On leaving Duluth, we visited Shevaun’s new office at the University of Wisconsin, Superior Campus (on the Wisconsin side of the St Louis River). She is the Chair of the Psychology Department but, ironically, her office features a stand-up computer as she prefers not to sit in her office chair all of the time.

On our way to our next destination in Ohio, we stopped for a night in South Bend, Indiana. Before leaving the next morning, we drove through the campus of the University of Notre Dame. This is a private, Roman Catholic research university with a highly successful (American) football team. Randall was particularly keen to see the huge mural of Jesus with outspread arms that is painted on the side of the main library. Because it can be seen from part of the football stadium and because the pose is similar to the signal that referees use to indicate a certain scoring-play, the image is nicknamed “Touchdown Jesus”.



“Touchdown Jesus”

That afternoon we arrived in Newcomerstown, Ohio, where for a couple of nights we enjoyed the kind hospitality of Randall’s Cousin Alan and his wife Naundice. I had met them once before in Washington State but this was my first trip to their hometown and Randall’s first visit there in about 35 years. The weather was not very cooperative but we were able to walk or run around the rural town between showers. During one such foray, we ran into some more-distant cousins that Randall had never met before. Invited over to the house, it was fun to listen to the stories as the newly-united family members reminisced and worked-out who they knew in common.



Randall with Alan and Naundice (center) and three “new” cousins

Alan and Naundice were happy to give us the family-tour, driving around the countryside pointing out houses in which Alan and his relatives had lived and signs showing the Stocker-family connections. Sadly, the river-side farm on which Randall’s father and Alan’s mother had been raised was no longer in existence, having being erased by a coal strip-mine.



Misty rain across the Ohio countryside



Randall’s family had some long-term influence on this part of Ohio

Newcomerstown is in the part of Ohio that has many Amish communities. The Amish are a group of traditionalist Christian church fellowships with Swiss Anabaptist origins. ("Anabaptist" means "one who baptizes again" which is a reference to those who had been baptized as infants but later adopted a belief in "believer's baptism", and then let themselves again be baptized as adults). Lead by, and named for, Jakob Ammann, the Amish church began in Switzerland in 1693 after a schism within a group of Swiss and Alsatian Anabaptists.

Amish are closely related to, but distinct from, Mennonites, and families from both churches began migrating to America in the early 1700's, first settling in eastern Pennsylvania. In the late 1800's, a large migration of Amish from Switzerland moved into Ohio. Although slow to adopt the English language, almost all Amish now are functionally bilingual in Pennsylvania Dutch and English. The estimated Amish population in the US is 270,000 and growing thanks to large families (average seven children) and an estimated 80% retention rate in the church.

The Amish are known for simple living, plain dress, and reluctance to adopt many conveniences of modern technology such as cars, radios, TV, and the internet. The use of specific farm implements and household conveniences vary by specific church affiliations. We saw one horse and black buggy waiting patiently in a car-park as Alan and Naundice drove us to the Amish town and popular tourist destination of Sugar Creek in Holmes County. The Amish settlement in this county is the largest in America followed by Elkhart, Indiana and Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Knowing our interest in boats they took us to a very unusual exhibition called the David Warther Carvings http://www.warther.org/Carvings.php

Warther's work is a collection of intricately carved miniatures that depict sailing ships from ancient Egypt, around 3000 B.C., to modern times. The collection, now numbering over 80 ship carvings, is a highly educational exhibit of maritime history. Made from antique ivory and ebony wood, the carvings are designed using blueprints and drawings furnished by maritime scholars and researchers worldwide and so are built exactly to scale of the original ships, typically between a scale between 1:144 and 1:216.



David Warther in his workshop seen beyond our tour-guide and part of the collection of ivory boats

Even the looped rigging (ropes) is made from ivory which has been hand-filed to seven thousandths of an inch (0.007") in diameter (0.18 mm). Warther developed this technique for making "ivory threads" at the age of 13, and has perfected it over the years. During our tour of the collection, we met David Warther and he showed us the tools and finished product of this process. Needless to say, the man must possess incredible patience and single-minded drive. His goal is to complete about 100 carvings that will convey the progress man has made in shipbuilding over the past 5,000 years.

Although the carvings are predominantly white, decorations and details of the ship's planking, doors, and windows are added to the highly polished ivory by scrimshawing. Fine lines are scored on the ivory's surface with a hand-held stylus after which ink is applied to the scored surface. The microscopic pores in the scored ivory absorb the ink while the polished areas remain white.

The Elephant tusk ivory David uses for his carvings is classified as antique ivory, meaning that none of it has been harvested specifically for his work. Instead, this ivory is antique material that was collected prior to the ban on ivory harvesting. It is purchased or donated from other museums and from private collections, all within the United States. Warther works closely with U.S. Fish & Wildlife authorities to document the legal origin of the antique material used in his artwork.

Some of the ivory ship carvings are released for traveling exhibitions but Warther does not sell any of them. So apart from entrance fees for exhibitions and sales from the well-stocked gift-shop, ivory carving is not his primary source of income. He told us he makes his living carving pieces from mastodon tusks to make bridges for stringed instruments such as violins. I was not sure which skill sounded more unlikely. Whatever he is doing, it must be quite profitable because the building that houses his main exhibition, workshop, and gift-shop looked very new and well-constructed.



Rocking chairs for sale outside an Amish Restaurant

We finished our tour of Amish Country with a stop to buy gift-packs of delicious local cheese followed by a filling buffet dinner of home-style Amish food. The restaurant also had beautiful, locally-made rocking chairs for sale but it was difficult to see how we could fit one in the Prius or aboard Tregoning.