After spending 30 years in the petrochemical industry, Ralph retired in 2000 to Lake Buchanan in the Texas Hill Country. As a retirement present his wife sent him to a canoe building class, afterward he set up shop and built his own canoe. Ralph had done some metal work over the years when he and his wife, Annette, raced but, that usually indicated something had broken. Several years ago he signed up to take a welding class and from that point on he was hooked on metal art.
 

About 4 years ago Ralph started designing and building Wind Spirals, a form of wind driven sculptures. These are hand built one at a time in his workshop and created out of copper, brass and steel.

He also does metal sculptures of fish, motivated by living on a lake, and plant life. He is self taught and is very new at this, but is open-minded about learning and is always looking for input to make his work better. Ralph lives at Buchanan Dam with his wife Annette and their puppy Lexus.