't know about him is that he became 81 last June. And forth, Rollin went directly from High School into the Marine Corp. It was the last year of WWII, and Rollin was on his way to invade Japan when the two bombs that brought that war to and end were dropped. Later, as a member of the National Guard, Rollin served in the Korean conflict.

We are glad Rollin survived his adventures in the military and in the weather reporting business to become a fellow wood carver.

After retiring from John Morrell & Co., Don Clementson worked as a craftsman for a bank in Brandon. His wife, Marge is engaged in the antique business, buying and selling at a booth in trading shows and through an antique store. When not carving, Don enjoys reading westerns and playing golf, and Marge likes to play Bingo. Don and Marge also enjoy taking their camper to Branson and Wisconsin, where they will stay ten to fourteen days at a time. They have two children and one grandchild.

Since Don joined the SD Woodcarvers Club fourteen years ago, his talent for woodcarving has grown, and he has gained a reputation as one of the area's best, along with Jim Savage and Jerry Bergeron, whose works are well known by art collectors in and beyond the Sioux Falls area. He likes to carve various styles of "Santa" figures and walking sticks, but his favorite carvings are large portraits of Native Americans and Mountain Men. Such pieces have won him several Best of Show awards at the Center for Western Studies Annual Artist of the Plains Show and Sale and at the Sioux Empire Woodcarving Exposition. (His Mountain Man that won the People's Choice Best of Show in 2002 is still pictured in the "Gallery" page of www.sdwoodcarvers.com.) Don usually participates in three art shows a year. One is our annual Parkridge Show and Sale. The other two are out of town sites. Don also participates in competitive shows.

When asked what we don't know about him, Don says that he is "old". Hey, Don! Welcome to the club! Speaking of which: besides growing old with the rest of us, Don's service as a club member has been very commendable. Numerous times he has offered instruction on various projects and served as president for five or more years! Many thanks, Don, for sharing your skills with us and for encouraging the rest of us "carvers".

At last report, Don has won a battle against the cancer that was slowing him down during the past year, but last Jan. 8th as he was getting the mail he slipped on some ice and broke his leg. We wish you a speedy recovery and look forward to seeing you again soon!