Page 31 - 2019 MAR/APR Outdoor Oklahoma

DON P. BROWN/ODWC

Wildlife Department technician Emily Clark re-created these scraping tools and the buckskin thongs.

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Wildlife Tech Crafts Traditional Items for Museum

By Don P. Brown, Information and Education Specialist of everyday use. And some of her “artifacts” are now on
display in the Ponca City museum.
Call it a labor of love for Emily Clark, a big game wild- In 2014, Clark was hired by the Wildlife Department.
life technician for the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Her existing interest in traditional crafting was only
Conservation. But to her, it’s not really labor; she creates stoked when she began working daily to help manage
by choice and out of pure enjoyment. Oklahoma’s deer populations. And through research and
Clark is a craftsman of her own teaching. And while her a how-to book, she taught herself the process to create
skills might be rare these days, they are nothing new. And buckskin from deer hide.
recently she had the opportunity to share her talents “It’s very rare to find people that do this, that do
with the Cultural Center and Indian Museum at Marland’s buckskin,” Clark said. “It’s very time-intensive.” She
Grand Home in Ponca City. spends about a week working on each hide, not count-
Clark is a buckskin maker and, by extension, a tool- ing the time spent to harvest the deer in the first place.
maker. Just like the native peoples of centuries ago, Clark “Not a lot of people want to do this – just us crazy peo-
uses the natural resources around her to create items ple!” she quipped.
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