montana
Jody Bakker lives in nearby Bigfork and was an excavator until the recession. He runs a karaoke show two nights a week, and his passion is scuba diving. Bakker’s new job as a professional diver sends him below 20 feet of murky water in Flathead Lake in search of the sunken timber. Armed with scuba gear and a bag of ropes connected to foam buoys, Bakker kicks and feels his way around in the lake’s murky water in search of the logs. The currents in the north part of the lake, combined with wind and runoff, stir up the water so much that Bakker says sometimes he can’t see his hand in front of his face. “I try to run by my compass to see which direction I’m going, but sometimes you can’t see that, even if it’s lit,” he says. “You almost feel like you become part of the bottom of the lake, like a bug.” Photo by richard smith
The murkiness really doesn’t matter though, because there are logs everywhere. Once Bakker locates one, he feeds a rope under it, hitching it about two feet from the end. Then he lets the little buoy attached to the rope float to the surface, marking the log. “I’m a true tree hugger—when I’m down there, to rest I’ll hug a log and just sit there. It’s so peaceful. You’re in the darkness, and all you can hear is yourself breathing.” Most of the dives happen during spring, fall and winter—not when recreational boaters are there in summer, and Bakker typically works with a three-man team—two divers and a driver running the modified pontoon workboat. The workboat winches the logs to the surface and brings them to shore. They average 40 logs a day, he says. After being measured for board feet, the lumber is loaded onto trucks and transported an hour down the road to Hunt’s Timbers, in St. Ignatius. There, it’s milled into rough-cut lumber, tongue and groove flooring and paneling.
Dan Roberts Stringworks Sitting downstairs in Dan Roberts’s custom guitar shop in Belgrade is a small slab of Western larch milled from Flathead Lake salvaged timber. It’s a rich, dark color, and is rough to the touch. Guitars are typically made from spruce or mahogany, and in the tradition-driven stringed instrument market, “if you want to use something a little unusual, you better be a real well known builder or have some proof,” Roberts says. With more than 25 years of experience building guitars, including a tenure with Santa Cruz, Roberts is one of the most respected luthiers in the country. Careful and precise in his work, he takes every piece of wood to a different thickness, based on its stiffness, density and tap tone. He compares himself to a chef working without a recipe, guided by intuition. Roberts built a larch guitar a few years ago, and said it’s heavier, but had a warm, mellow sound. He’s fascinated by the idea of building a guitar from the salvaged larch, and said luthiers have used wood salvaged from the Great Lakes with great results. Old growth lumber from the salvage operations tends to have a tight, even grain. As it ages, even while underwater, wood becomes lighter and stiffer, and the lake water forces the pitch out, crystallizing the resins. “Having a story behind the wood makes it more personal,” he says. He plans to inlay mother of pearl in the shape of barbed wire on the front of the larch guitar, naming it “Don’t Fence Me In” after cowboy poet Cole Porter’s famous song.
Diver Jody Bakker’s job as a professional diver sends him below 20 feet of murky water in Flathead Lake in search of the sunken timber. Photo by Brian Niles
“We’ll see. It’s experimental,” he says with a smile. danielrobertsstringworks.com
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