2WLI0603HD_FlintKnapper_REV20200304_Transcript

- Usually, we have a fist fight, don't we? 
[chuckling]

- Yeah, you'd goose me. Anyway... 
[chuckling]

- That was just laying here?

- Yeah, that was just laying right here.

- There's nothing like walking a field on a spring day.

- In farm fields across Wisconsin, spring is the time to pick rocks.

- Look at this piece, Bob.

- But Bob Keiper and Gary Eldred aren't farmers.

- Ooooh, look at the color in that one.

- They're flintknappers and they're looking for rocks shaped by ancient hands.

- All of the different cultures of Indians from Paleo all the way up to modern times are found in that field. 
§ §

- This field is just below an ancient rock quarry. 
[clink, clink]

- My guess is they were quarrying it right off this slope and taking it down there to work it up.

- Wonder if this was a hammer stone broke right in half.

- The ancestors of modern First Nations people found something more precious; a rock they could shape into knives and scrapers and arrowheads.

- When you find this high-quality material, you know that it's a workshop site.

- Broken pieces and raw material were left on site and covered up by the passage of time.

- You just can't imagine how much material there is in these fields.

- Each year, spring brings old stones to the surface and the farmer makes rock piles on the edge of the field.

- Of course, he says, "Take all the stone 'cause it wrecks my farm machinery."

- These rock piles are like little treasure chests, aren't they?

- Listen to this stuff. 
[clink, clink, clink, clink]
It just rings.

- Every one of these pieces will have been tested.

- Bob and Gary aren't just looking for artifacts, they're looking for the raw material so they can make their own points.

- We're going to take this one. Oh, it's got honey in there and it's thick. Oh, Gary! Look at this.

- Bob and Gary enjoy knapping together but the term has nothing to do with sleep.

- "Knapping" is a German word that means "to break stone." So flint knapping is "to break stone."

- A few thousand years ago, people used a hammerstone and a deer antler. Modern tools aren't that much different.

- Most knappers don't have fingernails. They're all broke off.

- Knapping is about technique and the quality of the material. The stone must be hit in just the right spot to knock off a flake.

- The question is: should I take this one or this one?

- That makes the original stone thinner and sharper. The flake itself could become a smaller piece.

- You against the stone is what I like to think, but a lot of times it's you against yourself.

- You can also tell almost right away by the sound of the crack whether it was a good one or not.

- A knapper can work for hours only to find a flaw in the rock that makes it useless.

- So he just threw it away.

- Gary thinks that's why this stone was discarded.

- He was trying to make a atlatl blade or a hand knife. So to get that off, the piece would have ended up being too small for what he needed. So he just tossed it. So the idea of picking up these pieces like this that are discarded on the sites really gives you way more insight than the finished blade. 
[train passes by]

- Not every stone is knappable. Outcroppings of silicified sandstone were destination spots for ancient toolmakers.

- It was not only Native Americans that worked flint. I mean, my ancestors, you know, Norwegian and German, they worked flint, too. We all went through the Stone Age. All of our families went through the Stone Age. It wasn't just our Native Americans here.

- Gary and Bob each remember finding their first arrowhead as boys and wanting to know how they were made.

- I just kind of stuck with it all these years. It's just-- I don't know why, but the whole history of the thing just captivated me.

- Scaly, looks like dandruff.

- You can pick up a flake of stone and you make this connection with whoever it was that knocked that off or made that point or broke it.

- They also travel the country attending knap-ins, where knappers get together to trade stone and stories [clink] and break rock.

- There's a rhythm. If you get eight or ten guys together and once they get focused, there's not a lot of talk going on.

- Even the knap-in has a connection to ancient peoples.

- Can you imagine what it would be like way back when another group comes to the same quarry site?

- Is there a conflict? Or is it a time to share knowledge, experience, stories?

- Gary and Bob have each been knapping for more than 40 years with no plans to stop.

- It's like opening up presents. You never know what's going to be inside the next rock.

- Here, here. Use this. 
[chuckling]
Isn't that a beauty?

- Yeah.

- It's all about the creation for me. 
[clink]
You sit down and knap [scraping sound] and something flows through your mind. It's just this primordial connection that's there. I don't know. I can't-- I can't explain it.
[chuckling]

- Yeah, you'd goose me.