Experience at Friendship

[Ohioan]

I was at Friendship the day the hurricane blew through.  I left around 1, but I really enjoyed talking to some of the fellers there.  I took my first and only rifle with me, and had lots of compliments, suggestions and constructive criticism.  There were two individuals I enjoyed talking to the most.

I can't remember the first gentlemans name.  He was a short man running one of the rifleing benches at the Gunmakers hall.  I enjoyed talking to him about rifleing, it was the first time I had seen a rifling bench at work.  The gain twist barrel machines were extremely interesting.

The second person, was Wallace Gussler.  Mr. Gussler had about a half dozen original rifles with him.  I walked up to the booth and started casually looking at them.  We small talked a second, and then when I asked him who the builders were, he knew I was interestted in the details of the guns.

He took each rifle down from the rack and showed me the unique features of each rifle.  The carving on a few of those guns was amazing!  One rifle in particular was the finest carving on a rifle I've ever seen.  There were absolutely no tool marks on the gun.

After we had talked for about half an hour he looked my rifle over and gave me some good healthy criticism.  He showed me a few places I should've taken more wood off.  And gave me some hints to improve my carving.  It was amazing that he could look at my carving, and tell me exactly how I did it. 

He did give me a huge compliment, he said I definately had the talent, and with some practice I'd be a great carver.

[Darrin McDonal]

Yep, Wallace is a great guy and loves to help. His life long pal Gary is also a bounty of knowledge and one of the nicest people you'll ever meet. There is more knowledge in all of the teachers and builders than one could hope to remember. You should highly consider going to the NMLRA Gun Building seminars in Bowling Green Ky in June or Conner Prairie. There are others popping up all over now. We are lucky. We will need to be the people who pass on what we learn so this doesn't fade away so it is absolutely vital to learn whats correct.
Darrin

[keweenaw]

Wallace is a great, and often diplomatic, teacher.  When considering whether a piece has tool marks on it, you need to remember than many original rifles have been refinished, including some that Wallace typically has along to show, and that some have quite a lot of finish on them with a 200 year accumulation of patina that can hide quite a lot.  In some cases one has to know how the work was done or have the appropriate light (not the light in a booth at Friendship) to see the tool marks.  I know from past discussions with Wallace that he is fascinated with tool marks for the very reason that they show the tools the maker used and how he used them.  He'll also frequently point out that the highly refined surfaces of the pieces by many contemporary makers is not at all in character with 18th century American pieces.

Tom