By: MrWhitBear

As a lifelong copperhead, I found myself wondering what I was going to do with this industrial storage tote filled to the brim with all things copper.  It was a treasure trove collected from years of being a commercial plumber. From the early years of re-plumbing our family’s laundromat business with my Pop to the water conditioning business, we started together that failed. That tote had been many a mile on more adventures than anyone of us could account for. After that final attempt, we closed that tote up and packed it away. 

I would open it from time to time to get something or drop something in and reminisce over pieces that brought me back to that moment and place. The jobs my wife and I worked together to make ends meet; So many pieces and parts in various states of patina. 

The smooth, soft feel of the flats and curves. The smell of the copper oxide on my skin to the sound of the various pieces as they fell into one another. It all intrigued me and seemed to intensify as time passed. 

We had always intended to just take it to the recycling center, and albeit nearly did when things got really lean in the last few years, (that’s another story.) 

But God in his mercies had another plan

Those rosey-colored bits of beauty were called out of that dusty old tote into the light and brought back to life for another purpose that I could have never imagined. 

Then one day, I realized that in my love for all things copper, I was not alone. 

Imagine my surprise when listening to a Biocharisma podcast and seeing the sultan of the Gardenians light up like a kid talking about copper garden tools. My mind wandered off to that tote. 

“Huh, I wonder.” 

Over the years, all sorts of odd inventions were created from that box of scraps, but this was by far on another level of magnitude; could it be done?

My dad’s voice echoed through my head 

“See a need fill a need, son.”

The Bears need copper tools to make their gardens flourish. Many tools were forged out of that treasure trove of leftovers, and we’ve had to buy most of this year’s supply to keep up with demand. 

The first trowel had to go to Topher as a tribute to the legend for the inspiration, of course. Unfortunately, the prices of components prohibit keeping costs as low as we’ve wanted. We still keep it near cost for our Bear families, and thanks to them and the grace of God, we’ve grown in skill and productivity. 

Now my hobby pays for itself, and a bit left over for the bee’s new boxes and some fresh paint this season.

Bee Alchemy helped me turn copper into liquid gold…

It was great meeting so many of you at the Festival!

God bless.

We are excited to share information on the next magazine issue! Issue #5, titled “Toiling Upward – Building a Better Future,” brings together valuable information and exciting stories from legends across the realm.

In this fifth issue of The Beartaria Times Magazine, titled “Toiling Upward,” we bring together articles from all aspects of the community to share resources, tutorials, and experiences during the spring season while we put in the work needed to have a beautiful summer, a bountiful fall and build a better future.

This issue features some fantastic articles, like a very informative piece on fermenting chicken feed from Cactus Eater Bear. Finksburg Bear shares some insights on how hard work now can lead to bountiful rewards in the future. Bolar Bear writes another great piece on lessons learned and how to avoid pitfalls that come with being in the truther sphere. Arbor Bear, BirthkeeperBear, and Knitting Mama Bear add some resourceful content in their respective fields. Lil’ Mrs. Camera Bear shares her journey into homeschooling, and Ukrainian Bear gives the rundown on building a rabbit hutch. There are many more articles from returning writers and some new names. You won’t want to miss this issue! We even have a piece from a well-known dome builder who has moved to Missouri and describes some of his recent projects and plans for his property. 

We’re reducing the sale price of this issue to make it more accessible to all community members. As a result, it will only be 50 pages. However, if we can sell more copies, we plan to increase the page count back to 100 for the new lowered price.

Pre-Orders will remain open through Friday, June 30. Click here to get yours now!

We have a few of Issues #2, #3, and #4 also available here!

We are excited to send out issue #5! And appreciate all the support for these magazines!

Sincerely,

-The Beartaria Times

We are pleased to announce that tickets to The Beartaria Times National Festival Are Now Live!

The Beartaria Times Event Management has released its first promo and has given us exclusive details of the epic event to take place this labor day weekend!

So much has happened since the start of the epic voyage that took place in 2022 to start an annual national festival.

The 2022 Beartaria Times National Festival was such a huge success that an offer to sell the land was extended in hopes of encouraging and promoting even more Beartaria-related activities and events.

A crowdfund was launched to purchase the property, and has been a huge success so far.

Read More about the crowdfund at BeartariaCampgrounds.com!

In addition to the amazing first-year festival, a full documentary was produced covering the festival planning and the story of the locals that helped put it all together.

Watch here:

Beartaria Times Event Management has shared a lot with us about how the festival went and all the things that they have learned from and expect to improve on this year.

Here is what they have said:

“We are thrilled to be able to continue the festival in 2023 and have a long list of things we will improve on. At the same time, we have some new challenges as we expect more people and are working with Beartaria Ozark Campground to plan logistics for infrastructure and to accommodate their loyal members.”

We have already booked a larger tent this time and a larger stage. In addition, we are including another smaller tent for an exclusive banquet offered to special donors of the Campground project.

We plan on ordering tons of gravel to tighten up roads and set up early-stage RV pads because as much fun as it was to get covered in mud, we need the manpower to facilitate the games and other events.

Last year the games got delayed because of the rain. Not because we were afraid to get muddy but because much of our manpower was busy getting people out of the mud!

This time, we are moving the RV camping closer to the entry so those big rigs don’t have to drive through the whole property like last year. In addition, we hope to have some primitive RV pads set up for them that can be built upon for years to come to have prime RV campsite locations.

We are also planning on splitting up the tent camping so people camping with children can be grouped together with much fewer disturbances from campers staying up late.

We are still working on music sets and our speakers lineup, but we expect to have the legendary Anchor Bear headlining again!

We are still getting into the weeds of all the planning as we have many new things going on, but we are happy to share some of the details we have closed in on so far.

We would love to see everyone that made it last year again, and we appreciate all the feedback and patience for this groundbreaking event we are doing.

A homestead-based event centered around community, self-reliance, and building the future we want wouldn’t be right if we didn’t get covered in mud and mistakes. Of course, we hope this year we have a little less mud and fewer mistakes, but we are ready to take on more opportunities to make mistakes!

In the next few weeks, we will share more details, like a tentative schedule, speakers, and performances.

Sincerely,

The Beartaria Times Event Management

We are so happy for Event Management and all the locals and people involved for taking on this amazing task. We are so grateful to our amazing community for supporting us and showing up in high spirits to have an amazing time!

If you think last year was fun, this year is expected to be bigger and better! If you heard of its success and felt like you missed out, well, this is going to be another one for the history books of Beartaria!