Flint Ridge Knap-in....report

[Teacher_of_the_Arcane]

Hi All,

My buddy Mike and I made the trip west just the other side of Zanesville, Ohio to Flint Ridge State Park for the Flint Ridge Knap-in this past weekend.  We drove over on Friday, and were at the festivities just as they opened on Saturday morning.  There were all varieties of "stone people" there.  I found a gent (neolithics.com) who was selling "rock", and just so happen to have some English gun flint.  For a few dollars I acquired enough raw flint to keep my .54 caliber muzzleloader going for the rest of my shooting career!  There were vendors who had all the different tools (flintknappingtools.com) you could ever need for knapping, from small billets for doing fine work, to solid copper ingots to smash open any flint nodule!  Rubber pads for holding rock in your hand while pressure flaking, copper nails of all sizes to make pressure flaking tools, hand held flaking tools, and 'Ishi sticks' that are held under the arm.  You name it, and some one had it for sale.

There was a fellow who does miniture points.... literally flaked, knapped arrowheads as small as 1mm. He uses a 10x binocular microscope to see his work while knapping, and uses pressure flaking tools that have points like carpet tacks.

There were "lithic artist" who had all kinds of arrow heads, knives, and blades for sale, along with a wide variety of stone art. Many of the points were made from fancy stone in a rainbow of colors. The artsy things would be mounted under glass for display purposes, but if you wanted to spend $25 for a flaked jasper clovis point to hunt deer with, it was there!

There were also a couple of guys with osage self bow blanks available, and if you hung around long enough, they'd step up to their portable bench and work out a bow, all the while talking about what they were doing.

Mike and I were listening to and watching a seminar on knapping and flaking done by a fellow named Danny Roush (ancientconnection.com/RoushKnives.html) and as he came to the end of his hour of alloted time, we wandered over and struck up a conversation.  Consequently, we were invited to his pavillion for some chit-chat and instruction.  We ended up spending two or three hours with Danny as he knapped, and flaked three pieces explaining exactly what he was doing, and answering questions as he went.  (Mike has done some knapping for several years, but I'm a tyro!) To put this into perspective, imagine that you're new to playing guitar and had the chance to spend three hours with Eric Clapton and get a lesson!!

We were fortunate that the Ohio Atlatl Association was also there for the weekend, and got to see and talk to a bunch of those guys. As it turns out the World Atlatl Champion, Mark Bracken, was there.  Cool stuff!!

The only down side we had was getting caught in road repair traffic on I-70 between Washington, Pennsylvania, and Wheeling, West Virginia on Friday night.  It took right at three hours to travel a twelve mile section of Interstate, and doubled our travel time to the event.  We'll know better next year!! We're talking about taking a tent and spending the weekend!

All the best, Brothers!

[Osagetree]

I went a few years ago and met up with 4runr. It was a good show but nothing was cheap. But a fun time all around anyhow!

Thanks for sharing your trip.

Oh,, I did bring home black lab pup during my visit.

[Teacher_of_the_Arcane]

Mr. Tree,

I bought one DVD, and was given a second, bought a bucket of good knapping flint for $45, and got a second bucket for $15.  There were a few bargains to be had if you looked quietly!    :D  

There were a handful of dogs around, but I didn't see any that were available!  My wife gave me the jaundiced eye for buying two buckets of rocks.....after  all there are a lot of rocks in West Virginia.....I'd have been in Dutch if I'd come home with a pup!