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Carroll County artisan Delbert Weteska hails from
Wisconsin, originally. From there, his grandfather, Gregory
Weteska, moved his family to the more southerly region of
Chicago when Delbert was a boy. Gregory had earlier changed
the family surname from "Vteska" to the more manageable "Weteska."
Delbert was among eleven children born to Fred and Juanita
Weteska. He attended the Motley and Carpenter schools in
Chicago, but says his early education was largely fruitless.
"I didn't learn nothing up there; they wouldn't take the time
to teach me," he says, his voice reflecting the frustration
and anxiety of those early years despite the fact he turned 63
on December 11.
But he speaks more forcefully with pride-tinged words upon
recalling how, in Tennessee, where his grandfather had
purchased a farm in the wilds of the county between Huntingdon
and McKenzie, Gregory's love and patience had paid off.
"When I came here my grandfather took time out of the Bible to
teach me and I learned to read and write," he says with tilted
head and a set to his jaw that, perhaps, echoes his
determination during those years long past.
He struggles to rise, still reeling from injuries sustained in
a car wreck three weeks ago, using a walker to navigate, with
broken leg, the confines of the home he inherited from his
grandfather. Once up, he locates a black and white photograph
of Gregory Weteska--taken at a time when the man smiling from
the picture was likely half Delbert's age--and wedges it into
the corner of a landscape hanging on the wall. Back in his
recliner, he gazes at the photo and muses that his grandfather
had read an advertisement for the Carroll County farm in an
agriculture magazine, had visited the farm to consider the
purchase, and made it.
Delbert was 14 years old when the elder Weteska began teaching
him to work with wood, a medium in which his hands found a
kinship so keen that he soon went from shaving wood into ax,
pick and other implement handles to coaxing scenes from rough
slabs of wood. He carved land and seascapes with chisels and
the power of his own hands and arms and back: it's not easy to
breach the grain of wood to bring forth the three-dimensional
scenes.
"I just picked it up and went ahead and done it and was amazed
at what I did," Delbert recalls. His earliest artistic efforts
were watercolor paintings, the first a farmhouse scene into
which he also painted his dog. Soon, he began carving the
scenes before applying the paint.
He wore out the cheap chisels he started with, wearing the
edge down to nubs. Then, his sister presented him with a
quality set that stood him in good stead over years of work.
Weteska's skill has wrought masterpieces--scenes with
mountains, buildings and skies with clouds, lighthouses, ships
sailing far away seas--including one that fetched $5,000 from
a New York couple who recognized the value of the hand-hewn
piece. Weteska recalls the scene, carved into a great slab of
cedar, featured a mansion on a hill, surrounded by a picket
fence, and a horse-drawn carriage. Weteska had detailed the
carving with chickens, pigs, birds and a cloudy sky. It took
him a year and a half to complete the work of art.
"Boy, that thing was gorgeous," he recalls.
In fact, many of Weteska's creations took form over long
periods of time. And commonly, when the scene was painstakenly
completed, he would gift the item to family members or
friends, leaving few items for himself. In his home, a carving
of sailboats graces one wall while on other walls hang several
Weteska paintings. Then there's a round, floral rimmed carving
in the center of which a red heart provides a frame for a
photograph of Weteska's nieces. The rest he has given away,
save for a few pieces still in progress.
Weteska is unsure how long it may take him to complete the
works, hand drawn and lightly roughed out, including one long
board that depicts the penciled-in figures of the Last Supper;
arthritis has taken its toll on his fingers and his labor of
love has gained an added, dissuasive element of pain.
"I hurt all the time," he says, flexing his hand. "I try to
hold the chisel and I just drop it."
He tried a dremel tool, however, he says miserably, for him,
"it didn't want to work."
His creative bent has found some refuge in another art form
he's practiced over the years--crocheting. A beautiful, blue
ripple design lies over the back of one sofa that, he says
proudly, is seven feet long. It's one of 36 afghans he's
crafted over the years, in addition to other crocheted
creations.
Weteska is also a devil on the dance floor. His favorite
recreation finds expression on the floor of "The Barn" in
Trezevant, where country dancing takes place every Saturday
evening at 7 p.m.
"The gals can't wait 'til I get there," he grins. He enjoys
his deserved reputation as one of the best dancers at the
establishment, declaring the women tell him, "You're the best
dancer out here."
"Even the guys say, 'Man, you can dance; I've never seen moves
like you put on,'" he says.
He learned how to dance while still up north, recalling the
Polka and Italian and Greek dances were popular under the
banner of the big band sounds.
But Weteska's dancing days are over, at least until he
recovers from his ailments.
"I ain't good for nothing now," he says, but laughs at how he
"hobbles around like a turkey without a head."
Until December 28, one of his seven brothers was down from
Chicago to lend a hand, helping him through the cold days of
the region's recent ice and snow storm, building fires in the
wood stove which Delbert must now feed himself, despite the
handicap of his walker.
Delbert chuckles, asserting he and his brother are the same
age, his brother having been born in January.
"We catch up to each other," he says, "then he gets older,
then I catch up again and we're twins."
Now alone and with no close neighbors on Futrell Road, Delbert
fends for his own nourishment needs and those of his pretty,
copper colored pup, Buster Brown, who happily greets visitors
with wagging tail and is kind enough not to jump.
Weteska never married--"I was smart," he grins--and has no
children. Now retired, he has been a truck driver and mechanic
as well as a farm hand and wood cutter in years past.
His hope is to recover quickly from his injuries so that he
can pick up where he left off with his carving and crochet and
resume his daily chores.
In the meantime, he recounts friends from the dance hall who
have called to wish him well - Margie, Ruth, Dave, Sylvia...
"They said they miss me," he says, looking forward to getting
through the weeks of recuperation, when he can once again
arrive smiling at The Barn in Trezevant and give the girls a
whirl around the dance floor.
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