By: Stephen McCollum; Photos by Don L. Rogers

No matter how long or hard one interrogates Pat McAtee it’s impossible to elicit a link between his experience creating three-dimensional displays of pork and bean cans at his father Joe’s grocery to the velociraptor sculpture lurking at the corner of City Hall. 

“I really don’t know where the artistic spark came from,” he says. He didn’t take art classes in school—after graduating in the first Blackford High School class he earned an Associate’s Degree in business administration at Vincennes University. Maybe it was a vision thing?

He recalls vacations to Florida after he’d left the grocery business and started working in the metal fabrication department at Hartford Concrete Products.

“I observed a number of metal artists making things to sell to the tourists,” he says. 

Over the years McAtee has created as many as 75 sculptures, large and small, of dinosaurs, a coral reef with fish, insects like the praying mantis, and even a replica of a Burning Man he first saw in the British Virgin Islands.

But the art had to go through an incubation period as McAtee undertook something akin to an apprenticeship at Hartford Concrete, where he assisted with the fabrication of all manner of metal forms for products from septic tanks to controlled environment vaults (CEV’s) used for housing fiber optic cables. 

When Hartford Concrete was bought and a downsizing process began, McAtee found himself opting to start his own business in 2004. He built a 30’x40’ shop at his home east of town and began the process of outfitting it with an array of equipment—an overhead crane, a drill press, lathe, four welders, horizontal and upright band saws, punch press, and even a fork truck.

“I was fortunate to have a friend who helped me acquire much of this equipment economically through sales at various manufacturing facilities that were closing,” he explains. 

By the time he decided to set up his own shop, McAtee’s artistic instinct had emerged, thanks in part to the fact that he was able to use equipment at Hartford Concrete after hours on his personal projects. So how does a 3-D object emerge from the mind of the artist?

“Take the velociraptor at City Hall,” he says. “That particular dinosaur was featured in the movie Jurassic Park. Unless you’re creating something life-size, you have to work to scale. Decide how large the piece will be and then choose the materials that will let you depict the dinosaur in a way that it is recognizable. I started with the spine and then decided how to position the head, what angle will it be perceived? Then the legs go on for balance, then the rib cage and the bony plates.” The velociraptor that stalks City Hall was assembled in the equivalent of three long days of work.

Some of his newest work will soon appear in the new downtown amphitheater park across from Old Town Villas. There will be a 6’ diameter world globe, a small version of Burning Man, and next to the stage an 8’ tall replica of an acoustic guitar with various items welded to it.

McAtee says awareness of the arts has grown over the years, especially enhanced by the community Arts Center and Arts Council. 

“I hope the downtown square can rebound to the level of business and social activity that many of us remember,” McAtee says. He appreciates that municipal, business, and civic leaders and committed citizens are working toward that common vision.

As Blackford County continues its comeback, McAtee asserts some artistic license to imagine what kind of sculpture might capture the spirit of past prosperity and the desire for a resurgent future. As the grandson of J.R. Johnston of Johnston Glass, his mind’s eye catches a glint of light.

“I think you’d have to do something to honor the glass industry that flourished here in the last century,” he notes. “While we know we can’t or won’t replicate the past, I think the younger generations might be inspired to know what the community was like during the gas boom that led to the glass industry’s success. 

“I’m envisioning maybe an oven with a glass blower—bringing that successful era back to mind in a way that inspires everyone” not to retreat into the glory of the past but to envision the community finding its way forward. 

Glass, after all, not only can be made into many practical products, it also has the capacity to mix light and beauty in a way that can inspire a new outlook on things. 

Pat McAtee is a lifelong resident who is thinking and creating in a Positively Blackford fashion.