If you have never visited Holmes County, Ohio there are some fun things to do and learn. Though located in nearby Tuscarawas County, we always make a stop at Warther’s to get our knives sharpened or purchase a new one!

Ernest “Mooney” Warther was born on October 30th, 1885 in an old, one room school house in Dover, Ohio. The youngest boy of five children, Ernest learned at a young age the value of hard work. After his father passed away when Ernest was just three years old, times were tough for the Warther family, with young mother Anna, five children, twenty cents, and a cow. Upon turning five, Ernest began his first job as the local cow herder, taking cows to pasture for a penny a piece and earning him the nickname that would stay for the rest of his life, “Mooney.”

One fateful day, taking the cows out, Mooney found a rusty pocketknife in the dirt. This old knife would ultimately change the course of Mooney’s life forever as the young boy began whittling sticks, fence-posts, and anything else he could get his hands on. Because times were tough and money was short, Mooney would only finish the second grade and would eventually lie about his age at 14 to work at the American Sheet and Tin Company which was one of the local steel mills. Falling in love with the railroad and steam engines as a teenager, Mooney found his focus for carving, which became his hobby. When he was not working at the mill, he was carving. If he was not carving he was with his wife Frieda, his own five children, and their neighborhood friends. Mooney’s journey is one that is remarkable, with one man creating sixty-four scaled and working representations of steam history. His carvings were created between 1905 and 1971, between the ages of 20 and 86.

https://thewarthermuseum.com/meet-our-family

There is a museum of the carvings works of Mooney Warther. See the locomotive photo above. Well worth your time when you visit there! Just amazing that he made those things without lasers or any technology of our time.

There are only about 10 miles between the two locations. The fifth generation of Ernest “Mooney”, David Warther, has opened a new shop and his own museum.

David began carving full-time at age 29, and in 1993 he opened a carving exhibit in the nearby village of Sugarcreek which is considered a tourist enclave in the heart of Ohio’s Amish country. David found himself carving every day amidst interested visitors and groups from bus tours as well as the local schools.

In 2008 David Warther Carvings was established as an IRS recognized 501c3 non-profit organization and in 2013 the carvings were moved to the new 10,000 sq. ft.exhibit building known as David Warther Carvings Exhibit and Gift Shop. David’s carving studio has been incorporated into this new building, where he shows visitors his special techniques and complete workshop of hand tools.

David’s evenings are devoted to his family and to a musical instrument parts business he started years ago. In addition he has become an expert in knowing the laws and regulations regarding the buying, selling and gifting of estate elephant tusks and ivory carvings in the US.

David’s inborn interest and natural carving ability has resulted in an art collection that is highly educational in its conveyance of human history and progress. Of his creative abilities, David believes the words apply when Christ said, “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16). 

We did not make the time to visit his shop and museum this time. Gives us a destination for next time!!