as told by Stella Gerba Gore

Weather-resistance and Painting

After it was completely carved, we loaded it up in Robert's truck and hauled it to Conway, SC, to the treatment plant to be weather-treated. Wakonda stayed there for three days, and while he was there, he got nick-named Mr.Woody. We picked him up on a Friday afternoon and took him back to Rusty Jone's warehouse. Robert and Pauline primed the pole in the warehouse. I primed the wings at my house. Then the three of us started the painting process. The painting process was actually nice because you could really see progress now. This was a good thing because the reunion of 2003 was fast approaching. The wings were sitting in my living room where my family worked around them day by day until I had drawn out the lines for them to be painted. My sister Rose went home with me after work one afternoon and we started painting the wings. It was beginning to look like it was going to take forever. Paul, Cody and Dalton Gore pitched in, and it started to move a little faster. Then out of the clear blue, thank goodness, Robert and Pauline, the diehards, showed up. With a crew like that we made excellent progress, and we were getting excited. Things were moving right along. My children, Cody and Dalton, each painted a beak with Grandma Fleetwood as their supervisor. [See photo series below]

Assembly at Council Circle

Robert picked me up on Friday, August 22nd at 5 p.m. with a trailer behind his truck loaded with his tractor and Wakonda. We were WV bound. That evening after a very long drive, we met Betsy and Dina Cook at Flat Top Lake, and spent the night at Victor Flanagan's. Saturday morning we called Dave Ballard, started across the mountain, stopped at Kirk's for breakfast, and were at camp by 9 am. Dave Ballard and Lynn Maddy were there waiting for us.

(photos of the painting and assembly - click to enlarge)

We took the old pole out, put the new pole in, and touched up the paint.

It took 4 to 5 hours.