WCHF 2013 Report

WEST COAST HORN FAIR Little Rock Washington, April 26 27 28 2013

The West Coast Horn Fair for 2013 was held at the Capitol City Rifle and Pistol Club in Little Rock, Washington, just south of Olympia.  We were eager to learn more about horn work, display our horn items that we made, gather supplies for future projects, and to enjoy the camaraderie of fellow craftsmen.

Many of the Participants for the WCHF 2013

On Friday, April 26^th, we attended a great class on horn engraving.  Some

people brought current engraving projects and worked on them during the class.

Kieth Beard and Chip Kormas working on their scrimshaw projects.

Steve Vance Scrimshaw Artist

Scrimshw Tools brought by Steve Vance

Harold Moore was honored this year for his contribution to horn making.  He was a pioneer horn maker from the 1970’s . Many of his customers brought in their “Harold Moore” horn to add to his display table.

Harold Moore Pioneer Horn Maker

A discussion on shop safety and horn selection was led by John Shorb. After a talk about horn design and the Golden Mean by Scott Morrison, the participants gathered around the equipment to watch the horns take shape.

John Shorb Teaching one of the many classes.

On Saturday, the real fun began.  Our classes expanded by offering live demonstrations of horn building.  Three competent Horners, Glen Sutt, Steve Skillman and Scott Morrison, volunteered to build three powder horns which would later be auctioned.

Glen Sutt making a horn in one day to be auctioned off that evening.

Scott Morrison showing Jim Smith and Don Nissen the finer points of horn making.

Steve Skillman working on his horn for Saturday.

All three craftsmen had to hustle to finish their projects by dinnertime on Saturday.  Six meals were included in  the $55.00 registration fee,  Dinner on Friday was provided by Glen Sutt.  Our banquet on Saturday was  prepared by Jim and Laura Smith.  Breakfast  and lunch were prepared by Bo Brown and Don Kerr.  A big thank you to all the people who helped with the food and all the things that had to happen to put on this event.

After the banquet, we had an auction and two different raffles. The main raffle was for everyone who bought a ticket.  Online and mail in ticket sales were brisk. Once we saw the prizes in person, we bought even more tickets. Some prizes were made just for the Horn Fair and others would have been hard to ship. Those items were raffled separately to the Saturday night attendees. We want to thank everyone who donated a raffle prize for this event.  The selection and quality of the prizes were fantastic. We do appreciate the generosity of everyone involved.  Without the raffle prizes, there would be no horn fair.

It is time for the raffle and the auction!

The raffle prizes and the winners will be posted in a different area.

HORN COMPETITION

And then there was the horn competition.  The table was full of submissions that challenged the judges’ ability to pick out winners.   Steve Vance took first place in the “Engraved Powder Horn” section, but it wasn’t an easy victory.  Harold Moore won “non-engraved powder horn “and Dave Rase won the “horn item” category.  Glen Sutt won the People’s Choice award with his banded powder horn. Good job to all who entered.

Engraved Powder Horn 1-Steve Vance 2-Henry Frank (Crawdad) 3- Chip Kormas

Engraved Powder Horn Competition. 1st 2nd 3rd

Engraved Horn Contest Winners
Steve Vance, Henry Frank (Crawdad), Chip Kormas

Non-engraved Powder Horn 1-David Rase 2-Harold Moore 3- Richard Downs

Non Engraved Powder Horn Competition. 1st 2nd 3rd

Non-engraved Powder Horn 2-Harold Moore 1-David Rase 3- Richard Downs

Horn Object Blowing Horn, Spoon and Fork, Salt Horn

Non Horn Competition. 1st 2nd 3rd

1-   Dave Rase 2-  Glenn Sutt 3-   Richard Downs

Non Powder Horn competition
Dave Rase , Glenn Sutt, Richard Downs

People Choice  1-   Glenn Sutt

Glenn Sutt and People’s Choice Award

People’s Choice Award for best Horn item

On Sunday, there were  three more classes: one by Scott Morrison who talked about installing leather ends on woven horn straps, Steve Vance discussed horn coloration and Jim Hayden talked on books available on horn work.

I will post another article on the Raffle and the Auction.  More pictures coming.

The Capitol City Rifle and Pistol Club is a good venue for this event.  The West Coast Horn Fair for 2014 will be held there next May. We will build on the success of this event with better classes, demonstrations, hands on mentoring and another outstanding raffle.

Scott and Cathy Sibley Featured Artists

Scott and Cathy are featured on the Contemporary Makers Blog by Art and Jan Riser.

They were also featured on my email and on my website.

Scott Sibley at his ranch

Scott writes for the website Kentucky Longrifles:

I had a great interest in History as a youngster. Living on a dairy farm there was the occasional de-horning of cows and bulls. This gave me a few small horns in with to make BB horns and Pellet horns. I carved myself a flintlock rifle out of a pine board and spent many hours entertaining myself with that and a horn to go with it.

Cathy Sibley

In 1969 I met Cathy, we graduated from high school.  In 1971 we married and I joined the service. While in the service I got my hands on a Green River Rifle Works Leman kit. I assembled it and I needed a horn. A trip to a slaughter house in Boise Idaho provided me with several. I made the horn and one day was scratching on it when Cathy said, “that looks like fun” I handed her a horn and said “sand it down and try it” From that day on my partner became my horn engraver. We fooled and fiddled with a few horns and in 1976. We discovered Rendezvous  We went to one and were told “You kids should make those things and sell them” We were on our way.

Early 1998 horn by Scott and Kathy Sibley

Horns and scrimshawed Jewelry, as well as my hunting skills, put food on the table and helped pay the bills during my 5 years of college. Upon graduation I had a job in a long away, remote Eskimo village on the west coast of Alaska. My partner and I prepared for our departure to the Last frontier. In our “stuff”, there was my limited supply of tools and a box of horns.

Scott Sibley at his work table in Wyoming

“Strange things are done in the Midnight sun” Cathy and I wanted no part of that and so we stayed at home. I worked on horns and Cathy decorated them for me. We sent completed horns to a friend in Kentucky who was heavily involved in muzzleloading and he found new homes for them.

Kathy Sibley at her work table in Wyoming

Life in an Eskimo village was unlike anything either of us had experienced. It brought us face to face into the pages of “National Geographics LIVE” We adapted and thrived. Living in our semi truck trailer stacked on 55 gallon oil barrels we made horns, carved fossilized Ivory and I found a new hobby, Selling furs to the Eskimos. I became “The White Whale fur man” “Ithpuk Gusiak”  While walking down the frozen tundra one day I had a revelation, Here in 1979, I was living as close as I could to the 18th century without leaving the country for Asia or Africa.. After that living there, surviving and prospering became a badge of honor for both of us.

Nathan Perry (ancestor) and his discharge papers. Auctioned at the CLA Show 2012

We stayed for 10 years, leaving in the summers to briefly attend a rendezvous along the way to visit our families in Michigan. All this time our interested in history never ceased and I got into genealogy  I discovered my Great Grand father had been at Gettysburg on Little Round Top and was wounded. I found his Grand Father, Nathan Perry, had served for 8 years in the Continental Army. I found that just under 100 Sibley men had fought for freedom and Liberty during the American Revolution. My horn making took on new dimensions and a new meaning to me. With every one I was making a “tribute” to those who served. To me ,being a DAV, this is especially meaningful.

Wyoming sunset

After the Civil War, my great grandfather didn’t go home, he sat off on a journey of the American West that went on till he died in 1915. His son and his ex wife had went on their separate ways several years earlier. “The old Captain was a hard and bitter man” My Great Grand Mother died, and then my grandfather died in 1917. The only 2 boys to be heirs to this history became step children with no idea of their real family name. I am glad to have dug it up and in finding my Grand fathers grave in central Wyoming I myself have found a home.

I look at my horn making and can rationalize that I am involved in it for a reason.

For the 2013 West Coast Horn Fair, Scott donated an “antiqued” Southern Banded Horn.

Southern Banded Horn by Scott Sibley

Scott and Cathy are the authors of two Best Sellers. The were one of the first to publish a book on building powder horns. Their second book is Building The Southern Banded Horn.

Building the Southern Banded Horn

Recreating the 18th Century Powder Horn

Sow’s Ear to be Auctioned at the 2013 WCHF in Washington

It all started at the West Coast Horn Fair last year in Morro Bay, California, Scott Morrison was given the challenge of starting with a bad cow horn (Sow’s Ear) and turning it into a “Silk Purse”.

Finished Banded Horn by Scott Morrison

John (Bigsmoke) Shorb gave a talk on “choosing your horn”. He had several examples of horns with defects that would lend a person to pass when choosing. One example that he recommended passing up was a thin, translucent, misshapened horn that had a severe delamination at the tip.

Scott Morrison recalls, “I was sitting in the back of the room with Steve Skillman in “Heckler’s” row and I just couldn’t let this go by. I told John something to the effect that this was nonsense and that there was a lot that one cold do with the horn. John came right back and said that when the horn came to me (it was being passed around the room) to go ahead and keep it. The gauntlet had been taken off and the challenge issued;  John was pretty much telling me to put up or shut up.”

“Well now honor was at stake and I could not back down. So I took up the challenge and not only would I take this “Sow’s Ear” and make some sort of “Silk Purse” with it, but it would come back to the West Coast Horn Fair in 2013 to be  auctioned off.”

“The horn sat in my to do box until recently when I decided that I needed to “get-r-done”. When I got back from the WCHF last year, all I had done with it was to cut off the tip and drill the spout. I had originally thought that the horn would be good for a Southern banded horn with an applied tip and when I cut and drilled it, I saw that there was plenty of material for such a horn.”

The de-lamination in this tip was sanded off.

“As you can see in the photo, there is approximately 1/2 inch at the tip, which would be plenty for an applied tip or even threaded for a screw tip. The discoloration at the tip is where the internal separation of the horn layers occurred. I decided on a horn with an applied antler tip.”

“I had turned a base plug and fitted a rear ring to the horn and when I did a trial fit of an antler tip the horn looked too long to my eye. I ended up taking about 3/4 inch more off of the tip which improved the proportion. There was still plenty of material at the tip so I had no problem fitting the antler.”

Applied Tip made from antler repair the defective tip. 

“Of greater concern to me wasn’t the tip but the thinness of the horn. When the horn was cleaned and polished, there was left humps and hollows from the sander that was used. One side of the horn was also pretty flat. Normally, there is enough wall thickness on a horn that I can work it to some semblance of round. However, since this horn was to thin, I was afraid that if I tried to round it I might break through the wall. The best I could hope for was to remove the humps and hollows and have a smooth body. The flat spot would have to remain.”

Scott Morrison Horn before staining.

“I first thought of having just one band on the horn, but decided that this would be too uninteresting so I went with three bands. I heated the bands so they were pliable and they slipped around the oblong shape of the body easily, leaving no gaps. The base plug is walnut. The button finial is turned horn and tapered to slip fit into the base.”

Banded horn By Scott Morrison

Two of the Three bands. Scott says the flat spot is in the picture.

“I heated the bands so they were pliable and they slipped around the oblong shape of the body easily, leaving no gaps.”

Base Plug with WCHF for West Coast Horn Fair.

“The base plug is walnut. The button finial is turned horn and tapered to slip fit into the base.”

Stained with aqua fortis, then added a patina

“The horn was stained with aqua fortis, then a patina applied with a combination of shoe polish and black powdered tempura paint.”

The horn is translucent and light as a feather.

“It measures 15 inches along the outside curve and 2 1/4 inches across at the base. The horn is nice and translucent and light as a feather.”

“I think it is an acceptable “Silk Purse” made from the “Sow’s Ear” that was the original horn.”

“Hawkeye” Horn Strap and Osceola’s Garters

This is a picture of the blue and white belt worn by Daniel Day Lewis. It was used as a horn belt in the movie “Last of the Mohicans”. It is  also known at the “Hawkeye Belt”

Hawkeye from the Movie, “The Last of the Mohicans”

This replica of the above Horn strap was made by Gary Bertelson, gbertels@insight.rr.com and donated to 2013 The West Coast Horn Fair for a raffle prize.

This donation  is made with from replica wampum beads, woven on brain tanned deer hide laces with artificial sinew.  It is long!  The beaded portion measures  50 inches plus 15 inches of lace fringe on each end. You can reach gary at:  gbertels@insight.rr.com

Gary also sent  a set of  “Osceola” beaded garters.   These are based on the original piece at the National Museum of the American Indian
which says they are associated with Osceola and included in a George
Catlin painting.  They are beaded in wool yarn.

Replica Beaded Garters associated with Osceola, Seminole. Donated for the WCHF Raffle

This is the picture of the originals from the website of  The National Museum of the American Indian.

Original Garters associated with Osceola (Seminole, 1803–1838)

The National Museum of the American Indian states this about the garters in their museum:

“These leg garters likely belonged to the Seminole leader Osceola. Born in 1804 to Polly Coppinger, a part Muscogee Creek woman, Osceola was the most famous of several Seminole leaders who rose to prominence during the Second Seminole War, from 1835 to 1842. Osceola, whose name means Black Drink Singer, was also strong in medicine and was known for his ability to consume the black drink made from yaupon holly.

Seminole leader Osceola Portrait by George Catlin 1838.

“Osceola enjoyed the stature and recognition that he had earned. George Catlin produced two paintings of Osceola. In each of them the war leader wears clothes of Seminole tradition. These finger-woven wool garters, which have beads woven into the pattern, are very similar to the garters Osceola wore in Catlin’s full-length portrait, painted in 1838, shortly before the Seminole leader’s death while he was imprisoned at Fort Moultrie, South Carolina.

Source:  The National Museum of the American Indian.

West Coast Horn Fair 2013 Raffle Prizes

The West Coast Horn fair will be held in Littlerock WA April 26, 27 and 28 2013. The event is funded entirely by raffle tickets.  Horn makers from all over the US have donated prizes for this raffle.

You do not need to be present to win. We mail the prizes to you at no cost to you. For a complete list of all the prizes and a link to buy tickets click HERE

Southern Banded Horn by Scott Sibley

This Southern Banded Powder Horn was donated by Scott Sibley.  The horn measures 13″ around the double curve.  Scott filed the horn to make it much lighter in weight. The tip is turned Whitetail antler and it done in two pieces as were the majority of original horns. The tip and bands are fastened with wooden pegs.

Applied Tip on Sibley’s Horn

There are four turned bands. The base plug is cherry, turned with a “wasp waist” design as per an original “Shenandoah Valley” horn that is in Scott’s collection.  The dark color is also like the original horn.

Wampum beaded Belt “Hawkeye Belt”donated by Gary Bertelsen

Wampum belt patterned after the movie The Last of the Mohicans. By Gary Bertelsen

This is designed after the belt Daniel Day Lewis used as a horn belt in the
movie “Last of the Mohicans” also known at the “Hawkeye Belt”

It is made with replica wampum beads, woven on brain tanned deer hide
laces with artificial sinew.

Measures (beaded portion) 50 inches plus 15 inches of lace fringe on each
end – At 50 inches, this is a strap that will fit a Big Boy. gbertels@insight.rr.com

“Osceola” beaded garters.

Second prize by Gary Bertelsen (no picture yet)I included a set of “Osceola” beaded garters.   These are based on the original piece at the National Museum of the American Indian which says they were actually worn by Osceola and included in a George Catlin painting. gbertels@insight.rr.com

Horn Box donated by Tim Sanner

Horn Box donated by Tim Sanner

Tim Sanner is a Journeyman Horner in the Honourable Company of Horners.  This little container is called a Horn Box. The box is made of cow horn with a walnut base.  The lid is turned walnut with a white horn ring.  It measures 3 1/2″ tall and 2 1/2″ in diameter. This is a piece anyone would be proud to own.

Artist Proof on cow horn by Yosef Trilling

Artist Proof on cow horn by Yosef Trilling

Two artist’s proof horns engraved by Yosef Trilling. He takes a cow horn and engraves a new subject to see exactly how it will look on the curved and limited surface of the horn. Yosef can be found on eBay and the CLA site. Also atrilling@kc.rr.com.

Engraving tool made and donated by David Rase.

Engraving tool made and donated by David Rase.

Engraving Tool by David Rase

This tool can be used to do some fine engraving on a powder horn. The tip is a Coulter Precision carbide point held in place with a set screw so the tip can be changed out when it gets dull.  Dave hand turned the brass holder and installed a blue grip cushion.  You can reach David  at davidrase@q.com

THE HARTLEY HORN DRAWINGS

This hard back book was donated by Jeff Bibb at The Honourable Company of Horners.

Robert M. Hartley made these drawings documenting historic powder horns. The  drawings are laid out so you see all sides of the horn. There are close-up photos of  the Royal Coat of Arms, rivers, cities and towns, forts and animals.

The Hartley Horn Drawings donated by The Honourable Company of Horners

Detail from the pages of The Hartley Book

Detail from the pages of The Hartley Book