Realia Register
for

Wayne Martin, Master Woodcarver Collection

RA2006.4.1
 

Martin, Wayne
Martin, Wade (1920-?)
Wood-carving -- Technique
Wood-carving
Decoration and ornament
Carving (Decorative arts)
Sculpture
Handicraft -- Appalachian region, Southern
Arts and crafts movement -- Appalachian Region, Southern

The carvings, made over a 30 year period, are varying in height, with the tallest figurine measuring 5 inches high.  The carvings depict daily life in rural Appalachia, particularly Western North Carolina and the Swannanoa Valley. Both Wayne Martin and Wade Martin's carvings are well-known nationally, and for years were sold in the Appalachian Craft Shop on Wall Street in Asheville, North Carolina [now closed]. Wade Martin's sculptures were also depicted in Life magazine. The carvings have been described as "a mountain man's piece of imaginative, unaffected folk art." (Maggie Lauterer, Introduction to Wade Martin's Swannanoans).

The sculptures includes documentation, Swannanoan’s Woodcarving Mountaineer Style,(1986) by Wade Hampton Martin, that describes the family and the lives of  both Wayne and Wade Martin. 

Information provided by the donor Miss Annette Ogden Duchein, indicates the carvings are by Wade and Wayne Martin. She also notes that only a few carvings are signed by Wade Martin and that the remaining carvings are unsigned. Tentative appraisal indicates the value may be reduced by the lack of signature. Local appraiser,  Robert Brunk suggests the majority of the work probably represents the work of Wayne Martin. A visit to UNCA by Wayne Martin confirmed this attribution. However, a few of the pieces remain uncertain in their attribution.

Information available concerning the artist is found in the accompanying documentation, and in the Asheville Citizen , Nov. 6, 1977, p. 19-C. The Asheville Citizen  article indicates the donation of Miss Duchein included “42 sets of wood carvings, the whole titled ‘Mountain People,’ which were done over a 30-year period by Wayne and Wade Martin of Black Mountain.” 

The donor, Miss Annette Ogden Duchein is the retired  vice president and director of industrial relations for Spartan Mills and Southern Powell Corp. of Spartanburg, S. C. and the John P. King Manufacturing Co. of Augusta , Ga.. She was the first woman vice president of the American Society for Personnel Administration.

[Assorted wood carvings of pine wood (approx. 93 individual pieces)]  [Art originals] Height varies; tallest figure approx. 5” high.

As a child, Wade, the older brother played around with creating figures out of branch clay, but it never amounted to much. When he was in the army and stationed in Luzon, in the Philippines during World War II, he served as a certified parachutist. He was honorably discharged in 1946. While in the army another soldier got him interested in carving and it was this interest that he brought back from the war and passed on to his siblings. 

On May 3, 1942, Wade Martin married Frances Katherine Stuart Martin. They had two children, Nancy Jo and Bruce Van.

After the war, Wade earned his living with his carving. He sold figurines to the Appalachian Craft Shop on Wall Street in Asheville, and they became very popular, selling out shortly after they arrived. His carvings were featured in Life magazine, as well, and are found in collections nationwide.

Like his brother Wade, Wayne Martin worked at Beacon Blanket Manufacturing Company in Swannanoa. In 1954, Wade Martin started work at Beacon where his father worked, and his younger brother also worked there at different periods in their lives.  Wade Martin retired from Beacon in 1983 as an offset printer. Nicknamed "Gob" by co-workers, he also served as Beacon's Athletic and Recreation Director for seventeen years.

It is through the collected stories, scrapbooks, and the published work of Wade Martin,  that the story of the Martin family of carvers is told. And, it is here that the essence of Wayne Martin and his sources of inspiration may be found.

Wade Martin received his high school equivalency certificate in 1973, and in 1974, he became a deputy sheriff. After this appointment, he commented that he was probably the "only dulcimer playing deputy sheriff on earth!" He had a sense of humor, and one of his many "Happiness is" sayings was "Happiness is: Saving money buying quality Laura Lynn foods and drinks at Ingle's Supermarkets."

In 1986, he finished compiling a handwritten family scrapbook, including pictures, documents, and stories important to the family. Woodcarving, of course, has a prominent role, and the book includes many sketches of carvings Wade and his brothers made over the years. Wade Martin titled the book, Swannanoans: Wood Carving Mountaineer Style and had 1000 copies of the book printed. He sold them for $4 each in Swannanoa businesses.

In addition to being an expert wood carver, Wade Martin was a storyteller. In his scrapbook, he tells a story about how he became such a good carver. Wade grew up with stories of pixies, elves, trolls, "some good, some bad" but had always thought them fairy tales. But in while he was hunting for carving wood in the woods one day just before Christmas, he met "a little old bearded mountaineer man that was about the size of a large ear of corn" holding a fiddle and bow and looking remarkably like his father, Marcus. The man told him, "First let me say you already have God given talents and are gifted. You also have a loyalty and faithfulness to kin folks, friends, and neighbors, and a kindness to nature's creatures, so this gift of a magical Barlowe knife I'm about to give to you is well deserved." Then the magical Barlowe knife and Martin's regular Barlowe blended together into one knife. The little man then started playing "Amazing Grace" on his fiddle and more little people -all miniatures of mountaineers -appeared and started to sing this, the Martin family's favorite hymn. After the hymn, the first man said, "Gather about the woodcarver in family groups and individually, with your hoes, buckets, hammers, Bibles, and so on, and let the impressions the woodcarver has of you be so clear upon his heart and mind that he may use them as models for his future woodcarvings." The little man also gave Martin several commandments: "You will never carve these you have seen here in the likeness of judges, federal or whatever for judges have religeously [sic] persecuted little school children, forbidding them free access their God and Father, and have given aide and comfort to those who wilfully [sic]demean and pervert others, and forced bussed hundreds of little children to their deaths or injury. You shall not carve, because their is not any of this kind among us, murderers, athiests [sic], arsonists, unnaturals, soothsayers, tax assesors [sic], or anything that depicts vulgardiness, and there are not any nude among us,  you must not carve any nude figurines, or craven images, nor idols. Also, your religeous [sic] faith will be in the wooden figurines you carve, and so cannot be otherwise, regardless of the religeous [sic] faith of those who acquire your carvings. This cannot be construed to be disrespectful of, or critical of that persons relegious [sic] faith, and his right to spiritual freedom, for you must never condone relegious [sic] persecution! You must not carve lawyers or scoundrels for obvious reasons, there are not any of them among us, 'tho some lawyers try their best to be honorable in their profession." The little people disappeared, and Martin was left standing in the woods alone. He gathered up the carving wood he had, and returned home. He began carving and, to his astonishment, was able to carve quickly a perfect likeness of the little people he had seen. He carved five mountain men playing a fiddle, five-string banjo, flat top guitar, bass fiddle, and dulcimer. When he put all five pieces together, they cam alive and began to play "the good old mountain music." He sold the pieces at the Appalachian Craft Studies store in Asheville in order to get money for Christmas. Before he left, he looked at the fiddler once more, who "seemed to smile as if to say, 'You've done well, Gob!' Again I was surprised, he had spoken my nickname!"  The Martin family had a happy Christmas that year.

In a footnote to the story, Wade Martin writes, "Even though the story is a dream, I did not carve the kind of figurines that the wee old mountaineer fiddler in the story told me not to carve...and religeous [sic] faith can not be in wooden figurines." Elsewhere, he said, "I never learned to carve, God gifted me."

Both Wayne and Wade Martin were fiercely proud of their heritage and  family. The Martins had their own family hymn, called the "Battle Hymn of the Martins" and sung to the tune of the "Battle Hymn of the Republic." Wade Martin resented outside interference with the mountains and wrote, "if people are happy and contented as they are, those health, welfare and education federal people busy bodies should leave them alone so they can keep on being happy and free." He also composed a poem, "Ode to the Blue Ridge Mountaineer," in which he laments the loss of the mountaineer's pride in his heritage:

"Ode to the Blue Ridge Mountaineer"
Oh! Mountaineer, you prideful, fiercely independent
Blue Ridge son!
Where are you now, in progresses' way?
Where is your hand hewed cabin, hung on a mountain side?
Where are your hound dawg, corn cob pipe and guns?
Where is your backbone and pride?
Are they all gone'd and died?
Are you wiped away by them bulldozer plows?
You know you were in the way of
Them federal road building sons!
Where is your fiddle and bow,
Your dulcimer and old banjo?
Where are these things you made
With your own bare hands?
Why ain't you singing them old
Ballads no more?
Are  you all gone, same as the
Indians went?
Where is your backbone and pride?
Are they all gone'd and died?

In keeping with their musical background and talents, the Martin family had their own family hymn, called the "Battle Hymn of the Martins," sung to the tune of the "Battle Hymn of the Republic." Part of the song follows:

Chorus:
Glory to the name of Martin!
Glory to the name of Martin,
Glory, "Sic itur ad astra!"
The clan goes marching on!

Verse 1:
The Martin clan is mighty -over half a million strong;
In Seventy-Six two thousand kinsmen fought to right a wrong.
Forty towns bear Martin names. Sure, let us sing that song --
The clan goes marching on!

Verse 2:
The House of Martin cherishes traditions of the past,
With the world's great movements they have all their fortunes cast;
And when they pledge their honor they are loyal to the last.
The clan goes marching on!

Verse 4:
John Martin sailed around the world with bold Sir Francis Drake,
Joshua the Governor served for the people's sake.
The Martins do their duty when their honor is at stake.
The clan  goes marching on!

Verse 6:
The Martin sons have courage any enemy to face;
The Martin girls are lovely with their beauty, charm, and grace;
The Marin leaven is a blessing to the human race.
The Clan goes marching on!

Verse 7:
We must prove worthy of our place on Martin Family Tree,
Let Martin standards with the highest in the world agree.
We owe a duty to the generations yet to be.
The clan goes marching on! 

Note: All quotations are taken from Wade Martin's booklet, Swannanoans: Woodcarving Mountaineer Style, 1986. [Used with permission]