“I knew I
was going to have to tear it down or make it presentable to the neighborhood,”
Womack said. “It’s somewhat of a landmark to people in the area.”
With help from his daughter and an article in John Deere magazine, he came up
with the idea of hiring a barn artist to paint the center of Tennessee state
flag on his Marlin Road barn.
Womack found Scott Hagan, a nationally known barn artist from Jerusalem,
Ohio, to complete the project. Hagan started one Wednesday evening and was
finished by late Thursday.
Scott Hagan started painting barns when he was 19. He painted the Ohio State
Buckeyes logo on the side of father’s barn just to see if he could.
“I was always able to sketch on paper. I just wanted to see how big I could
freehand an object, so I ended up on the side of my dad’s barn,” Hagan said.
His career began when his grandfather sent pictures of that first barn to the
local paper. Hagan was soon commissioned by the Ohio State Bicentennial
Commission to paint its logo on barns in all 88 counties in celebration of the
state’s 200th birthday in March 2003.
Hagan now paints everything from logos and advertisements to quilts on the
sides of barns, water towers, buildings and other large surfaces. Most of his
projects take from one to three days depending on the size and surface of the
barn. His main desire is to paint artwork, but he does occasionally paint the
barn itself first.
His work has taken him to 11 states, and after this project, he is off to
state number 12. He has been commissioned by the Missouri State Farmers
Association to paint their logo on several grain bins.
He would like to paint at least one barn in every state. Hagan estimates that
he has painted more than 300 barns over the last 11 years.
“If I had known I was going to be doing this for a living, I would have kept
track of brushes and miles. That would be interesting to know,” Hagan said.
Over the years Scott Hagan has been featured on Sunday Morning with Charles
Osgood and has had articles written about him in USA Today and The Wall Street
Journal. He is still probably best known, however, by folks in Ohio who enjoy
his work all over the state.