Tom Smith - Frankfort KY

Walking Sticks

Several years before he retired, Tom Smith began thinking ahead to how he could keep active after he left his job—and how he could continue to support his fishing. At a craft fair he noticed an older gentleman with a walking stick and began thinking about making one. Back home on his farm outside of Frankfort, Tom began to experiment and was soon making sample walking sticks and carving elaborate patterns into them. It was not long before he had acquired a router for the designs and was well on his way to developing his distinctive “Kentucke Wolkin Stiks.”

It was at Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill that Tom found inspiration for a distinctive component of his “wolkin sticks”— their knobs. On tour there, he saw a team of draft horses pulling a wagon through the village and was drawn to the polished brass hame knobs that guided the reins. It occurred to him that a polished brass hame might work as the knob for a carved cane. It worked, and hames continue to adorn his beautifully crafted walnut and hickory canes.

Since “retiring,” Tom has turned his cane-making into a very successful business and has become well- known for continuing this Kentucky art. Shovels made from his carved Kentucke Wolkin Sticks were used by officials to break ground for the Kentucky History Center. Tom's goal is always to make a cane that not only looks beautiful, but also functions beautifully.