Grandpa Karl and his Hobbies and Talents

Memories of Karl L. Probst as told by Glen W. Probst:

Karl and his Melody Harp.

Dad (Karl) worked on his Melody Harp for many years. He applied for a patent, but I'm not sure if he secured it completely. He even wrote a book on how to play it. I got pretty good at it and still have one at home. It was based on three chords--tonic, sub-dominate, and dominate seventh. Since most simple tunes have at least two and no more than three main chords, we could play most folk songs and the oldies but goodies.

We used this harp a lot. We even demonstrated and displayed it in Salt Lake City at an inventors' convention. Several people wanted to have one made, but I don't know how many he actually made or sold.

The Melody Harp had a very mellow tone, sounding a lot like a an acoustic guitar. The square box gave it a deep, solid sound. I really enjoyed playing it, and Dad would listen as long as I would play it. I was able to use a lot of the Mexican rhythms on it. He especially liked the Huapango beat. Many times Dad and I would play our electric guitars together at night. I played my Gretsch, and he played his Gibson Hawaiian Guitar. We each had our own amplifiers. Sometimes we played for hours. Dad was really good on the Hawaiian or steel guitar. He played it in his own dance band, as well as the saxophone and trombone. He made extra money by playing at weekly dances in Heber, Kamas, Wallsburg, Duchesne, the old town hall in Midway, and elsewhere. It seems like he was playing for a dance almost every weekend during the forties. I think he made $2 to $5 dollars a dance job in those days.

Dad also made a standard junior harp. This picture was taken in the front room of our old home in Midway.

Karl and his Carved Canes. I think he was in his late 60's in this picture.

I'm not sure how long it took dad (Karl) to carve each of these canes, but it did take quite some time, maybe months. He started doing it while they were on their mission in London, Kentucky. There was a certain plant there that had another vine-type plant growing around it, and that's what he used.

Karl and his Paintings.

Dad did landscape paintings for as long as I can remember. His work was widely distributed. He won a lot of blue ribbons at exhibits in the Wasatch County Fair and Swiss Days over the years. He seldom sold his paintings, instead, he gave them away. He painted Timpanogos (his favorite) many, many times. He taught art for many years at Wasatch High School in Heber City, Utah. The painting above is one he did of the old log cabin up Snake Creek where he was born. He was especially noted for the realism in his aspen trees. Here you can see he is painting his initials on a tree. He had carved his own initials in an aspen tree near the old log cabin. The log cabin is long gone. I saw his initials in a quakie there about 20 years ago, but I think the tree has since been removed. All of that property is now part of the Wasatch Mountain State Park.

The painting below is of the upper part of Snake Creek. You can see Mt. Majestic Peak (what we called it), the highest one there, the Rochester just below to the left, and the canyon between the two we called Caribu. If you could see just on the other side of these mountains, you would see the ski resort of Brighton and Salt Lake City in the distance.

Dad (Karl) also did a lot of leather work. He could braid anything. He made bridles for horses, breast collars, belts, wallets, women's purses, and other items out of leather. I also did a lot of this. I learned how to tool leather and ended up teaching Dad that part, but he taught me all the other stuff. I still have a beautiful breast collar (martingale) that I made for my horse.