People have one last week’s opportunity to buy engraved plaques to be installed on a local piece of artwork promoting an archaeological site and tourist attraction.
Havre Daily News/Nikki Carlson
A Thursday afternoon view of the Wahkpa Chu'gn Buffalo Jump mural next to Murphy's Pub along U.S. Highway 2 West.
Renowned artist Jim Marshall will travel from his hometown in Medicine Hat, Alberta, to put engraved plaques on the mural he erected promoting the Wahkpa Chu’gn Buffalo Jump.
The funding foundation for the H. Earl and Margaret Turner Clack Memorial Museum and Wahkpa Chu’gn contracted with Marshall to create the mural, depicting Native Americans driving bison off the bluff behind where the Holiday Village Mall now stands.
The foundation is selling plaques to be engraved and placed on the mural, around which a park also will be created.
Anna Brumley, manager of Wahkpa Chu’gn, said the engraver told her that plaques sent to him by Friday, July 1, would be completed in time for Marshall to place them on the mural while he is here.
Plaques purchased after that will have to be installed later, in the fall, she said.
The 10-foot-by-16-foot Havre mural is the first Marshall has created in the United States, but he has completed others around the world. Marshall takes blocks of wet clay, sketches images on the bricks, which are stacked in their final form and numbered, and then carves the image that will appear on the mural.
After the bricks are colored and fired, he takes them to the site and assembles the mural.
The engraved plaques will be installed on the mural around the image and on its back side.
The preparation of the park around the mural is in its initial stages, with the foundation selling plaques to put on items that will be in the park.
“People need to know we will continue selling bricks until the back of the mural is filled — they will just be installed at a later date,” Brumley said. “We will continue selling benches, flag poles and trees until the mural park is completed, but I don’t have an estimate on that date but probably late this fall or early spring.
People wanting more information about purchasing a plaque or dedications at the park can contact Brumley at 265-6417, Lynda Taplin at 265-767
