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Larry and Linda Harry of Giles County have an abundance of creative juices flowing in their lives. Larry has always enjoyed woodworking. Linda learned the basics of sewing in high school, but is completely self-taught for creating her elves and quilts.
They made so many things, they decided to try selling some at a craft fair. “At our first show many years ago, we came away with $171 and reveled in the success,” Larry says. “We have retired from the shows, exceeding $4,000 a day at the end.” While they may not do the craft fairs any more, each one continues to indulge their imaginative visions in new artistic elves, quilts, furniture and wood carvings.
Linda Harry
Dubbed the Elf Lady and Christmas Queen in her community, Linda relishes crafting elves with expressions and personalities that reflect her vision. “I’ve always liked elves,” she says. “I’m short and relate to them, I suppose, but the ones I found in porcelain lacked personality.”
She found a pattern and decided to try her hand at crafting an elf. “I’m not good at following instructions. I wanted the face to look a certain way, then I wanted each one dressed and accessorized to reflect a unique personality. I might have wanted some of them taller or shorter, fatter or thinner.” So striking out on her own, she developed a system for crafting her elves.
Larry builds a wood base with two upright dowels. The elf’s legs will be made around the dowels, supporting everything else. Often Linda makes the head and face first. She’s apt to revise the face until it matches her concept of who this elf is going to be. With the personality established, she designs and makes the rest of the body and intricate clothing to match. All the plump feet have multiple tips with bells on them.
An elf was a small being in Norse mythology, most commonly in medieval Iceland, and embraced supernatural powers in German folklore. Their popularity lost its steam for a while and returned in popular culture before appearing in the 1823 poem most commonly known as “’Twas the Night before Christmas” where St. Nicholas is “a right jolly old elf.” However, his small helpers took center stage in “The Elves and the Shoemaker,” a collection of fairy tales published by the Brothers Grimm in 1812. All the elves on all the shelves in Linda’s house have names.
Linda has many sewing machines, old ones restored by Larry and newer ones for different sewing projects. “My L-shaped sewing table, right now holding the Jenome sewing machine that I love, was made by Larry. Every time I upgraded to a new machine, Larry made adjustments to the table so everything fit perfectly.” Her favorite is a 1951 vintage Singer for which her husband restored both the machine and cabinet. She switches between sewing machines for a variety of reasons, and loves every one of them – all four dozen or more.
Larry Harry
A little more than 25 years ago when Larry and Linda were camping, they noticed a group of folks doing something. The couple wandered over to find a carving club out of Bluefield at another campsite. “They let us watch and showed us what they were doing. They even gave me a couple little blank wood pieces to try,” recalls Larry. “I’ve always loved the feel of wood, and this interested me.”
Larry has done some form of woodworking all his life. After this encounter, he purchased some carving books, read some of the instructions, looked at the photos. He is especially fond of Tom Wolfe’s books. His first piece was a dolphin, and he went on to carve baseball players, people, boots, animals and all sorts of things in great detail to scale.
“I’ve tried working with pine, walnut, maple and oak, but basswood is the best. Northern basswood is the most desirable carving wood. It grows slower than southern basswood for the colder weather which produces a tighter grain.” The northern variety is very expensive, and Larry happens to have his own supply of southern basswood, the next best wood for carving, growing on his property.
He might stain a piece, paint details, add stripes and a sealer. Many pieces simply have a clear spray so the wood grain is showcased. At craft fairs with Linda, he would sell some ornaments like reindeer, Santa, snowmen and crosses, but he’s probably given away more than he sold. Each is stamped on the back with his name and the year it was made.
Some readers might remember one of the most popular jingles in advertising: I am stuck on Band-Aid® brand, ‘cause Band-Aid’s stuck on me!” Larry knows it well and cannot begin to guess how many hundreds or thousands of Band-Aids have been stuck on him. “But hey, I still have all my fingers and lots of scars.”
He distinguishes readily between whittling and carving. “Whittling is passing time making a pile of shavings, often on a front porch. Carving is intricately crafting something which is easy to recognize.” He has tiptoed into his 80s with steady hands and continues to carve, unless he’s repairing or restoring a sewing machine, reconfiguring one of Linda’s sewing tables or making her elf bases.
Text by Joanne M. Anderson
Photos by Nathan Cooke
Photos by Nathan Cooke
