Call Maker - Robert Holcomb

Name: Robert Holcomb

Aliases: Bob

City: Ripley

State: Tennessee

Country: USA

Born: 1945

Died: 2019

Description

I started by teaching myself how to turn on a lathe, first I made pens, then I was facinated by duck calls. I turned my first few calls useing the Hut reeds and finally bought a jig and started cutting my own tone boards, always with looks and sound quality on my mind.  The first call I listed on ebay, was purchased by Mark Warmath.  He aranged for me to meet with Jim Fleming and be put in his book ( Custom Calls volume 2 ).  I then  joined CCAA and attended the get together at Reelfoot Lake.  I was facinated and kept learning from there.  Made a couple laminated calls and entered them in NWTF in Nashville and managed to get a fifth place twice and sixth place once.  Do to health issues, i didn't enter any calls for a couple years. After getting better I started marking Turkey calls both slate and box calls. In 2018 I entered a 3.5 inch slate in the hunting division and was supprised by being awarded third place. I have a duck call im entering in the southern Illinois sportsmans show this year (2019) hoping for the best. My mind is always on quality not quanity. I'm not interested in mass production, all my calls are one of a kind hand made, no cnc. I make most all kinds of calls, and still make pens and now custom rings.  Always quality in mind and no short cuts of quality for profit.  I'm priveledges to make one of a kind for a customer and have often used woods that had special meaning for a family keepsake.  I am 74 years old (2019) and have made a lot of friends along the way. You can look for another one of my calls to be entered in nashville next year, and I'm hoping i can attend a couple more times. Thanks to all that have helped along the way, defiantly a brotherhood that i value very much.