Quirky NC

Vollis Simpson's Whirligigs

The Wind & The Whimsy

As the wind picks up on this lonely stretch of rural road in Wilson County, NC, the creations slowly come to life. First, it might be one small wheel that begins to spin on one side of one the giant structures in this field. Then another catches the breeze, then another and another.  Soon, iron stars and metallic globes begin their planetary rotations. Suddenly, the massive arms that give support to the wheels and stars and globes lumber into their own motion, until the entire field is a dizzying display of kinetic movement and spinning color.

In the midst of this feast for the eyes, you might not notice the man outside the little workshop across the road. You might not hear him hammering out the flaws in an old bicycle wheel, and you might not smell the molten metal coming from his soldering gun. But the man in this workshop developing his next creation is none other than 89-year-old Vollis Simpson, a celebrated self-taught artist and the creator of the Windmill Farm across the road.

“I’m not the type to sit down and do nothing,” says Simpson, a former jack-of-all-trades who has been officially ‘retired’ for more than twenty years. “I can’t watch television. Everyone on television wants to sell you something or get you to vote for them. So I do this instead.”

Simpson spends much of his free time in this workshop outside of Lucama, North Carolina, (about 50 miles east of Raleigh) creating sculptures he calls ‘Whirligigs’, brightly colored and reflective works of art that spin and make noise in the wind. He sells some, he keeps others. Simpson has a four-story tall Whirligig on display outside the American Visionary Art Museum on Baltimore’s Inner Harbor, another at the Courtland Avenue Bridge in Atlanta, and yet another at the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh.

But as the saying goes, necessity was the mother of Simpson’s invention.  While stationed on Saipan during World War II, Simpson built a whirligig to help power a washing machine. During a stateside career that spanned carpentry, welding, house-moving and running a machine repair shop, he learned even more about building and shaping mechanical parts and making them move and function.

When retirement beckoned in 1985, Simpson says he found himself with “a lot of spare time and a lot of spare parts”. It was then he discovered the more artistic side of his work. He began by piecing together old machine parts to see how they would move in the wind. As the contraptions became larger, he placed them on some of his farmland that borders Wiggins Mill Road. “I think most of the people around here at the time thought I was this crazy old man,” Simpson laughs. “I think even my wife thought that for awhile.”

Soon, however, the sculptures began to get noticed by those in the Visionary Art world, and locals were drawn to the whimsical display on Simpson’s farm, especially on windy days. Simpson and his whirligigs have been featured on PBS and in People, Time, and Newsweek magazines, and were part of the Olympic art display at the 1996 Games in Atlanta. By his own count, Simpson figures he’s made ‘thousands and thousands’ of whirligigs in all shapes and sizes.

Vollis Simpson’s art has gone national, but the best place to see it, in all its moving, shining, whirring glory, is still on the Windmill Farm in Wilson County. If you’re lucky, you’ll even find Vollis Simpson at his workshop, and he’ll let you inside where he keeps smaller versions of his art for display or sale. If you’re really lucky, the wind will pick up while you’re there, and you’ll see for yourself the fantastical magic of Vollis Simpson’s art springing to life. 
       
Vollis Simpson’s Windmill Farm is located three miles outside of Lucama in eastern North Carolina. To get there, take exit 107 off of Interstate 95 (US 301 North), take a left at the light at Clint’s Corner, then another left on Wiggins Mill Road for approximately four miles.

added: December 1, 2008

updated: November 16, 2009