Precious Butcher – The Weird Side of the Internet
Written by Staff on June 3, 2024
Precious Butcher – The Weird Side of the Internet – by Liam Sweeny.
The saddest figurines, even sad enough to best the Etruscan statues of the goddess of sadness herself Hainke, (or whatever; I’m sure they had some goddess of sadness) was the Precious Moments figurines. I remember the tear that was magnetically ripped from my cheek every time I walked past the shop that used to sell them in Watervliet. I forget the name of the shop, but oh good God you can’t forget those eyes. The big pupils dishing out psychological warfare on every grandmother and parents of newborns that want to commemorate the occasion of the birth of their joy with a porcelain figure whose adorability no infant could match, making you just a little bit fearful that they might take the figure home and leave that swaddler in the maternity ward.
Yes! Precious Moments. The rare stamps for the crafter set, ever a lively discussion over whether the 1996 Puppy Dog Tails figure was going to crack five hundred on the open market that year. Precious Moments were the old money, in stark contrast to the nouveau riche of Beanie Babies. Precious Moments were dignified, no inspiration from the Grateful Dead or 420 or both. Just fine American (maybe?) craftmanship.
To what occasion do we recognize these tchotchkes of tchotchkes? Sadly, to the death of a loving creator. Sam Butcher is the artist who created the signature Precious Moments look, and he now signs the ledger at Saint Peter’s gate.
God, I hope he’s signing the heaven book. Hate to think that the guy that melted hearts from Bangor to Santa Fe could be begging for an AC right now. Nah, I’m sure it’s heaven. In fact, there’s a Precious Moments Chapel in Carthage, Missouri. It’s probably packed with people clutching their favorite figurine, praying for God to send down another prophet of the porcelain.
Sam Butcher was actually inspired to build that chapel from a visit to Rome and the Sistine Chapel. Can you imagine being a somewhat famous artist and deciding that you want your own version of the Sistine Chapel in Carthage? Devotion or vanity?
No slander. For all the evidence on a stack of three by five index cards, Sam Butcher was a great guy, full of faith, and possessing of a unique trait in artists – humility. Let us hope that Sam is met beyond the pearlies by the living embodiment of the years of work he put in. That’s right; living Precious Moments dolls. Because even heaven can crack a joke.
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