"Against the Wind": A Kansa Indian and Buffalo Accent Art-Chair

Mark,

Very nice work and a very interesting story. It must take a lot of patience and skill (that unfortunately I don’t possess) to be able to do the carving. I enjoy looking at your work.

Joe

Joe: You are sure kind to me. I first decided I wanted to carve when I was 10 years old watching a man sit under a tree carving a little “boot” out of a piece of wood. I was mesmerized by what he could do, and decided then to try and learn to carve.

Some things I have tried to “do” have come easy, others things “do not.” Carving is one of the “do-not’s” in my life.

I struggle with it, but still press on, reading books, practicing, and asking questions whenever I can find someone to help me a little here and there.

When I look at Dick Cain’s carvings, or Tony Ward’s Koala Bear, or Donna Menke’s Chipmunk, or Ellen’s boxes, or Ospreybait’s Bluebird, or Pat Sherman’s horse, or Roger’s canes, of Bob Morris’ horses, just to name a few people, I am truly humbled and impressed.

I also grew up watching my dad carve a lot, decorating his furniture, or carving figures. I work at carving hard when I do it, and get better with each project, but I have a long way to go.

I have the “want to” attitude about learning to carve, so I appreciate your encouragement and kind words as I continue working on the skills.

thanks,
Mark

-- Mark DeCou - Kansas Flinthill's Artisan

Its cool the way you put a story with your work. I hope to do that someday. Believe it or not I used to help a custom butcher and had to help him butcher out a cow buffalo that died giving birth back in the 70’s. If you wrangled and salted the hides of those critters by yourself you have my blessing. I remember I could’nt lift one of those hides on my own and I was in good shape back then. I’m not saying you did’nt, these were’nt free ranging bufs they were penned up so they had about 3 inches of fat we left on the hide plus the hump. It was quite an experience. The chair is beautiful, I love the texture you gave it, that had to take some time. I really enjoy doing mortise and tenon joints, dont you? It makes you feel like a carpenter….mike

-- Mike. Profisher50@yahoo.com

Jockmike2: you are right, green buffalo hides are very heavy. The guy that butchered the four animals called me and asked if I wanted them the morning after the butchering, and I said “yes.” Then he said that I needed to hurry as they were still laying on the ground, and would deteriate quickly in that state. So, I buckled the little ones in their car seats, jumped in the pickup and headed to his ranch. My wife opted not to join us on the trip. The ranch owner helped me drag the green hides into the back of my truck, and that was when I first learned how naive I was about working with hides.

When I got there, since it had been raining and snowing several days before, everything was so muddy, that the hides were covered in mud and all the rest that comes with butchering 4 large animals, something I had never seen before.

I would guess that one green hide weighs at least 250 lbs, but I am just guessing. I know they were too heavy for me to carry them by myself, but I could drag them on the ground one at a time. When I got them home I pulled them out of the truck onto the grass by myself, as my wife took one look at them, the back of my truck, and the huge mess, and quickly ran the kids back into the house with her, muttering something about my low level of sanity. I mentioned somewhere else in my lumberjocks writings that I am stubborn, so this “motivation” just made the job more important to get done.

I spread them out on the grass and starting the washing process with a garden hose to remove all of the mud and other stuff. I had already acquired several books with information about tanning from my mountainman rendezvous hobby days, so I cleaned up and went into to read the books. It was during this cleaning process that I realized how much I enjoyed the freedom of living in the country, with no neighbors to complain about the mess. I only had to worry about the wildlife at night, but as it turned out, the wildlife only messed with the fat material that I scraped off of the hides, and they left the hides themselves alone at night.

I scraped one hide at a time with a hunting knife. If I were to do it again, I would take a few minutes and make a scraper out of an old lawn mower blade and tree limb. But, like I said, I was pretty naive when I started this process. I was able to heft one end of a hide at a time up on top of a set of saw horses with boards running across them to make sort of a table. With some heavy lifting, I was able to put each up on the table and scrape them with the knife.

If I remember right, it took me more than 4 days of work to scrap out the four hides, and cover them each with their own 50 pound bag of salt I bought at the local livestock supply store. The salt turned out to be the cheap part of the experience, only about $3 per bag.

I called around to see what it would cost to tan a full hide with the hair on, and soon found out that I didn’t have the money to do that. So, I started calling around to see if anyone I knew would want a green hide that they could have tanned on their own. I did sell two that way, and then I had the other two tanned.

About 16 months later the hides came back, and were just beautiful, long soft hair, and they have that freshly tanned leather smell, and then all of the hard work seemed to be worth it. I have a Morris Chair started in my shop that I have planned to sort of match the styling of this dining chair, and then I will use more of the hide on it, draping it over the leather cushions. Someday, I hope to get the Morris Chair done.

Thanks for your comments,
Mark

-- Mark DeCou - Kansas Flinthill's Artisan

I took this chair to a small local art show today in Cottonwood Falls, KS. It is so fun to share the inspiration behind this project with people, and see them connect with the plight of the Kansa Nation.

-- Mark DeCou - Kansas Flinthill's Artisan

A very historic piece you have created Mark. Have you printed this information out and put it some place so that it can “stay with the chair”?
I’ve tanned rabbit hides (a lot of work) and a deer hide.. and that was enough for me. We now take our deer hides to a tannery to get done. Much easier hahaa.

The chair is magnificent and definitely depicts the history. Thank you for sharing, for creating, and for the information.

-- "Functional WoodArt" by Debbie, Canada (http://www.execulink.com/~yohan)

I dusted off this Chair this past weekend to show it at the Great Plains Woodcarving & Fine Arts Show and Sale in Wichita, KS. The Great Plains Woodcarver’s guild has started hosting the Wichita Sculptor’s Guild in this show, and since I’m a member of the Sculptor’s Guild, I decided to throw my “hat” into the ring this year. I’m glad I did. A great group of folks, some great work to look at, and many appreciative people looking at what I do with my time. What could be better? Well, I could think of a couple of things, but you get the point.

I entered this Chair in the only category it would fit, “Low Relief Carving.” I looked at the other entries, all expertly done 3-D pictures of scenes, animals, and people, and walked back to my booth pretty dejected. But, then they later announced over the PA system that I had won 1st place in this category. What a thrill, that could have only been topped by selling it. But, now buyer yet.

Thanks,
Mark

-- Mark DeCou - Kansas Flinthill's Artisan

Congratulations Mark on the win.

-- Karson Southern Delaware karson_morrison@bigfoot.com

congrats!!! What an honour.

-- "Functional WoodArt" by Debbie, Canada (http://www.execulink.com/~yohan)

I entered this chair in the Chase County Kansas Fair last week. It took 1st in “woodworking” beating out my other project, the “Rustic Hallway Stool”. To be honest, I think my two projects were the only two entered in this category, but I don’t know that for sure.

Next judging stop for the chair is the Kansas State Fair. I’m hoping to entice someone to buy this chair, or commission a set of things in this style, so I have been showing it more lately.

thanks for looking,
Mark

-- Mark DeCou - Kansas Flinthill's Artisan

I love this chair . it has so much meaning. Good luck with the commission. I’ll be sending good thoughts.

-- "Functional WoodArt" by Debbie, Canada (http://www.execulink.com/~yohan)

Mark, I’ve run out of things to say about your work. I’m just in awe of your skills in design and execution. Bravo, brother…Bravo!

-- You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation. (Plato)

Another great example of adapting for the business.

The Indians big mistake was not requiring a background check, $5000 and a 2 year temporary visa before they let us in.

-- No piece is cut too short. It was meant for a smaller project.

I took this chair to the Kansas State Fair, and entered it in the “Low Relief Carving” category. It took a Blue 1st Place in that category, which was quite an honor, as there were some other very nicely done low-relief projects that it competed against.

Here is a Photo from the Fair. The walking cane that is leaning up against the chair is another entry of mine which is shown and written about at: http://lumberjocks.com/projects/268

Here is the Blog Summary of this year’s Fair Results:
http://lumberjocks.com/jocks/decoustudio/blog/1890

-- Mark DeCou - Kansas Flinthill's Artisan