Rodney C. Richard, Sr. (1929-2015)

FARMINGTON – Rodney C. Richard, Sr., one of Maine’s finest traditional artists, died peacefully in his sleep, surrounded by his family, on April 14, 2015, in Farmington.

Born on Nov. 13, 1929, to William J. and Abbie (Calden) Richard of Phillips, he dedicated his life to his family and to the preservation of his logging heritage in the western Maine mountains.

After graduation from Phillips High School in 1948, he worked in the woods with his father and other local men. A forward thinker, he bought the first chain saw in the Phillips area, an IEL Pioneer. He entered the United States Army in 1951 during the Korean War and served in both the United States and Germany. He took leave to marry his sweetheart, Lucille Haley, on Sept. 20, 1951, in Rangeley.

After his Army service, he and Mrs. Richard settled in Rangeley. Mr. Richard worked in the woods, cutting and hauling with horses. Then, in 1954, he bought a second-hand John Deere MC crawler tractor. In 1964, he began working on roads for Brown Company, at first, sanding them. Then, he began his own gravel business for roads work. In 1965, he bought his first skidder. He worked with Seven Islands for three years beginning in 1977 in their experimental logging program, thinning woodlots. In 1978, he sold his gravel business and went into logging full-time, helped by his sons and local men such as Earl Ross. In 1990, after selling much of his larger equipment in 1986, he retired from logging.

For Mr. Richard, the cultural history of logging in western Maine was a vital concern, and he worked to share it with others. In 1979, with a group of friends, relatives, and fellow loggers, he founded the Rangeley Lakes Region Logging Museum. He had begun thinking about a museum, though, in the 1960s; and he collected the first item for it, a snubbing machine, in 1968 when a Brown Company foreman was about to pitch the machine over a bank. He kept adding to his collection, storing everything at home until donations and hard work made it possible to begin building the Museum in Dallas Plantation in 1988. The Logging Festival and parade that he and Museum volunteers began grew to the largest event in Rangeley.

Mr. Richard’s traditional wood carving grew seamlessly out of his life’s experiences. Mr. Richard learned to carve from his father, William, a woodsman and a master artist who carved tools, toys, and the rare, traditional sculptures known as fan towers. Young Rodney carved his own toys, and more, with a jackknife. His first chain saw sculpture was a beaver, meant to entertain his lively group of Boy Scouts on a camping trip along the Kennebago River. He went on to carve almost everything he was asked to do: bears, squirrels, beavers, cougars, dogs, snow machines, fishermen, and much, much more. Maine black bears, though, was his specialty, and he carved them in an array of poses: standing, dancing, sniffing the air, and more. “Anything I can imagine in my mind,” he often said, “I can put in the wood.” His carvings grace the streets and gathering places in the Rangeley region: his “Bear” greets customers at Parkside & Main Restaurant, for example, and his “Good Shepherd” welcomes worshippers to the Church of the Good Shepherd. Above all, his “Bear Chasing a Man up a Tree” that hangs on the balm-of-gilead tree in the yard of his family’s home is a Rangeley landmark.

His carvings are displayed throughout the United States. His “Fisherman Looking Out to Sea,” for example, stands in Point Park, Joppatown, Maryland; his “Minuteman” stands at attention in the National Guard Armory in Asheville, North Carolina; and his “Virgin Mary” graces the St. John of Vienno Church on Vashon Island, Washington.

Mr. Richard delighted strangers and friends by giving away his trademark “bunnies,” hand-carved rabbits about one-half-inch in size. “Do something nice for someone else,” he would say, “that will take you about 10 minutes”—just the time it took him to make one rabbit. He gave away well over 30,000 bunnies. He and his family set up the “Mad Whittler Shop on their Main Street property and warmly welcomed many Rangeley visitors there, sharing history and stories of the woods.

Mr. Richard’s art received national and international recognition. He was invited three times to the Smithsonian Institution’s Folklife Festival on the National Mall in Washington, DC: 1976, 1983, and 2005. He also carved at the National Folk Festival in Lowell, Mass.; the Northwest Folk Festival in Seattle; the International Folk Festival in Archangel, Russia; and the 1993 inauguration of President Bill Clinton. Mr. Richard’s work has appeared nationally in museum exhibits in Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington, DC, and internationally in Romania, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Russia, and Poland. He exhibited for the Stihl Company in 1980, and a year later, he changed to Poulan. He has been the subject of numerous articles, and is the subject of a book, in progress.

In 1987, Mr. Richard received the first Marshall Dodge Traditional Artist Award at the Maine Festival for promoting traditional arts in Maine. Ten years later, he received the Governor’s Service Award: Roll of Honor for Volunteerism. In 1993 and 2001, the Maine Arts Commission awarded him the Maine Traditional Arts Apprenticeship, and he worked with his son, wood carver Rodney, Jr.

A generous citizen of Rangeley and beyond, he founded the Mad Whittler Scholarship in 1983 and donated money to a Rangeley Regional School graduate to further their education; the first recipient was John Fitzgerald. A major supporter of The Giving Tree, he carved the angel for the first year’s event in honor of his former niece Mary Ellen Richardson in 1988. Mr. Richard also belonged to American Legion Post 120 and led Boy Scout Troop 579 for many years. He served on the Traditional Arts Advisory panel of the Maine Arts Commission. Fond of teaching, he demonstrated carving and spoke in many school and college classrooms from Maine to Virginia. Many other woodcarvers and traditional artists, such as poet Gaylon “Jeep” Wilcox of Rangeley, consider Mr. Richard a mentor and source of inspiration.

Mr. Richard enjoyed life in the mountains. He was an avid downhill skier and a passionate golfer. He also spent many happy days fishing, hunting, and camping; and he loved to visit with friends over games of bingo and cribbage.

Mr. Richard was predeceased by his wife of 55 years, Lucille (Haley) Richard, and by his brothers Allan Richard of Mexico and Mortimer Richard of Phillips. He is survived by his sons: Rodney C. Richard, Jr., and his wife Lenita of Pownal; John Richard of Rangeley; and Stephen Richard and his companion, Mary Garboski, of Rangeley; his brother Lewis Richard and his sister Winona (Richard) Davenport, both of Phillips, and his sister-in-law Jennie (McLafferty) Richard of Mexico; his many close friends all over the world; and his many, dear young friends who were like grandchildren to him, especially Meredith and David Hunter of Milton, Mass.

Tributes and condolences may be shared by visiting www.wilesrc.com.

Relatives and friends are invited to call, Friday, April 17 from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. from the Church of the Good Shepherd (upper chapel), 2614 Main St., Rangeley, ME 04970. Funeral services will be held Saturday, April 18 at 1 p.m. from the Church of the Good Shepherd in Rangeley. Interment with full military honors will take place on Saturday, May 30 at 10 a.m. at Evergreen Cemetery in Rangeley.

In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be made to these charities: Church of the Good Shepherd, Episcopal, Rangeley (P.O. Box 156, Rangeley, ME 04970); Rangeley Region Health Appointment Transportation Program (RRHAT, Town of Rangeley, 15 School St., Rangeley, ME 04970); and Golf Opportunities for Children (c/o Skowhegan Savings Bank, 124 Main St., Phillips, ME 04966).

Funeral services are being cared for and provided by Wiles Remembrance Center, 137 Farmington Falls Rd., Farmington, ME 04938.