Oregon Art Beat; #205; Carousel Museum

What's the year we got home, Red, just in the fog, so... Can't blame him particularly. Whoops. Okay. Okay. Okay.

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I need my hat cloth. I need my hat cloth. I need my hat cloth. I need my hat cloth.

I need my hat cloth. I need my hat cloth. I need my hat cloth.

I need my hat cloth. I need my hat cloth. I need my hat cloth. I need my hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. I need your

hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth.

I need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth.

I need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. I

need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. I need your hat

cloth. I need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. I need your hat cloth. Mom and I talked to him into buying one. I only had option to be a man, a broken pony. Now, subconsciously, I wonder if subconsciously, I wonder if subconsciously, I wonder if subconsciously, we knew each other well. We knew each other well, but when we went to high school we knew each other well, months, rather, I would work at Playland Peer selling hot dogs and cotton candy and those sort of things, which was right across from the carousel, which is where we bought the mound of broken ponies and later on we also got to buy my hometown carousel that I grew up with. Wow. So that was pretty special. So you started out wanting one, it kind of got out of hand, didn't it? Yeah. It's probably gotten out of hand, for sure. I was going to check my way down, it's okay, it was fine, everything's fine. And again,

you started out wanting one horse, right? And now it's gotten way out of hand. Yeah. It did. And when we were in Portland, Duane and I had three operating carousels and the museum started in Portland. And then in about 87, it was after we went to Expo 86 with our big PTC 15 and my son decided to join forces. So now he does the business end of things and manages all the carousels and takes care of the major restoration and gets all that together. Do you know how many horses you've actually restored? I, okay, now restored or refinished. I have restored probably about 45 restored and painted. And then I knew something had to give. So I would rather paint than restore. So then I've painted about

325 or something like that. Wow. After you get one all finished, is it hard to let it go out to back to the car? Yeah, it is. It is. Especially the two big carousels, one is the Burbank, California, that was in Portland for a long time with the museum. And then the PTC 15 that went to Expo that's now in New York. And because they're so grand and so special. And of course you put many, many, many hours into it and I name them all and you know all of that stuff. So yeah, it is, it is tough. And in fact, now I have started, since we now have a permanent museum and what I want to do with a display is have a big picture of all of our operating carousels with an example of what that carousel has on board. Now, why do you think it's important to keep these carousel animals restored? Rest keep that art form

alive. Okay. Well, mainly because they're disappearing so much. But I don't know. I mean, it's nostalgia, it's part of history, it's, and I don't know. It'll be interesting to know that now the people that are growing up with the fiberglass ones, it'll be interesting to know when they get grown up if they have the same memories that we had when we were kids on the old wooden ones. I mean, I don't know. But it brings a lot of nostalgia and good memories. Do you think of it as an art form like sculpture as an art form? It is now, it wasn't when it was created, it was a craft. And you know, the master carver would do the heads, you know, sometimes and different people would do the body or the legs or whatever. But it was a craft then, it wasn't art form, it has become

that because it's such a collector's item now. Are there many people alive today that can do this kind of work? No, they're really, well, I don't think to the degree of what the old masters did. There are very few that really can, I think, compete with them. How did you ever learn how to do restoration? Trial and error, and we tried a lot of different things and a lot of different products until we finally came up with what we liked the best and just the love of it. I guess it's what passion for it. When you choose your paint colors, are you trying for an authentic color or a... No, I don't, a lot of people do. If we had original paint, of course, I wouldn't touch it because it is more valued that way. But to restore

them the way I want to restore them is not harming them at all unless the original paint is being harmed. And so I do it the way I like to do it, the way I feel comfortable with the result. And to do a whole carousel, it's an entirely different thing than just doing a horse. Because I like, I want the whole carousel to look like a unit. I don't want it to just be whatever. So I spend a lot of time working out the whole thing, the animals, the leg positions, the head positions, how they're placed on a carousel like if there's two armors, an arm or one side, an arm or another side, roach mains, whatever. So I like everything in balance and then I do the color scheme as an entire piece which is a challenge and very rewarding. You talk about being rewarding, but to somebody like me, this looks like

incredibly exacting, detailed work. It just has to be done exactly right and takes forever. What keeps it interesting? What keeps it interesting and rewarding? Just the passion of it, I guess. I don't know. Well, to me, to paint a horse, they come alive at that point. They gain a personality. And although I'm just trying to enhance the carver's work, still they become a being more, for me, anyway. Well, maybe that's your answer to this next question, but it is what is your reward? What do you get out of this when you're done? Satisfaction, I guess. And having the way I want them. Okay. You got anything that I didn't ask that you'd like to have? I mean, keeping in mind all the stuff we got from Dwayne. Is there any particular animal here that you would like to talk

about? You know, there has an interesting story. Oh, well, they all have interest in not all of them. This animal is probably one of my very most favorite carvers. It's a loof. Loof is my favorite carver. But this is a tribute to Edward Buff. And when we first got into it and then we learned the loof, he had not been brought up to his stature in the carousel world. And in 1992, someone researched Edward Buff. And he's probably my favorite of all of them that we've got. There's a lot of different animals. You know, I had an ultimate piece that I wanted, which was the hippocampus, the densel hippocampus down in the museum. And that sort of thing. But a lot of the ones that I

like the best are just little inside row horses. They're not fancy. They don't have to be fancy. If they talk to me, if they're something special or something alive or something, I don't know what it is. But that's what I like. That's how I choose the animals I like the best. Okay. I do have one question. You got to talk to Jeff because I'm not here. Yeah. But just describe for us a typical process of you hear about one. Maybe you get a picture of it. You start to get excited. You really want it. But I mean, all the way through, you know, it becomes yours. I assume that there's some real excitement. And you'll never have. I mean, there's no doubt about that. I'm sorry. I was not rolling. It's okay. So just start over. Go ahead. The process of finding. Oh, okay. Sure. There's pieces you always want. Some you can get. Some you can't get. I was able to get my ultimate peace through a lot

of well contacts. And that sort of thing because there aren't very many of them. But a lot of the animals that I really like are little playments. And so you do go after some. And of course you're disappointed in some. But there's always something else that comes along. And you have to realize you're never going to have everything you want. Yeah. I can describe a feeling I had today as we went down to the second basement or something in the carousel. And you go into the back and there are these rows of. Yeah. And some are missing legs. And there's. I mean, it was kind of like there was these rows of patients that nobody was working on. Do you have that feeling? Well, you know, when we started, I was bound to determine. I was going to paint every course in our collection. And of course now there's no way with my time left that that will ever happen. But yeah, there's a lot of courses down there.

I still want to paint. And they're the little plain ones too. But that is quite an impressive. Room down there. Kind of sand in a way, you know, because they're all waiting for the light of day. Yeah, but at least they're waiting. Yeah. You know, they could have been destroyed. They could have been. Because that's what some did happen to them. Because people would burn them or throw them away. Of course, now they're collector's items. But they have a better chance of going back on the carousel and going round and round than most do. Good. What is your ultimate pace? You said you. It was the the denser hippocampus in the museum, the seahorse, the middle seahorse. And there's so many, so many. It's hard to choose now. I really wanted that one bad. And I was very fortunate to get the message to the right

person accidentally so that I found out where it was and what I had to do to get it and that sort of thing. But there's a lot of special pieces. And so many of them have a story on how we did get it or why that's special. So it's pretty hard to pick one. Yeah, yeah. Okay, great. Thanks so much for here. You You

You You do eight to ten coats of your own just to protect it and I don't think there's anybody that doesn't like that. but we don't want to have to do it over again. You know, a lot of people that do the job and they want to be able to come back in five years and touch them up. We don't want to, you know, because we want to go on to

our other things. You're not going to run out of money. No, no, for sure. For sure. And Brad has a location down in Long Beach. She's working with the Urban Company. Well, that big mall. And then they decided they wanted it in the parking lot. But they weren't willing to do a pavilion. We can't have our own living without, you know. So they decided to go fiberglass on that one. But Long Beach, we're going to have one in Long Beach, which will be the one that was up at the Forestry Center, which was our first carousel that we put up. It was important in 1978. And so it was finally getting finished. Portland was a lot of fun. That big guy over there, we just got an auction. And he was in the Ringley Brothers Museum TV. Hi, George. What kind of little? Well, we have her new and sitting

right out there this, but was sitting here until yesterday. At least I got this place cleaned up because you got it. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, we have. This is an old turkey shrub, but this is a new turkey shrub. We have, I don't know, doing to it, but our other son is an architect here in Hood River and he's fortunate, though. A bit architecturally. It's a challenge, though. I suppose that's why we get the big gimbals there. Yeah. Because I don't know if you would know, we don't regret it, but if you guys ever were talking milk, you guys had soft walls on the glass and double the time. Because I guess the house would be a little bit pop on your glass now. Thank you for all the questions. I just noticed that crack right there that I hadn't noticed until the only land. Go ahead. Now, on this side of the floor. Just walk right by me here. Yeah, that's good. Magnificent, you know, like the little...

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.