John Wellman, Flintknapper

John Wellman, Ray Harwood and the late Robert Rexroth cutting up antler tools
and making one of John's "twist flakers".




Here John Wellman demonstrates his "twist flaker" I saw john make many very nice points with this tool. He wrote an article about it in the Mound Builder books publication :20thCentury Lithics", edited by D.C. Waldorf.



John Wellman here demonstrates his fluting board. He and I spend many an hour fluting points with this in the 1980s.

I met John Wellman in 1988, over the phone and later met him at the 1989 Wrightwood knap-in. John was a teacher in the bay area and knapped a lot of Clear Lake and Borax Lake obsidian he had collected. John was from the old school and was friends with many of the old "Flintknapper's Exchange" . J.B Sollberger, Crabtree and Callahan. John was turned off by the knapping communities' politics and dropped out in 1978, but when he say some new knappers out there...ie me and "da boys" he resurfaced and became active again. He published the book and tape "Sequential Flaking" with was a giant book of hundreds of pages. John was one of the most knowledgeable knappers I ever met. He pioneered the "twist flaker" and "fluting board" but he was an expert at everything: fluting, pattern flaking and percussion. John wrote for"Flintknapper'Exchange", "Flintknapping Digest" "20th Century Lithics" and "Chips". John came by my house last about 15 years ago.