(light cheerful music) - Welcome to the "Volunteer Woodworker."

I'm your host, Charles Brock.

Come with me as we drive the back roads, bringing you the story of America's finest woodworkers.

(light cheerful music continues) (light cheerful music continues) We're going to Columbia, Tennessee to meet Randy Walters.

Randy is one of the most prolific wood carvers ever.

He is not one for just one style.

He does pictures in relief, figures both historical and whimsical, and he does architectural elements like linen fold panels and castle gargoyles.

Let's meet Randy Walters.

- [Announcer] "Volunteer Woodworker" is funded in part by.

Since 1970, Whiteside Machine Company has been producing industrial grade router bits in Claremont, North Carolina.

Whiteside makes carbide bits for edge forming, grooving, and CNC application.

Learn more at whitesiderouterbits.com.

Real Milk Paint Company makes VOC-free non-toxic milk paint available in 56 colors.

Milk paint creates a matte wood finish that can be distressed for an antique look.

(gentle music) Good Wood Nashville designs custom furniture and is a supplier of vintage hardwoods.

Keri Price with Keller Williams Realty has been assisting middle Tennessee home buyers and sellers since 2013.

Mayfield Hardwood Lumber, supplying Appalachian hardwoods worldwide.

Anna's Creative Lens.

- Randy.

- Yes, sir.

- Yeah, this is just like being at the Randy Walters Carving Museum or Randy Walters "This is Your Life."

We have your work all around this room.

- Yes, sir.

Yes, sir.

It's a life, there's some things I've done when I was real young and some as I progress on.

Yes, it is.

- Total immersion.

I mean, you've got relief carving, you've got 3D carving, you've got whimsical carving, you've got canes.

You turn it out, and it's all beautiful.

- Well, thank you very much.

- Yeah.

What got you on this path?

- I don't know.

Many, of course, when I was a kid, we played a lot outside, you know, you got to do all that.

- Yeah, my mother put us out- - So I-- - And she'd lock the door.

- Right, go on outside, yeah.

- Yeah.

(both chuckle) - We, I'd just walk in the woods and be looking for little sticks or something like that, and something would catch your eye, maybe a little 90 degree or something angle, and of course, at that time, we always had a pocket knife, we could always carry a pocket knife, still carry one, and so you just kind of start whittling as it began.

Whittling is what it starts out, and it just kind of progressed from that.

Then one Christmas, my uncle was from Pennsylvania and he sent me an Exacto set, little Exacto knives.

It's got the handle and the different blades.

- [Charles] Mm-hmm.

- And that's kind of how it kind of got started.

I was able to do different things with that other than what you could do with a pocket knife.

- Mm-hmm.

- And it kind of just progressed from that.

Then as time went on, I think the first relief carving I ever did was the praying hands, my hands, for my mother.

- [Charles] Mm-hmm.

- I don't think, I can't remember right now whether they're still up there or not, but anyway, how hard it is to carve your own hands and look at 'em and.

(Charles laughs) It got quite drastic, but anyway, it come out good for what I did to learn from.

- Yeah.

- Then as it progressed, when I went in the Navy, we was on a repair ship, which had all kind of stuff, anything you could think.

It had a wood shop, it had a metal shop, just anything you wanted, foundries, and that's where I did the last supper up here.

- [Charles] Mm-hmm.

- Had a little painting of it, and those were done with scalpels.

There was a medical store room below our workshop where we rewound motors and stuff, and they had a fire, so you had to get all that stuff out there.

Well, it just so happened, a package of those blades and a handle fell out on our deck, and I picked them up, and then I got in good cahoots with the corpsman that were on there, so I was able to get more blades and stuff, and.

It took me three years to do that little thing up there, so that's, it kind of progressed from that.

Then when I got, of course, got out of the Navy and started working, it'd be different things would come up.

Then every now, I don't remember how long it would be, I started to take classes from different carvers, or maybe go to a, what do you call it?

Not yard sale, but craft shows, and see different people and watch 'em and sit there and just be, you know, I was fascinated by them.

So it just kind of went from there and just kept growing and growing and growing.

Then after a long period of time, of course, I started doing more and more reliefs, and one of our fellow carvers was an instructor at different schools around Alabama and Tennessee and stuff, and the guy that did the relief carving, he retired.

and they wanted to know if I wanted to try it.

So I bit the bullet and did, and the first carving I ever taught with that was a lighthouse.

And there was a, what impressed me more than anything else, I was a lot younger then, too, but there was a retired Presbyterian preacher there, he was 76 years old, he out-carved every carver there, and the rest of 'em were a lot younger than he was.

But anyway, just given me that thought of being able to tell him what to do, how to do it, what to do, and kind of get him in the general direction.

And I keep telling people on this is, when I'm in the process of teaching relief carving at different places-- - What is relief carving?

- Carving into a piece of wood, rather than what we call in the round.

In the round means, like pick, for instance, a duck.

You can take that duck and carve him, you carve all the sides of him, that's in the round.

- A three-dimensional duck.

- Three-dimensional duck, right.

Now, in relief carving, you're only carving the front side of it, or supposedly the front side of it, but you have to look, you gotta look at it in the round.

- And you're giving it depth.

- You're giving it depth, and that hasn't (indistinct).

It may not be a 16th of an inch, but just the way you can do it can make it look like it's deeper than what it actually is.

Eighth of an inch or whatever.

- Wow.

- So it's.

- Yeah.

- Your imagination goes with you.

Of course, people say that it's up here.

I don't-- - So where do you get your up here?

- Well, this particular one right here, I happened to be in TSC, and.

- [Charles] What is that?

- Tractor Supply Company.

- All right.

- And they had birthday cards there, and when I walked by, I saw this mountain stream, not the dirt, everything that's added to it, but the stream of the mountain come off, and I thought, hmm.

I bought the card, and then took it home, and then I started playing with it and adding to it and stuff, so that's where a lot of ideas come from.

Cards, magazines, everything.

- You see a picture- - Yeah.

- That catches your eye- - Right.

- And you start, you know, what can I do with this?

- Yes.

- Yeah.

- I'm not, of course you have to be careful with copyrights.

I can't copy my own work, much less somebody else's.

(Charles laughs) And to me, it's a gift of God on top of that, the way I look at it, but a lot of things.

There's nothing out there that hasn't been printed, painted, carved, whatever.

Somebody's done something somewhere, so I don't own anything.

I don't own any of these ideas and stuff, it's just something that works.

- It's kind of composition.

You select some elements and you pull them together- - Right.

Yeah.

- To tell a story or to paint a vision that you have.

- Right.

It's just like.

(chuckles) The worst part about it, wood carvers are observed as, are not qualified as artists, we're crafters.

- I think the idea of art or an artist is an individual thing.

Like when I tell you that, Randy, you're a tremendous artist.

Well, that's my opinion.

- Yeah.

- And I think it's done cumulatively.

If you hear something like that over and over again, it doesn't matter about the they, it's an individual thing.

- Yeah, it is.

It is.

- Yeah.

- I don't go around patting myself on the back.

I don't, it's just something that I enjoy doing, and my biggest enjoyment is teaching somebody else or try to show them how.

- So you've been teaching for a good while, and I've run into, actually, I think I met you through a former student that.

- Right.

- Yes.

- Yes, yes, you did.

You sure did.

- And he said, "Well, you've got a great wood carver just down the road from your house, and his name is Randy Walters."

And I called you up and.

- Yeah, it went from there, yes.

- Yeah.

- Yes, it was embarrassing.

(both chuckle) - No, that's a great form of flattery.

- It is.

It's a compliment.

It's a compliment when somebody wants to, "Can I take a picture?"

I said, go right ahead, fine.

I mean, it's just... And then I kid people, I say, especially ladies.

We'll go up and somebody will say something about that.

I said, "Have you ever carved before?"

"Well, no.

I don't know how."

I says, "Do you cook?"

"Well, yeah."

"Have you ever peeled a potato?"

"Yeah."

I said, "Well, that's carving.

You may not believe that.

And the next time you're in the kitchen by yourself, take your knife and peel.

You can carve a little fish, a little bear, and if it doesn't work out, you make french fries out of it.

Nobody's the wiser, so."

(Charles laughs) So you have a little humor, you'll have a little humor with it, too.

- There you go.

- But you'd be surprised what you can do if you want to.

Not everybody can build a chair, nobody could be a mechanic and do this kind of stuff.

- Go down to your shop.

- Okay.

- And watch you get outside the lines a little bit.

- Hmm, okay.

(both laugh) - Let's go.

- I'll bring my Band-Aids, okie doke, we'll do that.

(light cheerful music) (light cheerful music continues) - Randy, I think we're in your happy zone down here.

- That it is.

I can come down here and the whole world disappears.

If I'm hurting, I got a headache, it don't make any difference.

Just come on down and start carving.

- Well, there you go.

Now, recently, you had some adversity, some health problems.

Tell us about that.

- I did.

It was stupid on my part.

I went up and out in the garage looking for something and come down the steps and missed the bottom step.

Twitched my knee.

My left knee was on the third step, when my rear end was on the floor.

So I went to orthopedic to have it X-rayed and nothing broke, nothing dead, but it just continued to get worse and they put me in a boot, and the boot caused my feet to act up.

Unfortunately, my feet don't angle out, the boot does, and from there, it just kind of went from one to the other, of course, sitting around trying to take care of it, and that got boresome.

Then it wasn't long, I was in a wheelchair.

I went from walker to wheelchair to crutches, trying to get back and forth from the back part of the house, the bedroom and stuff.

Finally I got to thinking about it, and was able to get to the front door without any problem, go down the steps, my wife would bring the truck around, she'd load me up and bring me to the basement, I'd load myself out into a chair and I'd roll in here, and I'd be in here happy all day long carving.

I had something to do, and it kept me from just being a couch potato and being bored to death, so.

- Yeah, it's your therapy.

Your work and your art- - It is.

- Is your therapy.

- It is.

It really is.

- Yeah.

Everybody needs to find something like that.

- They do that, they do that.

And of course, people say, "When I retire, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that."

That's fine if you want to, but it's the best thing to do is start.

If you want a hobby, start it now.

Think about what you might wanna do.

There's several things you can go with.

"I can't do that.

I can't."

Well, how do you know unless you try?

- There you go.

- And just keep on and develop these feelings and stuff to work with.

Been many a times, wife'll shop and I'll sit out in the truck and carve.

It just passes the time and works out good.

- Well, your current project are some gargoyles that you're doing for a castle, and we're gonna go to the castle a little bit later, and those gargoyles, some of 'em have dogs' heads.

- Well, that's what's unusual, when people think about gargoyles, they think about the mysterical, the grotesque looking, wicked looking things, but they're really there for, supposed to be for good luck, some way just to keep the spirits away.

But this gentleman raises Scottish Deerhounds, and that's what he wanted his gargoyles to look like.

And these are in-house type deal.

They're not outside in the weather, they're actually in his, the upper level of the castle.

- They're architectural gargoyles for the interior.

- Correct, it is.

It is that.

And it was a challenge.

The type of wood was the, it was Douglas fir.

It was a challenge, but it's working.

- He gave you something to kind of work toward.

- He did do that.

This is a casting of his dog that he had casting on.

He's very protective of that, (laughs) so I don't wanna break it, that's for sure.

- Mm-hmm.

- But the hair, the hair and everything on here, and of course this particular one here is with the dog's ears laid back, and showing the inside of the ear, not just the outside flap.

- Yeah.

- So that creates more illusion.

So I went next door, and the other dog were down there, and I asked the lady if she'd mind holding it while we took some pictures of the inside of his ear, so I've got that to go by, so.

- (laughs) Yeah.

So you're working on one of these right now.

- Correct.

I am.

The hair and everything, I mean, even though the ears are different on this one, but the hair and everything else on this one will be established pretty well like that, 'cause they have a, like a little goatee on the bottom of his chin.

- Well, you have pencil lines everywhere.

- Pencil lines, that's the most important part of the.

They're guidelines, and when I'm teaching carving, I make a point of it.

I says, "When you put that pencil line on there, don't carve it off.

If you carve it off, put it back, 'cause if you carve it off and I catch it, that's gonna cost you 50 cents."

(Charles laughs) I never collected yet, but they get the idea.

It does help, anytime you have a reference line to work with.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

So you're trying to remove everything that's not- - Going to try to.

- That dog.

- It's mostly done with, well, I use not only using gouges and the mallet, I also use power, which is with a grinder or sander or anything like that to help establish that.

So there's no sense of worrying about a whole lot of stuff when you've got the tools to work with, so it works out.

- I wanna see how it works.

- It works out pretty good.

(mallet tapping) The biggest thing is, you block everything out.

You don't try to put any details to it, you know, the nostril, you don't wanna put the holes in the nose, 'cause it may not be there when you get ready for it.

The eyes are one of the last things that gives it life.

- Mm-hmm.

- And that's the last thing you put into it on that part, 'cause things, if something goes wrong, I got enough material here that I can put everything back a little bit.

Say there was the end of the nose broke off.

I was able to come in here and I can shorten this up a little bit and push the head back a little bit and make it a little smaller, and it'll still look uniform or more like the dog that I'm looking for.

(mallet tapping) - And if you had to, you could create a flat, and you could glue on another block- - Exactly right.

There's nothing wrong.

- And try again.

- Try again.

(laughs) - We'll look on a gargoyle over at the castle.

- [Randy] I'm anxious to do that, too.

- Let's go.

- Let's go.

All right.

- This castle has what's called a hammer beam timber frame.

- Right.

- You would expect something like this, and.

- You would, but, you know, trying to think how they did this kind of work with the material they had and the equipment they had, but it's beautiful.

- Yeah, well, you didn't build the timber frame, but you have a part of this that is really interesting.

- Well, thank you.

It was a thing of the heart to accomplish what we're trying to do with the animals and stuff.

- Well, it's a gargoyle, but it's an interior, architectural gargoyle.

- That is true, and the gentleman, instead of gargoyles being grotesque, like you see a lot of pictures and stuff, these were his images of his dogs and some of the animals that he has raised and kept and worked with.

- And they're in an interesting place.

Let's go see one.

- All right.

- Wow, this is really something, and it's hanging off of a Douglas fir piece of timber frame here.

How many of these are there?

- There's eight arches, and that's what we did, we kind of put all the arches, an animal on each one of 'em, a gargoyle on each one of 'em.

- And this part is pretty much the same on each one.

- It is the same, because you only had so much wood to work with, so they pretty well designed out, and the heads themselves were carved in place, but as it progressed on, they wanted to be able to turn it, so we did that to help it.

Not only that, since these dogs mostly all look alike, these Scottish Deerhounds, we're able to remove the head and add another carved head of a different animal, or, this one happened to be a dog that he had for 19 years, and this is what he wanted on his part of that.

- That is just outstanding.

And you've been working on a whole group of them over here.

- Oh, yes, each one of 'em done.

If I did work on one, if I did the wings on one, I did all the wings at the same time where everything would be consistent as much as close as possible.

- Well, let's go look at 'em.

- All right.

- Randy, here we have five of the collection, plus the one hanging off the timber frame over there.

You have one at your house.

- I do, that.

- And then there is an original.

- There is an original here, right here, close to here, someplace, but anyway, it's, I don't know really the age of it, but it's, as you can see, it is a gargoyle.

I mean, the carving on it is something else.

It's not real delicate or anything like that, then right in the front of it, it's got a great big scroll that comes down in front of him with airspace in between it, and it is, it's a masterpiece.

It really is.

- But these are masterpieces, too, and they're gonna look just great in this setting.

Wow.

How long have you been working on this?

- I believe I started, it's been somewhere between eight and 10 months, the time I started and laid 'em out and started carving on 'em.

It was an almost an everyday job, either an hour or two, couple hours at a time, but then trying to duplicate it each time I went through it.

- Mm-hmm, and a great way to duplicate is put 'em next to each other.

- Put 'em next to each other, keep 'em close by, because what you think you see, if you don't.

I'm a visual person.

I have to see something.

What's up in here, I don't really wanna talk about that.

(both chuckle) But anyway, it's where you can compare if you're gonna try to make.

I can't even duplicate my own work, period.

As far as the detail and stuff, each time you do something, it's a little different.

- Yeah, the wood is different, the grain's different all of a sudden- - Yes, it is.

- In a certain spot.

- Yes, it is.

And this Douglas fir was rough.

It's not something like basswood, which is close grain.

The grain on this runs like, where you can see the ends of it, how long the grains is, and when you go to cross grain with carving, it'll tear on you if you're not careful.

So some of this wood, most of it, not only done manually, it's done also with a grinder or something like this.

- Randy, there are lots of projects here in the Renaissance castle, and another one is this French staircase.

- Yes, yes.

- It's a spiral.

Tell us about it.

- Well, when he first told me about it, it just kind of blew my mind.

It was sitting out in the garage, of course somebody had it stored for him, nasty, dirty and all that stuff, but there was a lot of pieces missing here that had broken out over the years, hadn't been repaired.

This was the only piece right here that was complete, and it's actually, the way I was being described, it's actually another piece in here that's carved the same way, but it's upside down, so it kind of plays on your mind a little bit.

So we had to go in and design, the man that owns this had a computer guy come in and design what could have been in there, so then we took that and take the patterns that we drew up and what he showed me in photographs, lot a lot of photographs, and then went from there to replace the pieces that were missing and try to make 'em look like what came out of there.

To clean this, it was actually done by hand.

Done it with a Scotch-Brite buffing pad on a mandrel to clean the dust and the dirt and the filth off of it without doing any damage to it.

It looked like you wanna pressure wash it.

Well, you couldn't do that.

- Mm-hmm, right.

- That would not treat the wood, as old as that is, it wouldn't take the pressure.

But then come back and try to complete the stain which was on there, not knowing what they used, and just to blend it back in where it looks pretty close, and-- - Well, it looks better than close.

What an amazing project.

And so you've also done some linen fold carving here.

- Yes, I have.

Some of the panels that he had bought or found years and years and years ago, he had to, some of the ends were completely rotted off, so in order to put what he wanted to do in this bedstead, which we're gonna look at, had to cut 'em off and re-carve this end to match that end.

So that was a, then also they were worm eating, worm eaten, so we had to fill and try to contour those as the original, so it turned out real good.

- Definitely a master's work.

Many masters.

- Many masters, and it's a privilege for me to work on this kind of stuff.

I just, it thrills me, because trying to, in my mind, trying to figure out how they did all this stuff with the tools that they had to work.

Some of the tools that we have now, what they had then, they made everything, but they knew what they were doing.

- The craftsmanship.

- Definitely.

- And you do, too.

Well this is really outstanding.

Thank you so much.

- Well, you're more than welcome.

You're more than.

It was a job of love and labor.

- (laughs) That's woodworking, and woodworking will make you smile.

- Oh, yes it will.

- I'm gonna be heading down the road to find a story of another great woodworker.

See you next time on the "Volunteer Woodworker."

(door thuds) (bright cheerful music) (bright cheerful music continues) - [Announcer] "Volunteer Woodworker" is funded in part by.

Since 1970, Whiteside Machine Company has been producing industrial grade router bits in Claremont, North Carolina.

Whiteside makes carbide bits for edge forming, grooving, and CNC application.

Learn more at whitesiderouterbits.com.

Real Milk Paint Company makes VOC-free non-toxic milk paint available in 56 colors.

Milk paint creates a matte wood finish that can be distressed for an antique look.

(gentle music) Good Wood Nashville designs custom furniture and is a supplier of vintage hardwoods.

Keri Price with Keller Williams Realty has been assisting middle Tennessee home buyers and sellers since 2013.

Mayfield Hardwood Lumber, supplying Appalachian hardwoods worldwide.

Anna's Creative Lens, crafters of resin on wood decorative arts.

Visit charlesbrockchairmaker.com for all you need to know about woodworking.

If you'd like to learn even more, free classes and a variety of subjects are available for streaming from charlesbrockchairmaker.com.

(cheerful music) (bright music)