JONES' CARVING IN ARRAY AT SHOW.Byline: BETTIE RENCORET Senior Columnist PALMDALE - When the Palmdale Gem and Mineral Club presents its third annual Gem Roundup this weekend, the display of Al and Fran Jones will be prominent among the showcases. Al's artistic stone and wood carvings wood carving, as an art form, includes any kind of sculpture in wood, from the decorative bas-relief on small objects to life-size figures in the round, furniture, and architectural decorations. The woods used vary greatly in hardness and grain. include animals, airplanes, stagecoaches, cannons, bolo slides, arrowheads - almost anything he can think of. The gem show runs from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday at the Palmdale Elks Lodge, 2705 E. Ave. Q. ``When we go rock hunting, Al can pick up any old, ordinary-looking rock and envision a carving from it,'' Fran said. ``And he never throws anything away,'' added rockhound Russ Lass, the club vice president. Working in a shop attached to the couple's home, Al says he's partial to howlite, a stark white rock found mostly around Acton. ``See the fine streak of black in this piece?'' said Al, holding up a carved carousel horse. ``I try to bring that out when I start to carve but I have to be very careful. It gives the piece a little more texture but it also weakens the material.'' When he finds a good piece of hardwood, such as ironwood ironwood: see hornbeam. ironwood Any of numerous trees and shrubs, found worldwide, that have exceptionally tough or hard wood useful for timber, fence posts, and tool handles. or black walnut black walnut see juglans nigra. , he loves to turn it into a highly polished dagger-shaped letter opener. They used to be able to dig out to depart; to leave, esp. hastily; decamp. See also: Dig around Edwards Air Force Base Edwards Air Force Base, U.S. military installation, 301,000 acres (121,805 hectares), S Calif., NE of Lancaster; est. 1933. It is one of the largest air force bases in the United States and has the world's longest runway. , said Jones, and 1968 was their best year. ``The deepest we've ever dug down is about 22 feet, but that year we found petrified wood petrified wood Fossil formed by the infiltration of minerals into cavities between and within cells of natural wood, usually by silica (silicon dioxide, SiO2) or calcite (calcium carbonate, CaCO3). at three different levels. About 18 feet is where we usually stop,'' he said. Al puts his all into what he does and finds a lot of enjoyment in the finished product. He said one miniature cannon took him 55 hours. ``The wheels were a project in themselves and then the barrel, and of course, the carriage. It's quite a lot of work making them,'' he said, ``because some of this material is about as hard as a file and has to be cut with a diamond saw.'' On hand in addition to the Joneses will be 11 dealers and 17 tailgate A conversion layer that lets IDE devices connect to the IEEE 1394 Firewire interface. vendors. The show will include tumblers For other meanings, see Tumbler. Tumblers were proposed by Ted Nelson in "Literary Machines" as a means to address every bit ever written, or a particular span of bits in any text ever written. A tumbler is a unique numerical address of an interesting artifact. , grit, vials, hammers, hand burrs (both diamond and metal) and other equipment items for sale. Food will include barbecued beef sandwiches and dutch-oven apple cobbler. Prices will be $3.50 for the barbecued sandwich with three sides, and $2 for the cobbler. There's no fee for parking and entry is free. CAPTION(S): photo Photo: Al and Fran Jones show off some of Al's carvings that will be on display at the upcoming gem show. Al carves by hand and saw in rock and wood he finds in the desert. Bettie Rencoret/Daily News |
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