Page 6. MAINE COASTAL NEWS August 2018 '70s Memories: Jack Gilley, Decoy Carver By Lee S. Wilbur “It's interesting you know,” Jack says.
“I can usually tell in a minute's time if someone's serious about buying a bird.” Duck hunters, of which there were
several in the town of Southwest Harbor and along the coast of Maine when I was growing up, needed decoys. Needed the lures, the come hither gesture of “here's a good place to fi nd food or safety, or just plain old “hang out for a while.” As time has passed, and the numbers of hunters has steadily shrunk, decoys have become col- lector's items, a member of whose ranks I became when I would sneak out of a warm bed well before daybreak, drive to the har- bor, unload boat and gear and head out for a local fl yway. Decoys soon became another of my collections (as witnessed by a barn I'm now trying to empty) and one I thor- oughly enjoyed. Having to part with them after these many years is not easy and that's why I have to commiserate with one of my older friends on occasion Jack, lifelong resident of Southwest
Harbor, relative of the well-known bird carver, Wendell Gilley and one of the stars of Pemetic High School's legendary bas- ketball teams, decided several years ago
he needed something more to occupy his time so he opened his decoy and small bird carving shop to the public.. A very personable guy, Jack hunted for much of his life, worked for some 30- odd years in the civilian arm of the US Coast Guard as maintenance of Lighthouses, lifesaving sta- tions, and buoy maintenancy, and did a fair amount of carving, beginning with decoys for his own hunting. As a youngster he'd been impressed by his father, Richard, who carved two sets of decoys for himself: two strings of 8 birds to the string of what we call “Sea Birds” or Eiders, and the other a set of “Coots” or Scoters. With great pride, Jack tells the story of
how he'd just opened the shop to the pub- lic when a gentleman happened by, strolled into the shop, looked around, and spotted one of his Dad's sea birds and remarked, “Now that's a good head on that bird”. They got to talking and the guy said to Jack, “Come out to my car for a minute. I want to show you something.”
Jack went with him and the guy pulled
out from the back fl oor two quite decrepit looking birds. “See those heads. Do you see the resemblance? I just paid two thousand dollars for the pair. And they're probably
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island. 400 tons of precast concrete blocks brought to the island. 600 tons of rock placed behind the new wall. A total of (at least) 1400 tons moved by the 85 foot landing craft. 60 men and women working hard for
30 straight days. Seven days a week. No nonsense. All excellent team work. Can't wait for them to return next June to take on the south sea wall, the pier and the marine railway.
Just need to raise a bunch of money to buy the materials and make it all go! At the middle of the project, June 16 -
18, the plywood forms for creating the con- crete base to hold the many concrete blocks washed away in the high tides. Destroyed. Three days in a row. The Guard was chal- lenged. And they responded. They got the forms built and the base
poured. No excuses. No nonsense. Work harder. As they said at the time: "We will not fail our mission, Sir." Makes us so proud to have been associ-
ated with the men and women of the Maine Army National Guard. And makes us proud to know that our
Army does not allow failure as an option. Great training was certainly provided. For Wood Island Station - an exception-
ally large and strong sea wall will protect the island for decades (centuries?) to come. Can't thank them enough...
KUSTOM STEEL worth quite a bit more.” As many of us male types from South-
west Harbor, Jack fi rst picked up an interest in working with his hands in the manual arts courses at Pemetic High School. Jack from a teacher named Urban Feero Jr, and myself from Stanwood “Les” King who I've mentioned in previous articles. Les and Jack would have been in school about the same time, both being from Manset. Along with the woodworking and other manual arts subjects, Jack made two sets of De- coys, Eiders and Coots as his father had. Found he liked the carving so well that later he started carving smaller birds sometimes tagged as the “song bird' varieties when carving classes became available at the Wendell Gilley Museum here in Southwest.
A few days ago, when I stopped in to
see Jack, and the conversation as ours is prone to do, slipped into “the old days”, we questioned what had become of the vast numbers of coots and Eiders there used to be. We know the Eiders displaced the Coots to a great extent. But then after the Eiders became the predominant birds there were thousands of them that would pour through the “Eastern Way” at sun-up every morn- ing to come in and feed on the mussel beds. That's no longer. See an occasional half dozen or so, but nowhere the numbers as before. And, nowhere near the number of hunters. I guess we're lucky to have a few carvers left like Jack to remind us of those cherished times.
Maine Army National Guard: Wood Island Mission Accomplished!
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