PROFILE

CARVER
BRINGS
WOOD
TO LIFE.
For Spencer Tinkham, it is his life.

by JOANNE KIMBERLIN
photography by KEITH LANPHER
 T
Tucked away in Norfolk’s Algonquin Park, the lights of a workshop glow in really like the character and age – things that once crayons instead. But drawing what he saw wasn’t His original armada sank. So did the second.
the dark. Most of the neighbors have called it a day. Not Spencer Tinkham. At had a life of their own. They’ve just got an edge, you enough. He started whittling soap, raiding the fam- And the third. Maybe even the fourth.
24 years old, he’s got plenty of energy. He’s also obsessed. Busy evolving. know?” ily bathrooms for supplies. “Working decoys have to stay upright and float,”
To call Tinkham a woodcarver sells him short, though the ribbons and Tinkham loves the outdoors and having a small “Every shower was fair game,” Tinkham says. “I he laughs. “I had a lot to learn.”
plaques that crowd his walls attest to his skills with duck decoys – including two hand in cleaning up the waterways. He grew up wanted 3-D – something I could hold in my hand.” In summers, he carved out on a pier; in win-
first-place wins in the youth division of the Ward World Championship Wild- duck hunting with his father and grandfather on He moved on to scrap wood and made his first ters, on the back porch. Year-round, he carved in
fowl Carving Competition in Ocean City, Maryland. Back Bay and the Eastern Shore, and fishing the riv- real piece at 8 years old – a palm-sized mallard his dreams.
These days, those are just sweet spots on his resume. Birds remain Tinkham’s ers and creeks with his younger brother, Clay. carved with a Swiss Army knife given to him by his “I couldn’t stop. I wanted to keep getting better.
mainstay, but he’s spread his wings beyond competition-grade carving. The boy “I don’t hunt much anymore – it’s more about grandfather, Jim Tinkham. I’d think about it on the drive to school. And in
wonder is now a conservation-minded sculptor – prowling shorelines and yards birding now – but hunting gave me a chance to real- “He encouraged me to keep going, to make school. And in bed. ‘Do I want him feeding or strik-
for the kinds of things most people would haul to the dump: a chunk of worm- ly see everything up close. The details of every feath- some full-sized decoys we could hunt over.” ing or getting ready to fly? How do I do it? What’s
holed wood, a curiously crooked branch, a collapsed chicken coop. er and how they all fit together; the scoop of a wing, But his grandfather, sick with cancer, died be- the next step?’ ”
Junk art? No way. Hand carving, precise joinery and intricate finishing meld the colors. Everyone else would still be hunting and fore those first decoys were done. In search of mentors and feedback – he didn’t
flotsam into elegant, lifelike creatures that sell for as much as $3,000. An almost- I’d be behind the duck blind studying anatomy.” “I didn’t feel like I got to say goodbye to him. know any other carvers – Tinkham began entering
done sandhill crane seems ready to leap off Tinkham’s work table. There’s no Television and video games were scarce in his I think I kept working on those decoys as a way to decoy competitions. They’re popular around the
hint that its spindly legs were made from washed-up welding rods. childhood. Jeff Tinkham, an attorney, and Denise, feel closer to him – like we were continuing our con- Chesapeake Bay, Great Lakes, Massachusetts and
“It would probably be easier just to go buy the stuff I use,” he says, “but I a private school teacher, gave their boys books and versation.” other waterfowl meccas. Collecting is big business.

Spencer Tinkham's passion for carving has eclipsed his degree in economics from Baylor. As a boy, Tinkham carved, using a knife from his grandfather and sometimes studying anatomy
60 SPRING 2017 Often he uses trash he's gleaned from the shore, and studies old pieces to develop paints and finishes. during hunts, behind the duck blind. Now he sees his direction: carving combined with conservation. DISTINCTIONHR.COM 61
 Two decoys by master carver Elmer Crowell sold for
$1 million each in 2007.
“I figured the best way to learn was to have judges tell
me what I was doing wrong,” Tinkham says.
He listened. And started winning and selling. But carv-
ing still seemed like just a “nice hobby,” he says. “There’s a
lot of starving artists.”
After graduating from Norfolk Collegiate, he headed to
Baylor University in Texas. Armed with an academic schol-
arship, he earned a degree in economics, figuring it would
lead to a “real adult job.”
“But I’d carved every summer through college. And I
went right back to it as soon as I graduated last December.
No class ever lit any other fire.”
Now, he’s surrendered, deciding that this window –
while he’s still living with his parents – is the best time to
see if a carver can depend on his craft. He recently became
engaged. The pressure is on to make a living.
His parents want him to take the shot.
“How many people find their life’s passion at 8 years
old?” his mother says. “It’s amazing. Where I see firewood,
he sees a bird head. He’s been dragging stuff home forever.”
Much of it’s been trash – litter he couldn’t stand to leave
where he found it blighting the banks. But some objects he
Leather salvaged from a car is the crest above left; a pitchfork tine, the bill at right. The owl opposite
62 SPRING 2017 is a favorite of Tinkham’s mother. Its beak was a snapping turtle’s claw; its body, part of a telephone pole.
squirreled away.
“The weathering on an old piece of wood just fascinates
me,” he says. “What the salt and sun and tide do to it. The
cracks and holes and textures. It’s beautiful. One day it hit
me: I could combine conservation and carving. I feel like
I’ve only recently found my direction.”
Finishes are one of his specialties. He studies old decoys
and antique patinas to capture their mellowed look, mixing
his oil paints from raw pigment powder. Completed pieces,
signed with a distinctive “TINK,” move from workshop
to house, where herons and godwits and curlews occupy
shelves, mantel, coffee tables and corners. Fish – another
interest – dot the walls.
His mother tries not to fall in love with any of them.
“I never know when I’m going to walk in and they’ll be
gone!” she says.
She points to a handsome owl in her kitchen. Carved
from a piece of telephone pole, it’s perched on a porch spin-
dle scavenged from a Norfolk house that caught on fire.
Onyx eyes gleam. Its beak – fashioned from a snapping
turtle claw – dangles a mouse by the tail, which was made
from the leather of a worn belt.
“There used to be two of these owls sitting here,”
Denise says. “I told him he’d better not sell this one.”