New Fishhook signs give area sense of community

WASILLA — The Fishhook community is a unique part of the Valley, and now the sprawling area in the foothills near Hatcher Pass has the signs to prove it.

Two new wooden signs recently appeared alongside both Palmer Fishhook and Wasilla Fishhook Road. Willow carver Scott Thompson of Willow Creek Studio built the carved spruce signs featuring wildlife and local scenery.

Joe Irvine of the Fishhook Community Council said the group commissioned the signs as a way of creating a greater sense of community in the area.

“Something like that that gives a tangible indication of your community is a huge positive for our area,” he said. “People are really excited about it.”

Along with giving visitors a warm welcome to the area, the signs are functional. When he carved the main signs, Thompson also created smaller signs that can be hung on the welcome signs and used to announce upcoming community council meetings and clean-up events.

“That was a really good idea,” Irvine said.

Thompson said he hopes the smaller signs can help build community cohesion.

“It kinda allows them to communicate with the community,” he said.

Carving the signs was a yearlong process, Thompson said. After the community council settled on a design, Thompson hand-selected spruce from the Valley Sawmill, then digitally scanned the design into a computer. From there, he used a specialized machine to carve the basic design. At that point, the signs were about 80 percent complete, with the final 20 percent of the work done by hand.

The result was a pair of 78-inch-high signs featuring a colorful, three-dimensional appearance.

“I think they turned out pretty cool,” Thompson said.

Irvine said the council paid for the roughly $15,000 project with funds from state revenue sharing money. The community council has previously accessed those funds to help build a community center at the Government Peak Recreation Area. Irvine said the council likes to be active in the community because otherwise planning decisions would be out of locals’ control.

“We don’t try to be nimby’s (an acronym meaning “not in my back yard”), but we also want to have planned growth,” he said.

Irvine said the community wants people who travel through the area to know they’re in a distinctive area — something the news signs should definitely help with.

“Hatcher Pass is in our back yard and everybody has to come through our front yard to get to Hatcher Pass,” he said.

Contact editor Matt Tunseth at 352-2268 or email news@frontiersman.com