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July 12, 2009

The Off Season: Shaking hands with Mr. Lincoln

By Mike Lunsford

TERRE HAUTE — On a blistering hot afternoon a few weeks back, my wife and I knocked on the door of sculptor Bill Wolfe’s workshop on the west side of Clinton. We were there to meet Abraham Lincoln.

The 16th president has come to life again in Wolfe’s hands. Now at an Indianapolis foundry being cast in bronze, Wolfe’s Lincoln, all 6 feet, 4 inches of him, stood that day on a small, wooden platform, a piece of half-inch galvanized pipe slipped through his back to act as a temporary spine until he became a man of bronze.

The three of us sat and gabbed and gazed at old Abe in his beardless, pre-presidential days, his huge feet and El Greco hands and flowing topcoat all giving the clay man the attributes of length and power and reality. Wolfe has contracted his Lincoln to be placed on the courthouse square in Marshall, Ill., in this, the 200th anniversary of the great man’s birth. I think Bill is going to miss Lincoln in the days to come; he has spent considerable time talking to him, shaping him, cutting his long legs and tousled hair out of a shapeless gray lump.

To create Lincoln, Wolfe first had to get to know him; he has read extensively about the man and has carefully studied virtually every photograph ever taken of “The Railsplitter,” time-consuming work when one considers that Lincoln was among the most photographed men of his age.

Wolfe is a special man, himself; born in tiny Mecca he spent countless hours playing with and shaping the clay near the old tile plant there — his father worked at the factory — along Raccoon Creek, using his imagination to make his first sculptures. Staying on his grandparents’ farm near Coxville and Tick Ridge was also an integral part of Wolfe’s childhood. His family eventually moved to Clinton when Wolfe’s father changed jobs; the artist now lives near West Terre Haute.

Lincoln, of course, has been immortalized in bronze and stone countless times. From Daniel Chester French’s seated Lincoln at the Lincoln Memorial to Gutzon Borglum’s titanic face on Mount Rushmore to George Grey Barnard’s controversial 11-foot bronze — “Artworld” called it a “stoop-shouldered, consumptive-chested, chimpanzee-headed, lumpy-footed, giraffe-necked, grimy-fingered, clod-hopper…” — each sculptor’s vision of the man has differences. Wolfe’s vision is his own.

“I want to show the younger lawyer Lincoln, papers in hand, stoic, but at certain angles he is in movement … maybe heading to the Marshall courthouse, where he was involved in a couple of trials,” Wolfe says. “I am mostly impressed with his intelligence, being primarily self-taught from such simple Midwestern beginnings. He was also compassionate for his fellow man.”

Wolfe has had Lincoln in mind for some time. “Since I started sculpting, I have always wanted to do a model of Abraham Lincoln. Just about any figurative sculptor feels the same. I have always judged the level of other sculptors by how good their Lincoln sculptures are. Lincoln has a unique, distinct face. His bravery, concern, compassion, and the weight of the world on his shoulders … all that shows on his face,” he says.

“My grandmother started me drawing when I was 4 years old,” Wolfe added. “Spending summers in the woods in Parke County and getting clay from the creek was great for me. There were no toys; I was just being creative with what was available.”

Before we knew it, a couple hours had passed. But before we left that evening, Bill pinched a small bit of clay from a brick of the stuff that lay on a worktable. He handed it to me in a ball and told me to roll it between my thumb and forefinger to make a thin soft thread. I wasn’t quite sure what he had in mind, but through that simple act alone, I think Bill could tell he wasn’t working with Frederick Remington.

I did as I was told, and when the 2-inch worm of clay was apparently ready, Wolfe asked me to step toward his Lincoln and place it on top of the sculpture’s right hand, then to connect it into one of the veins he’d made for Abe.

“Okay, flatten it out some,” he said, showing me how to rub and shape the clay into something more broad and believable. “Run your fingers over your forehead and get a little of the sweat and oil from your face to work into the clay,” Bill said.

When I had finished, a bit feverish in the knowledge that I could have destroyed something Bill had worked on for months, I stepped back to see the top of Abraham Lincoln’s hand, and I had a hand in making it. It was the final detail to be completed on the piece, and Bill had given me the honor of doing the job.

If you happen to make it to Marshall someday to see the statue of our greatest president on display, remember: It is my vein that runs in Lincoln’s right hand. But make no mistake about it; all the rest was done by Bill Wolfe.



Mike Lunsford can be reached at hickory913@aol.com or through regular mail c/o the Tribune-Star, P.O. Box 149, Terre Haute, IN 47808. Visit Mike’s Web site at www.mikelunsford.com. His second book, “Sidelines: The Best of the Basketball Stories…” is due to be released in the fall.

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