By Conrad Dudderar
Staff Writer
The Yukon Veterans Museum receives a unique, hand-crafted gift during a recent Yukon civic group meeting.
Yukon’s Jerry Keniston crafts all kinds of wood figures and miniatures, some of which he showed off during the Yukon Rotary Club’s weekly lunch meeting Aug. 1 at Primo’s restaurant, 1215 S Garth Brooks Blvd. in the Chisholm Center.
Keniston presented Yukon Veterans Museum founder/curator Rick Cacini with a wooden miniature World War II half-track.
“We are going to proudly display this inside the museum (1010 W Main) and at our 10th anniversary gala on Oct. 19 at the Dale Robertson Center,” said Cacini, a Yukon Rotary Club member.
“On behalf of Yukon’s veterans, I want to extend our appreciation to Mr. Keniston for his amazing donation. He does great work!”
The Yukon woodcrafter displayed several unique creations for Yukon Rotary Club members, specifically a fire truck, a bulldozer, and wall art of a boy and his dog and an angel.
‘QUITE EXTRAORDINARY’
But the highlighted piece was the very realistic WWII half-track vehicle which can now be seen at the Yukon Veterans Museum, according to longtime Yukon Rotarian Betty Corn.
“The work Jerry does on these and other pieces is really quite extraordinary,” Corn said. “They are all completely made of wood, with moveable parts and intricate details.”
Keniston has always had an interest in working with fine woods, but he only began creating these pieces of art in 2009 in his home garage.
The Yukon resident works with jig saws, band saw, lathe, and other tools needed for small detail work, and he shops for exotic woods all over the country – including right here in Oklahoma.
Often the color variations in his pieces are not painted, but rather fashioned from the different colors of woods.
Keniston has collected patterns from wood publications and sometimes modifies them to create his own works of art.
His wife Carole says, “it keeps him out of the kitchen”, but it is quite obvious that she is proud of her husband’s talent, patience and perfection.
