4 minute read
PEACH SEEDS COME TO LIFE
By Elizabeth Shane
Culleoka resident, Roger Smith, has a very unusual talent of carving peach seeds that started in the late 1960s when he retired from the Marines Corps. Smith began making carvings from peach seeds as a hobby, but it quickly became an avenue for making new friends as well as becoming a business venture.
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Smith has always had a pocketknife with him and one day he ate a peach and started carving a pig, the first thing he ever made from a peach seed. “For a long time, I just made pigs and then through trial and error I thought I would try something else and expanded to making dogs and anything else that came to mind. I haven’t made everything, but I have made quite a few different creatures over the years,” Smith explained. Peach seed carvings takes a great deal of time and patience to complete usually taking 4 to 8 hours per piece.
Over the years Smith has transformed peach seeds into just about everything from animals, villages or towns, and people to an entire baseball stadium with players, spectators, and cars. All he uses to make his carvings are peach seeds (of which he has thousands that have been given to him), knives, sandpaper and for the finishing touches, he uses acrylic paints to bring the creations to life.
In 1987, Smith’s carvings caught the attention of Renee Elders, a writer for The Nashville Tennessean. After participating in the Maury County Fair in Columbia, Elders published an article that brought attention to Smith’s peach seed carvings that led to his participation in various art exhibits in Tennessee, Missouri, and Michigan. In fact, in 1993, Smith was invited to participate in Christmas at the White House where his “peach seed” Santa was displayed on the Christmas tree and became part of the White House collection. Copies of his work were also sent to the AfroAmerican Museum and Cultural Center in Wilberforce, Ohio, and a set of Smith’s pigs carvings became a permanent collection of the Tennessee State Museum in 2001. Although not currently on display, his carvings are a part of the Tennessee State Museum’s archived inventory.
Smith has also appeared on three local television segments Tennessee Traveler, Tennessee Crossroads, and Lifestyles and in 2006, he was a guest crafter on the Delta Queen Steamboat Cruise. Later in 2012, his carvings were displayed at the Tullahoma Fine Arts Center’s exhibit showcasing local artists. That year Smith was also featured in two books; Tradition: Tennessee Lives and Legacies, by Robert Cogswell, which was on tour around the state of Tennessee through 2013, and Weird Tennessee, by Roger Manley, which highlights local persons of interest throughout Tennessee. Smith even has a photo of his carvings of The Fairfield Four, a gospel group, featured on their Revival CD. FOR A LONG TIME, I JUST MADE PIGS AND THEN, THROUGH TRIAL AND ERROR, I THOUGHT I WOULD TRY SOMETHING ELSE AND EXPANDED TO MAKING DOGS AND ANYTHING ELSE THAT CAME TO MIND.
Peach seeds are like people and come in all shapes and sizes. Any peach seed can be transformed into something that before only existed in Smith’s imagination. As he said, “The secret is to get everything in the proper proportion. I use my memory to create my inspirations. I don't ever have a picture to go back — everything is from root memory. I just look at things and make the details, from giraffes to kangaroos or rabbit and hummingbirds, it’s all in my memory.”
One of Smith’s grander projects, and one he is most proud of, is his “Holy Peach Seed Church” carving. The intricate church carvings took almost four years to complete and were finally finished in 2017. There are almost 100 people carvings enclosed in a church with stained glass windows and a clear roof for viewing, more than two dozen cars parked outside, and a few trees along the perimeter all carved from peach seeds. Smith smiled and said, “My inspiration for the church was it was going to be the last thing I ever made.” Although that was “supposed” to be his last project, at 77 years old, Smith to this day continues to carve and recently started carving little donkeys to add to his repertoire. n
