Frazier Son Molding Work for Memorial
By David Olson
The last unfinished sculpture by the late Bernard "Poco" Frazier is taking shape in the basement of his schoolteacher son.
Matt Frazier, eldest son of the well-known Kansas University professor of sculpture, teaches handicapped children in Oskaloosa by trade. Now he's found himself completing an 18-foot-long fiberglass panel commemorating the dusty frontier days of Hays.
"The project was unfinished and I was thinking of a memorial effort for my father," Frazier said Friday while adding clay to the model in the basement of his home at 1640 N.H. "As I get more and more into it, I'm really pleased with my progress. I'm going to be seeking more projects in the future."
The panel was one of three works left after his father's death May 24, 1976. Malcolm, the youngest Frazier, is the sculptor for the other two -- the "Justice" sculpture in the new Kansas Supreme Court building and one of the Spanish explorer Coronado for the town of Liberal.
Sourthwestern Bell Telephone Co. commissioned the panel to remember the days when Fort Hays was the last outpost on the railroad line to Denver. Gen. George Custer commanded the post for a time, and "Wild Bill " Hickock was sheriff of Ellis county.
"It shows the corner of 10th and Fort streets, which was a landmark intersection," Frazier related. "It was right on the railroad line. Originally I had the idea of borrowing different buildings to create an atmosphere, but it turned out that there was a year or two (1871) when all the elements were together.
Frazier used period photographs provided by the Ellis County Historical Society. The results, he said, were more accurate than he'd planned: "It's very close to the real thing. That wasn't my main concern, but it did turn out that way."
He completed a one-fourth sized model last summer and began to work on three sections of the full-sized clay and wood model in June. A plaster mold will be made of the three sections, which will then be joined together. The last step will be to cast the mold in fiberglass.
Frazier said he hopes to experiment with limestone powder found in the area to give the panel a tan or buff color. When completed, it will measure 18 feet long and six feet high, and will stand in front of a new communications center the telephone company has built at the historic intersection. It is to be completed by December, he said.
Frazier's formal training was in education, not sculpture. But the influence of his father was always present through his childhood, he said.
"The only training I had was working for my father for a good 15 years," he said. "Being exposed to a person of his talents and being able to see him work on projects, that's something not many people have an opportunity to see."
Frazier said he has no plans to abandon the classroom for a sculptor's chisel; the Hays project has whetted his appetite, however, for more.
Lawrence Journal-World, July 31, 1978, http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2199&dat=19780731&id=Ok8yAAAAIBAJ&sjid=ieYFAAAAIBAJ&pg=6127,4954517