The roar of the chainsaw drew curious onlookers at last week’s Philomath Frolic and Rodeo as Joey Wallace worked his artistic magic on a piece of wood. His final carving turned out to be something uniquely meta — a wooden chainsaw carved with an actual chainsaw.
“The irony is thick and I’m looking forward to that one,” said Chris Workman, a board member of the Philomath Frolic and Rodeo who asked Wallace to come up from Wilderville, a small town west of Grants Pass, for an appearance at this year’s event.
Wallace, who began his carving journey in Alaska during the 1980s, has spent decades perfecting his craft. What started as a hobby gradually evolved into something more serious. “Eventually, I decided I’d take it on as an occupation and here I am,” he said.
He returned to the Frolic after competing in last year’s chainsaw carving competition. This time, however, he came at Workman’s invitation for a special commission rather than to compete.
“We just paid him a flat fee to come out and carve for us,” Workman said. “Everybody’s been interested and asking about it. I was working at the front gate today (Saturday) and people were asking ‘where’s the chainsaw guy?’ I know a lot of people like watching him and seeing everything come together.”
Wallace crafted the roughly 10-foot-long chainsaw out of red cedar. As 9 o’clock approached Saturday night, the carving remained unfinished and returned the next morning and worked a few more hours to complete the piece.
Wallace has been a regular on the competitive chainsaw carving circuit for over a decade, participating in his first Oregon Chainsaw Carving Championship in Reedsport in 2016. Last year’s Philomath creation — a great blue heron titled “Yin and Yang” featuring two koi fish in the ancient symbol — was auctioned off to the public.
This year’s wooden chainsaw, however, has a different destiny.
“We’re hoping that it ends up in downtown Philomath at some point,” Workman said. “We’ve got to get it finished off and figure out how to mount it and all that, but hopefully within the next month, we’ll have a spot for it downtown.”
So, it seems that residents and visitors to the downtown vicinity will soon be able to admire the ultimate example of form meeting function — a chainsaw that will never cut wood but will forever capture the artistry possible when skill meets imagination.
2. Fireworks ban in Philomath?
In its first meeting since the Fourth of July, the Philomath City Council listened to Mayor Christopher McMorran on Monday night talk about an email he received from a local resident that was urging him to consider the implementation of a ban on all personal fireworks.
The issue sparked some interesting discussion among the councilors.
“I’m writing from my home in Philomath while my neighborhood sounds akin to a war zone with a nonstop cacophony of explosions that have been ongoing for hours, and from previous year’s experience, will continue for hours into the night,” she wrote in the email, which McMorran noted had been sent at 10:21 p.m. on July 4.
McMorran wrote back saying that he understood that fireworks can be distressing for some and expressed some concern about the fire hazards that they pose in the interest of public safety.
“At the same time, I do also want to acknowledge the importance of allowing people to celebrate traditions, and the importance of community gatherings and not bringing the ‘heavy hand of the government’ down when not absolutely necessary.”
A private fireworks ban went into effect not long ago in neighboring Lincoln County. McMorran reached out to mayors over there to listen to some of the experiences they’ve had with bans in place and he received a “mixed bag” of comments. In general, it sounds like a lot of fireworks are still being set off around the county.
McMorran also talked to the Philomath Fire and Rescue board. He said their takeaway was that luckily, there hadn’t been any serious fireworks-related incidents in town as far as they could remember.
“Their conclusion was that they would prefer sort of a more collaborative approach than an outright ban just because they didn’t think an outright ban would necessarily actually be effective and might just end up with people shooting off more dangerous, illegal fireworks,” McMorran said.
One suggestion, he said, was to establish a designated safe fireworks location — such as a parking lot where perhaps a fire crew could even be on site to monitor. McMorran appeared to favor a plan to partner with the fire department to put out more public safety-related messaging ahead of the Fourth of July.
City Councilor Rich Saalsaa, the former deputy fire chief in Philomath who still volunteers for Fire and Rescue as a duty officer and sits on the Police Committee, said he was out on the Fourth going through a neighborhood and his presence alone seemed to have a positive impact. But when he moved on, he could hear things starting up.
“It’s not something that we’re going to be able to resolve, it’s just not,” he said. “People are going to do what they’re going to do in the privacy of their own property.”
Still, Saalsaa said he believes a team approach to messaging should be implemented and he seemed to like the idea of having safe designated places to set off fireworks.
Councilor Diane Crocker said she was sympathetic to those impacted by the loud noises — including those with babies or dogs and those suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. She brought up the idea of limiting fireworks to the Fourth of July only between the hours of 5 and 11 p.m. with certain exceptions (for the Frolic and Rodeo, for example).
Saalsaa pointed out that the only restriction in Oregon is that fireworks sales are restricted to the period between June 23 and July 6. “There are no regulations pertaining to when consumer-legal fireworks may be used,” he said.
In other words, based on the state regulations, people can set off fireworks whenever they want — New Year’s Eve, celebrating a birthday and so on. However, local jurisdictions can implement their own restrictions about when they can be shot off.
City Councilor Spencer Irwin experiences both sides of the issue and wants to represent the majority of what he hears from residents.
“My feeling is that if the expectation is that I represent all the people of Philomath, not just the ones that I strongly agree with one way or the other, if the Fourth was any indication, then a lot of people are big fans of fireworks,” Irwin said.
Irwin added that he agreed with others about focusing on having a presence around safety.
The resident who wrote in suggested that residents watch organized fireworks displays on the Fourth of July, such as the one in neighboring Corvallis.
“It is utterly absurd that this annual tradition of harassing neighborhoods through all hours of the night is allowed. … It is past time we join Lincoln City, Depoe Bay and other towns by banning the use and sale of personal fireworks in Philomath,” she wrote.
Several other comments were shared but in the end, the issue ended up getting referred to the Police Committee where it could be discussed in the coming months for recommendations.
3. ‘A great Philomath moment’
The words in the subhead leading into this column’s third item originated with Mayor Christopher McMorran, who wrote about something that happened a few weeks ago while he was in attendance at the Philomath Farmers’ Market.
On the afternoon of June 29, a vehicle hit an unoccupied van near the farmers’ market, which is set up on Sundays in the Philomath Community Library parking lot near Applegate and South 11th.
According to the incident logs compiled by the Philomath Police Department and Philomath Fire and Rescue, the crash occurred just before 1:15 p.m.
The van that was hit belonged to the Dough Hook Bake Shop, a bakery that has locations in Corvallis and Salem. The crash forced the folks from the bake shop to leave their farmers’ market booth to take care of their vehicle.
“So what did Philomath do? Stepped up and looked out for one another,” McMorran wrote in a social media post. “Several people rushed to the scene of the accident to make sure everyone was OK. Our police and firefighters were on the scene in minutes.”
McMorran said that while this was happening, Janel Lajoie, the farmers’ market manager, and several other vendors stepped in to run the Dough Hook booth.
“Without being asked, folks stepped up to ensure everything kept running smoothly,” McMorran wrote.”This is what Philomath is all about — coming together in community, looking out for one another, and always being our kindest selves. How lucky I am to call this place home.”
Fortunately, there were no injuries. Fire and Rescue did step in to clean up coolant that had leaked onto the road.
The Philomath Farmers’ Market runs from 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Sundays through Oct. 19.
(Brad Fuqua is publisher/editor of the Philomath News. He can be reached at News@PhilomathNews.com).
