Dover, Ohio: Warther Carvings Museum and Button Collection

World master carver Ernest Warthers' carvings of trains. What he did with ivory and wood is remarkable . Family run the displays and talk about his life. There is still a knife factory that he started and there are also tours of this. His wife collected buttons and these are displayed in Mrs. Carver's Button House. All children are given hand carved pliers.

Warther made knives but he also carved trains out of ivory, bone and wood. He was on the Tonight show when Carson was still the host. Warther is now dead but his museum is terrific. There is also a collection of his wife's buttons, they have wonderful gardens around the grounds as well as a gift shop to sell the knives that are still made. The trains are all accurate, historical trains, to exact scale. Well worth the visit, we took some friends from India and they were knocked out by the museum.

This site also has a button museum with thousands of buttons arranged in quilt square patterns. The Warther carvings however are incredible! The guy was a genius and some of his family are still involved with the business. He has carved the Lincoln funeral train, a plier tree made from a single piece of wood, chains, etc. This is not far from the world's largest cuckoo clock.