Lance's Journal: A Matchstick Masterpiece, Nov. 12

By: Lance Schwartz - Email

Updated: Mon 7:27 PM, Nov 12, 2012

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The price tag to build the Nebraska State Capitol in the 1920's... 10 million dollars. Dick Caves of Lincoln says it cost him about $75 to build his version of the state capitol.

Dick is not like most of us. When we see a box of matches, we think, 'Well, what a great way to start a fire. But not Dick, he thinks, 'Wow, what a great way to build a replica of the most important building in Nebraska.'

Nothing ignites Dick's creativity like matchsticks, "I enjoy doin' it, I probably wouldn't do it if i didn't. "

Dick's fascination with matchsticks started when he visited a matchstick museum in Gladbrook, Iowa, "On the way home I said, 'I think I'll just build the capitol.'" so he did.

Dick says it took 25,000 matchsticks and two years to create the incredible replica of the Nebraska State Capitol, "It's a unique building. I look back and I can't understand how they even constructed it when they did with the equipment they had to do it with."

Dick knows a lot more about the capitol than he ever bargained for, "I found out it's got an awful lot of windows. I think there's about eleven hundred or so windows in it. That's a lot of drapery."

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