All Tied Up With Bolos, presented by Jim Hird

Highlights by Andy Thompson, MSDC Secretary

Readers: The purpose of this report is to provide readers with highlights from Jim’s presentation as encouragement for readers to visit MSDC’s YouTube channel and view Jim's presentation in its entirety.

MSDC member Laura Dwyer introduced Jim Hird who, as a teen, encouraged his parents and they all became members of the Buffalo mineral club and dedicated rockhounds. So instead of Jim following in his parents’ footsteps, they followed in his. Jim pursued a life-long career as a mining engineer.

Laura encouraged everyone to view Jim’s earlier 2021 presentation to MSDC explaining the geologic history of the Keweenaw Peninsula in upper Michigan which is rich in native (pure) copper.  

Jim introduced himself and his program by saying he is a life-long mineral collector and a veteran of 20 years of attending the Eastern Federation’s annual Wildacres sessions. While there, Jim participated in diverse workshops that support attendees’ interests in earth sciences, minerals, gems, jewelry and crafts. It was at Wildacres where he learned and honed various skills that supported his passion for making and wearing bolo ties. 

“I’ve been going to Wildacres for 20 years now and of late, when there, I wear three to four bolos, different ones. I change during the day.” 

Tonight’s program for MSDC is a result of Jim having been approached by a fellow participant and was told: “You ought to do a program on this” (bolo ties). Jim said he had been playing with bolos since the 1950s but did not know much about them. So, to provide a context for his talk, he dug into their history, some of which is highlighted below.

What is a Bolo Tie?

Each of its three major components and the standard methods of bolo construction has an interesting history. The three parts – chord, slide, and tips – were documented in a 1940 patent for the slide mechanism.

Jim shared with his MSDC audience interesting and diverse examples of minerals and fossils that he affixes to the ornamental clasp or slide. Each of the clasps illustrated shows diverse scenes and motifs expressing personal meanings or whimsical themes. Jim described the skills required to work with the different materials, skills he acquired during his participation in Wildacres workshops.

Bolo ties gained popularity in the 1980s with rockabilly revivalists and new wavers groups and achieved high fashion. By 1988 they rose to high fashion with Hollywood stars. China and Japan also saw a rise in the bolo popularity. Several states in the southwestern U.S. have made bolos their state neckties and in the last decade, several NFL football players and teams began sporting them.

Highlights From My Collection

Jim’s collection of bolo ties began with buying them or inheriting them from his family. They were made of diverse materials (e.g., resin, wood, metals) and illustrated different themes. As a teenager learning lapidary, he incorporated polished Michigan calc-dolomite (left), standard wonder stone (middle), and dinosaur bone (right) into his bolo creations.

From his field collecting in the upper peninsula of Michigan, he incorporated the specimens below in bolo ties: Kingston copper ore (left), datolite (middle), mohawkite wrapped in silver (right).

Below is a series of bolos that illustrate Jim’s evolution as he progressed in his skills working with different materials and methods. In his earlier phase Jim worked with and incorporated mineral specimens he received from others, including from his Dad (left), while on a business trip or collected himself. Readers can estimate the size of the stone or metal specimens by comparing them with the two-inch-long metal tips at the end of each string.

The three bolos below are from Jim's earlier years of working with string ties. Don Brown, an expert for working with datolite, made the piece on the left which incorporates datolite intarsia (a technique for creating patterns by inlaying different materials into a surface). The piece in the middle is made of a splash copper pendant that Jim bought while visiting the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Jim obtained the third piece, a beaded dragon, from a wonderful wire wrap artist named Kitt Katt who did her craft work in the Roanoke, Virginia area.

A number in Jim’s collections include his commemoration of special situations such as the “Bad Day in Dino land” below. It includes at the very top an incoming meteor.

Jim’s experiences at Wildacres not only gave him the tools needed to create interesting bolo clasps out of diverse media, but even his dining hall encounters inspired his productivity, as illustrated below.

What also became clear was that so many of Jim’s creations were the result of his personal relationships with members of the mineral collecting and artistic communities. The mineral specimens used in the three bolos below all have a unique story. For example, Jim obtained the pink opal from Peru (on the left) from the internationally known Helen Seras Herman. The Mexican amethyst in the middle is special to Jim because it came from his Mother’s mineral collection. The unusual squared-off concretion came from the Hickory, NC show (on the right).

Jim said a number of the bolos he made were created at the request of mineral collectors who asked him to make them as gifts for family and friends. As with all artistic creations, artists have to work with the size and weight limitations of the media. As shown below, despite its two-pound weight, the heavy but whimsical Canadian concretion was a favorite of some of Jim’s MSDC audience.

His longest specimen by far is the mastodon tusk below.

Another genre of Jim’s bolos celebrates his personal road trips or the cultural values he encountered. On one such trip, he purchased the unpolished Death Valley jasper (below), which included the silver image of native American’s Kokopelli, the flute playing, trickster fertility deity who is shown coaxing plants out of the ground. Jim used a bundle wrap and at the bottom, where he brought all the ends of the wire threads together. He made them into a spiral that is consistent with the shape of the silver tiny plants Kokopelli has coaxed out of the ground.

By way of concluding, Jim encourages everyone to come to the next session of Wildacres in 2025 where he will be happy to share his latest bolo creations. The recent Hurricane Helene did considerable damage to the mountain top retreat center rendering access currently very difficult. But he hopes to be there at the next Eastern Federation session. His invitation below encourages everyone to come to Wildacres.

Questions & Answers

MSDC president Kenny Reynolds thanked Jim for his fantastic presentation and opened the floor for questions. To learn some of Jim’s trade secrets, go to the YouTube video and learn the mechanics of the two main methods of wire wrapping (stick man and bundling) used to make bolos operational and appealing to the eye.

The photo below is an example of the bolo’s back side showing the two cylinders through which the strings are threaded and, in the middle, the spring-loaded catch which bites down on the strings and holds the slide in place.

The above slide mechanism and the wire wrap below is mainly hidden from view thereby making the mineral specimen the front and center attraction. Jim’s preference is to minimize the presence of wires so they do not obscure the mineral specimens. As an example, for the bolo below, he placed the wires on the side.

The audience peppered Jim with questions for about half an hour and asked about the size of his collection (maybe close to a hundred), his cataloging of each bolo (by number), cost (relatively inexpensive), and how he tracked down where the mineral specimens originated. Discussion also referenced the pure copper Ontonagon Boulder currently housed in the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History and the extensive collection of native copper on display in the A.E. Seamans museum of the Upper Peninsula (Museum | A. E. Seaman Mineral Museum (mtu.edu).

For mineral collectors Jim also called attention to the more than 80 minerals that have been found in the Upper Peninsula and the region’s relative absence of oxidized mineral specimens that were carried off by the glaciers. One audience member asked about the possibility of having bolos made with calcite infused with copper or with rutilated quartz (very delicate) which led to an interesting discussion of Jim’s other favorite minerals. Jim said that he has never used anything from Franklin, New Jersey in his bolo ties.

Kenny thanked Jim for sharing his artistry and extensive knowledge of minerals. The audience expressed its gratitude with applause for Jim and also for Bonnie and her technical assistance.

Readers are reminded that they may view Jim's presentation in its entirety on MSDC's YouTube channel.