CUSTOM FIBERGLASS - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Professor of Naval Architecture and Dean of the Webb Institute
Dr. J. B. Hadler, professor of naval architecture and dean of the Webb Institute on Long Island, owns an Isotope and a Tornado. He is using the isotope to teach his grandchildren to sail. They may be gaining an inside track on the New Millennium Olympics.
As sailors, Frank and Rhoda have shelves of trophies won racing the Isotope and the Cheshire Cat. Each year the Carolina Sailing Club sponsors the North Carolina Governor's Cup Regatta at Kerr Lake, one of the largest and oldest inland-water regattas in the United States. This regatta is held each year in June and attended by many sailors seeking the most prized trophy in North Carolina Sailing. This is a trophy won many times by the Isotope Class and by Frank Meldau at the tiller on two occasions. As past commodores of the sailing club, Frank and Rhoda have sponsored the Isotope National Championship each year since 1975.
Robert Howard, a UNC art professor whose sculptures commanded fees of $50,000 and more in 1960s and 1970s, also worked at IFG creating one enormous sculpture, the 24-by-13-by-10-foot Untitled 1967-1968, that brought a price of $10,000. Last week Howard recalled that Frank "was such a helpful person. He just helped me a lot, and he helped my students a lot, sometimes even hiring them. He's just an all-round great guy."
The Triangle area's most renowned artist in the medium of fiberglass, Bob Gaston, is famous in the region for the Pig in the Sky atop Crook's Corner Restaurant in Chapel Hill (a replica sits in Frank's back yard), his scattered trademark rhino heads, the dancing couple at Pyewacket Restaurant, the angel leaning outward from the roof of the ArtsCenter in Carrboro (as though she is unsure of her financial standing) and sculptures at the zoo in Asheboro and other sites. Now living in New Orleans, Bob traces his ability in fiberglass to the days he worked with Frank, of whom he says, "There's nobody else in the world quite like him."
Wallace Kuralt, the proprietor of the Intimate Bookshop chain in Chapel Hill, Raleigh, Winston Salem, and elsewhere, has engaged Frank often to execute his personal designs---oversized books, computer stands, a copper-toned inside awning for his Charlotte store. "He's a remarkable craftsman," Wallace asserts. "He is great doing whatever. Just the touch and feel of everything he does is so right."
To create an object from fiberglass, Frank first creates a "plug", a true-size rendition of the final product, from which he takes a mold. "Almost any material can be used for the plug," Frank explains, "just as long as I can get the shape." For the Playport, urethane, plastic and random odds and ends went into the plug.