A phone call came from New Zealand giving us the big news. Our youngest, Douglas, had just returned from a sculpture competition in Kurashiki, Japan, where his sculpture, “Pillars of Wisdom,” won first prize and $100,000! Douglas used granite from Adelaide, Australia, to create his pillars. “Pillars” weighs six tons. The columns face each other with their highly polished surfaces 10 centimeters apart. Each pillar is composed of slim horizontal layers of carved granite. The chief judge of the competition, Ogura Tadao, described Pillars of Wisdom as “a powerful piece with impressive design application.” In the March 12, Christchurch Press, Tadao said the sculpture brought to his mind, “the twin towers destroyed in the New York terrorism attacks, and showed the ability of the human spirit to survive.”
But Doug Neil assured him this was not in his mind.
The polished inner surfaces were “the path of pure wisdom, and the eroded outside referred to the many attacks which wisdom had to withstand.”
Neil’s sculpture now stands in Kurashiki with four other winning compositions. Competitions are held every three years and the city already has 42 pieces of public art.
Douglas Neil was born in Oak Harbor, attended Oak Harbor schools and graduated from University of Washington in 1964. The next 10 years, he worked with university crew racing in Seattle, at Purdue and the Naval Academy, plus a few years of writing, before he became interested in Northwest Indian art. In 1990, he moved to Christchurch, New Zealand, where he began using local white stone in his sculpture.
Doug, his wife Kathleen, who is a professor at Christchurch University, and their son Thomas plan to come for a visit in July. Doug’s brother Jim Neil and mother Dorothy Neil are looking forward to that. Summer will mean time at Sunset Beach where three cabins are still in family hands and reams of fun are remembered over the years.
Lt. Cmdr. Christopher M. Stevens, 33-year-old son of Anne and Bill Stevens of Oak Harbor, is currently with our men and women in Iraq. Stevens is a supply officer for the Seabees, Naval Construction Battalion No. 133, out of Gulf Port, Miss. Lt. Cmdr. Stevens has been deployed since Feb. 1, and is now with the Seabees in Iraq as they are busy building bridges, air strips, setting up mess tents, and more, all in support of our armed forces and Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Stevens is a 1988 graduate of Oak Harbor High School and received a full NROTC scholarship. He graduated from Boston University with an Economics degree in 1992, and is a 1993 graduate of Navy Supply School in Athens, Ga.
Air Force Airman 1st Class Rosh H. Pacheco has graduated from basic military training at Lackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, Texas. Pacheco is the daughter of Anelita Pacheco of Oak Harbor, and is a 1999 graduate of Oak Harbor High School.
Air Force Airman Cara N. Radford recently arrived for duty at Monot Air Force Base in North Dakota. Radford is a security apprentice with the 91st Missile Security Forces Squadron, and has one year of military service. The airman is a 2002 graduate of Oak Harbor High School.
