Sports Leader

“Corey is pretty tall and he wanted to be able to
stand in it,” Barwick said.
After initial construction, they ran into a problem.
The wagon and blind stood at about 16-feet-tall.
The Department of Transportation does not allow
trailers taller than 13 feet, 6 inches to be pulled
down the road. So, it was back to the drawing board.
“We totally dismantled it,” Elgersma said. “We
pulled out the floor and changed it so we could
drop the floor into the wagon a foot. Then we
shortened the ceiling. I guess Corey’s going to have
to duck a little. It made the whole thing more structurally
sound.”
In the beginning, construction of the wagon blind
had been taking place outside. That was until Tobin
Smith of Sheldon learned of what was happening.
“I didn’t even give Corey a chance,” said Smith,
owner of Heartland Steel & Millwright Services. “I
literally said, ‘Naw, we’re moving it.’”
“He saw that thing and his eyes lit up,” Elgersma
said. “He grabbed his four-wheeler right away and
pulled it to his shop. All I had to do was buy beer
and order wings from Langer’s.”
Smith took on the steel work for the project.
“I had all the tools we
needed at the shop. Equipment
movers, welders, steel
— I’ve been building deer
stands for 30 years,” he
said.
The team worked together
on the project a few
evenings a week with the
goal of having it ready before
bow hunting season.
Smith’s son, Colin, as well
as Rod Winkel of Sheldon
and his son, Brandon, also
pitched in to help.
One of the final pieces
missing was the interior.
The wagon would block the
wind, but it still needed to be insulated for the harsh
Iowa winter. Also, being inside the wagon was like
being inside of a tin can according to Elgersma. It
needed sound proofing to be truly comfortable and
not scare away deer.
Elgersma went to Downtown Hardware in Sheldon
in search of some cardboard to line the blind
with. Once again a friendly face was waiting to help.
As he was inquiring if the store had any cardboard
he could buy, another patron had just what he was
looking for. Gary Rosenboom of Rosenboom Frame
& Body in Sheldon donated a pallet of heavy-duty
corrugated cardboard to Elgersma.
“He told me, ‘The look on your face is payment
enough,’” Elgersma said.
“Now it looks finished,” he continued. “The
cardboard is sound deadening and we cut cost and
weight.”
The inside of the wagon is carpeted and cozy.
There is room for three to four adults to sit comfortably.
There are four 36-inch wide by 24-inch tall
sliding windows, one on each side, with shooting
rails on the sills. They added custom gun holders
and bow hangers.
According the Smith, using a grain wagon will
work perfectly for hiding in plain sight.
“Deer won’t even think to look at it,” he said.
“They normally associate a wagon with food. We
just have to be sure there’s no corn where we put it
because deer baiting is illegal.”
The way the blind was built and the comfort it
provides will lend itself well to young hunters, according
to Barwick.
“That thing will last years,” he said. “It’ll be good
COMFORTABLE SPOT Brandon Winkel and Corey Elgersma take a seat in a hunting blind that
was crafted out of a grain wagon.
for grandkids someday. Kids get cold in a tree stand.
Anytime you keep kids warm, they’re not moving
and scaring away the deer.”
More important than the functionality, work on
the wagon blind transformed into an opportunity
to spend time with friends and collaborate on
something they are all passionate about.
“All the guys that helped are really good guys,”
Barwick said. “We just had good male bonding time.
We don’t play cards or go to the bar so it was fun to
get together and work with our hands.”
The project was yet another favor exchanged
among good friends.
“Corey sold me my shop. Corey has done anything
I’ve ever asked, so this was a chance to help
him out and kind of return the favor.” Smith said.
According to Elgersma, his vision could not touch
the final product.
“This thing would have never turned out the way
it did if it wasn’t for all the guys that helped,” he
said. “These guys never let me take a shortcut. They
told me, ‘You’ll never regret doing it right.’ They
developed it, they engineered it, they made it better
than I ever would have on my own.”
22 THE SPORTS LEADER | DECEMBER 2017