Every now and then, it is not necessarily NECESSITY that is the mother of invention, but FINANCE. For several years now, Buffalo River BCH has been needing some gravel hauling bags, but since we didn’t need them EVERY workday, it was hard to anny- up for them. BRBCH board member Larkin Floyd has the perfect set up and equipment for turning wishes into reality with a few extra yards of heavy-duty canvas, a sewing machine that can handle it, and lots of intuition, imagination, and know-how in putting projects together (a pattern with directions didn’t hurt either).

One evening in September three Arkansas BCH members got together at Larkin’s workshop and measured, cut, sewed, and manipulated that canvas into some pretty good-looking bags (if we don’t say so ourselves). Previous to that evening, Larkin had already welded flat metal into hoops and then welded chains to those hoops to be integrated into the tops of the bags where they hook over a sawbuck saddle. After all the sewing, Larkin intends to rivet the metal hoops into the tops of the bags thinking rivets will be sturdier than stitches . This enterprise took three people four hours (not counting the welding or the riveting), and now we know why the darn things are pricey.

We are anxious to haul some gravel to some sites we’ve have in mind for years, so we’ll send pictures when we do, but here are a few of the work in progress.

Maybe the second set would be easier–it seems like that’s always the case–but we will never know.