Purdey has reinvented Damascus, using a process I don’t even pretend to understand. From Michael Yardley’s site: “Powder steels have around twice the fracture strength of normal steels. The molten steel from the refining furnace runs into a nitrogen-filled vacuum chamber. In the chamber powerful gas beams atomize the alloy into a fine powder. The… …
Tag: Art
Seton and Vadim Gorbatov
Vadim acknowledged Seton as an influence before he ever visited us in NM. When a Korean publisher asked him to do a version of Seton’s Lobo, the story of a youthful Seton’s capture of a notorious cattle- killing wolf in late 19th century New Mexico, we sent background images to him in Moscow. He in …
Weaselry & Seton &…
Self- perpetuating thread on Twitter & more re weasel tenacity, skulls, more– see here. Ernest Thompson Seton, childhood influence on me & RT Peterson & Gorbatov & more, born in Canada, trapped wolves in NM, had a Leopoldian change of heart, died in Santa Fe. He combined art science & whimsy in ways I miss. …
Scupture- in- progress
What my friend, Albuquerque sculptor and naturalist Sarah Madigan Keenan is making of a Barbary falcon killed many years ago… And another example:
An Older Man’s Tale
My father and his, about 1923: When the young artist returned from the war with his fancy New Mexico pointer and his already antique car, his father told him to take his rich man’s dog and car and get them out of his house. Remember that grand car? After flying those missions over Germany Joe …
A young man’s tale: part one?
Libby’s boss Greg and I share a certain nostalgia for fine old cars. Today he showed me a magazine– Classic Auto I think—- and a picture of a thirties vintage Cadillac V16 roadster brought back a tale from my father’s youth… A young man, the son of immigrants, was an artist of real talent and …
Illustrations
The kind of things I might use in the book of 100. Covers are obvious, and will obviously be the majority, but here are a few other ideas. From the top: a couple of “twofers”; a letter from Angus Cameron to Jack O’Connor, both in it, on Jack’s New Yorker review (for the Rifle Book!), …
Figured Maple
Everyone (who reads this blog anyway) is familiar with figured walnut. But figured maple has even prettier patterns if not warm color, and only needs staining. It was used in Pennsylvania- Kentucky rifles and at least one early Purdey. A friend back east is currently stocking a Ruger #1 with an astonishing piece:
Framed Vadim
The new frames are finally done — here’s the latest rotation in the library. Click once right and again for biggest…
Dream Gun Meme
At Atomic Nerds, LabRat has posted her sensible choices for an Interweb “meme” that in my over- busyness I didn’t even know was circulating: Five Dream Guns. Once I would have gasped “only five?” Now I like the idea of having a few well- used, high- quality Good Guns. I should postulate also that I …