Description: Christmas card featuring a carving of a family of bald eagles, the female perched on the edge of the nest of two chicks, the male on a branch above with wings spread. Marked 1969 on reverse of card
Description: Christmas card featuring a carved barn owl on a piece of driftwood. Signed "Addie & Wendell Gilley." Marked "Xmas 1976" on reverse side of card
Description: Christmas card featuring a carved saw-whet owl surrounded by snow covered greenery. Signed "Sincerely, Wendell & Addie Gilley" and dated 1967 on reverse side of card
Description: This letter is a reply to the Gilley Museum Director's request for a garden to be donated by the Garden Club of Mount Desert. It also mentions a carving of three gulls on a driftwood based that Mrs. Bancroft commissioned from Wendell Gilley.
Description: The letter writer is asking for more information on Wendell Gilley after watching a Boston television program profiling him. She also mentions owning a Gilley carving of a mallard pair.
Description: Letter describes Mr. Silver's visit to Elmer Crowell's workshop where he purchased several miniature bird carvings, and his subsequent visit to Wendell Gilley's workshop. Enclosed are photographs of a greater yellowlegs and a duck carved by Crowell. Silver also describes Wendell Gilley's trip to Abercrombie and Fitch where he was inspired to start bird carving.
Description: Letter to the President of Warren Tool Co., Fred Clark, concerning wood carving tools and ways of holding tools on a work bench. Also mentioned is a grouse carving loaned to Harry Meech, one of the founders of the National Carvers Museum.
Description: Describes Wendell Gilley's visit to Herkimer New York where in 1967 Fenner invited him to be guest speaker at the National Woodcarvers Association Woodcarving Show held there. This letter is accompanied by photos of Wendell Gillley at the show.
Description: Letter to the president of Warren Tool Co. from artist Ekstrom about an article and artwork of Wendell Gilley's chickadee for Popular Woodworking. Ekstrom describes how he had to carve the chickadee himself before he could finish the article.
Description: Letter thanking Fred Clark, President of Warren Tool Co., for promoting the Gilley Museum in its catalog. The letter also describes winter events at the museum as well as the museum's collection of taxidermy.
Description: Letter mentions meetings of the Mount Desert Island Bird Club and MDI Hospital Auxiliary being held at the Gilley Museum. Enclosed with the letter is a Polaroid photo of an unpainted eagle carving. Wendell also mentions working on two life-size grouse .
Description: Letter mentions receiving a bird book from the Whitlocks. It also talks about working on carvings of an eagle with a fish and a ruffed grouse with spread tail and another taking off in flight. Enclosed with the letter are drawings of male and female swimming buffleheads.
Description: Letter from the founder of the Order of Demolay, Frank S. Land, instructing Wendell Gilley to choose and send carvings to Harry S. Truman, Dr. Frank Stanton, president of CBS, Leon Leonidoff, producer of Radio City Music Hall shows, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, and White House aide Bernard Shanley. The cost of the five carvings was $250.
Description: Letter regarding the possible exhibition of a Gilley piece in the Spirits and Nature Exhibition organized by Steven Rockefeller and held at Middlebury College. The piece was a carved and painted group of eiders made in 1970. Color slide transparency enclosed with letter
Description: Letter typed on FBI letterhead and signed by FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover in gold ink thanking Wendell Gilley for the gift of carved bobwhites sent on behalf of Frank S. Land.
Description: Thank you letter from the Governor of California thanking Wendell Gilley for a carving of a quail, which he placed on his desk in the Governor's Mansion.
Wellington - C. G. (Clarence George) Wellington (1890-1960)
Date:
1957-03-04
Description: Letter typed on Kansas City Star letterhead from Executive Editor Clarence G. Wellington thanking Wendell Gilley for carved birds sent on behalf of Frank S. Land.
Description: Written on museum letterhead, this letter describes the opening of the Wendell Gilley Museum and mentions Wendell Gilley's donation of his carvings to the museum
Description: Letter concerning the packing and shipping of a pintail duck carving commissioned from Wendell Gilley by Norman Willock and returned to the museum for repair.
Description: This letter acknowledges receipt of a letter and chisel from Gilley, and discusses various carvings including a spotted sandpiper on a mussel shell and two pairs of quail
Description: Letter discusses sending text, artwork, and photos for the book, Art of Bird Carving, to Byron Cheever. Flying goose, bob-white and blue quail carvings are also mentioned.
Description: Cheever writes that he has received the materials for Gilley's book and that he read the new chapter on decoys and thought it was well done. He also talks about meeting carver Harold Haertel in Chicago at a meeting of decoy collectors.
Description: Note from O'Brien included with a copy of a letter from Byron Cheever. O'Brien mentions having been asked by Peggy Rockefeller if Gilley would sell her a flock of geese.
Description: O'Brien acknowledges receipt of a spotted sandpiper carving from Gilley and discusses a handle Gillely designed for an X-Acto blade as well as decoy designs.
Description: Male eider perched on carved rock facing female. Female faces forward on the carved wooden base. Underside marked Northern eiders by W.H. Gilley, S.W. Harbor, Maine. No date.
Description: Two chickadees, near life size, on driftwood, both with glass eyes, metal legs and feet, carved and painted detail ; both upright, left chickadee has head down. Signed, dated on rear of base "Gilley '58".
Description: Two adult birds on a roughly "J" shaped driftwood base ; glass eyes ; cast lead legs and feet. Signed "Gilley" on right side of driftwood base below the sitting gull ; inscribed "Made for Hilda - Hulda Bragdon 1972" on underside of base.
Description: Birds painted in summer plumage. Bottom of driftwood base marked "Made for Hilda + Hulda Bragdon, Xmas 1971." Signed "Gilley" on right front of base.
Description: Pair of adult herons on roughly "x" shaped driftwood mount. On lower right arm of the "x" a heron in hunting posture is loosely mounted. On upper arm of the x, another heron is depicted in a guarding posture. Twin metal-strip crest, glass eyes, metal feet and legs realistically painted. Signed "Gilley" on top side of sand-finished oblong base, lower right.
Description: Signed "Gilley" on right of carved wooden base. Underside of base marked "'Ring-neck Ducks' by Wendell Gilley, Southwest Harbor Maine ; Made especially for Dr. Claud F. Young". Not dated.
Description: Two Chickadees mounted on driftwood branch attached to carved wooden base ; upper bird is upside down, lower bird faces out from branch ; glass eyes, wire legs and feet ; no visible date ; signed "Gilley" on rear of base.
Description: One chickadee hanging upside down near top of branch above second chickadee perched on lower part of branch. Branch attached to carved oval wooden base. Underside of base inscribed "Chickadees by Wendell Gilley S.W. Harbor, Maine. No date visible.
Description: Adult male and female mounted on pine and twig base, the lower bird (female) in downward crouching position, the male perched on lower fork of twig ; wire legs and metal feet, glass eyes ; signed "Gilley" on carved base.
Description: L-shaped driftwood branch serves as base for three gulls, positioned (left to right) taking off, raising wings, standing erect ; birds show totally different bill carvings, and the similar but minutely different paint indicates a transitional period (1940's?); unsigned
Description: Approx. 1/4 life size; three part composition: one swimming, flat-bottomed adult, two swimming, flat-bottomed chicks; adult's head turned slightly to left, with glass eyes and painted detail; chick a's head is erect, chick b's head is down, both have burned detail. Adult marked, dated, signed "Loon, made for Addie Gilley by W.H. Gilley, 1973" on underside. Chicks unmarked.
Description: Approx. 1/4 life size group of four; two males, two females on driftwood branch mounted on smooth oblong wooden base. Underside of base inscribed "Wood Ducks by Wendell Gilley 1976".
Description: Figure permanently mounted on round footed base, intended to be covered with a glass dome. Top of base is a 3/4 inch diameter inner-ground of fine sand. Heron has cast lead legs and feet, lead-strip crest feathers, glass eyes. Signed "Gilley" on side of driftwood "stump" below left side of bird ; no date.
Description: Gull in adult plumage, head erect and straight ahead, wing tips balanced high over tail, feet braced on a navigational buoy called a red nun. Glass eyes, wire legs and metal feet. Buoy painted with white Arabic numeral "4". Carved oval pine base, gouge-carved and painted to resemble sea water. No date visible.
Description: Herring gull in adult plumage, taking off from a smooth burl driftwood base ; carved with minimum of detail; outside wing edges notched to suggest feathers; painted eyes, bill, legs and feet. W.H.G. marked on underside of base ; no date on piece but probably from the 1940s