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A career engraved in steel

Bob James wanted to give his son Chad, an F-15 pilot with the 2nd Fighter Squadron, a nice gift, a memorable gift — something to recognize his success in realizing his childhood dream to fly a fighter jet.

So when Bob found a handgun Chad liked, a Kimber CDP II, he brought it to Chad’s younger brother Kevin with an idea: Why don’t you ask about getting this engraved with Chad’s callsign, maybe his squadron insignia?

Kevin, a design engineer with a company that makes engraving tools, was in a good position to help; he is surrounded at work by metal and by people who love to cut intricate patterns into it, line by painstaking line.

So Kevin asked — and that’s when things began to get delightfully out of hand.

Nine months later, when the stainless steel dust had settled and the job was finally done, Bob James’ nice gift had become a showstopper involving hundreds of hours of work, covert operations to consult with Chad’s commander and the talents of a master engraver.

At Kevin’s shop — Glendo Corp. in Emporia, Kan. — his boss, D.J. Glaser, was intrigued by the chance to experiment with a different kind of work piece.

“A lot of engravers won’t work on modern pistols,” Glaser said. They prefer to stick to classic rifles and shotguns and decorate them with equally classic scrollwork.

But Glaser knew an artist who might be willing to do something riskier — and had the time to do it.

Engraver Chris DeCamillis travels from his home in Michigan to teach part of the year at GRS Training Center, Glendo’s educational program. He also tests new tools for the company.

DeCamillis considered traditional scrollwork and Celtic designs but rejected both.

“You know, this is a military thing,” he said. “Scrolls are nice, ... but they didn’t have the right design element for what the gun was for.”

Someone suggested playing with images of the F-15 Eagle and its feathered namesake, and the ideas flowed from there. “Once you get started on something like that, you keep building and building,” DeCamillis said.

Bob and Kevin James gathered squadron patches and memorabilia, and Bob even flew to Tyndall Air Force Base, Fla., to get design ideas from Chad’s commander.

“We told [Chad] we were going to the commissary” before sneaking off for the secret meeting, his dad said.

By September 2006, several months after their initial inquiry, the schemers had a plan on paper.

The fantasy design that had emerged would keep DeCamillis busy — but it was much more than busy work. Fantasy engraving gives the artist great freedom, but the challenge of balancing different elements in an unforgiving medium means that many engravers won’t attempt it.

“If I make an artistic risk and it doesn’t work out, I’m in trouble,” Glaser said.

Working when his teaching schedule allowed, DeCamillis finished the complicated design in April 2007; he estimates it took him about 150 hours.

Lethal scrapbook

The result is a beautiful — if deadlier than most — scrapbook of Capt. Chad James’ professional and personal achievements:

* His jet, the F-15 Eagle, morphs into a wingspread bird over the top of the slide.

* A Grim Reaper, the mascot of his old unit, the 493rd Fighter Squadron at RAF Lakenheath, glowers from one side of the pistol while the jaunty beagle of the 2nd Fighter Squadron proposes a toast on the other.

* An inscription will always remind Chad, if he could ever forget, of the ride he took in a MiG-29 in Laage, Germany.

* A pair of jump wings mark his jump training as a cadet at Fort Benning, Ga.

* And his three children make an appearance in the three stars that curve over the muzzle.

Bob and Kevin surprised Chad at Christmas with a visit to Glendo to see the pistol in progress and, even unfinished, the gun got a great reaction.

Bob James said his son, seeing the gift, was like a “racecar driver winning a race.”

“It was incredible what they could do,” Chad said.

His response delighted Glaser and the team at Glendo, but Glaser admitted he was aiming to impress officers far above Chad’s paygrade: “My assignment to them was, ‘Make some general jealous,’” he said. “We had a ball doing this.”

Meanwhile, Chad’s career continues to take him to new places, most recently to South Korea as an air liaison officer with the 607th Air Support Operations Group on a yearlong unaccompanied tour.

That means he left his wife and kids behind. And he left the pistol at his dad’s.