Nowacki carves unique gift for an area man
By Casey Krautkramer
Athens chainsaw carver Tom Nowacki is giving an area man the perfect Christmas present this year.
Michael Daninger of Weston recently contacted Nowacki with an interesting request. He wanted Nowacki to carve Santa Claus out of a small chunk of wood from the branch of a red pine tree that has a special meaning to him.
Daninger grew up on his family’s farm in Forest Lake, Minn. In 1971, his grandfather Frank
See WOOD CARVING/ page 3
PROUD OF THE FINISHED PRODUCT- Tom Nowacki on Monday night stands in his town of Rietbrock wood shed with an 11-inch tall Santa Claus that he carved out of a chunk of red pine wood for a Weston man just in time for Christmas.
STAFF PHOTO/CASEY KRAUTKRAMER Wood carving
Continued from page 1
Brown dressed as Santa Claus and gave him a red pine sapling as a Christmas present for him to plant in his parent’s yard.
Three years ago, a hail storm stripped the needles off the red pine tree. The tree never recovered and it died. Daninger’s brother now owns the family farm and he ended up cutting down the dead tree. This summer, his brother sent him home with a chunk of the branch from the red pine tree because he knew this tree meant a lot to him.
Daninger gave Nowacki the task of carving Santa Claus out of this chunk of wood in time for Christmas this year. Nowacki said on Monday night that he carved a five-foot tall Santa Claus out of wood last year, but this is the smallest Santa Claus and one of the smallest items he’s ever carved out of wood because it’s only 11 inches tall.
“The smaller the piece of wood the more difficult it is to carve with chain saws and the more lighter Dremel tools,” Nowacki said in the wood shed on his town of Rietbrock property near Athens.
Nowacki said this small Santa Claus was also a more challenging project because the chunk of wood was taken from a tree branch, which is a much harder piece of wood compared to the tree trunk. It took him seven hours to carve and paint the wooden Santa Claus that he will deliver to Daninger this weekend in time for Christmas.
