Fiberglass Sculptor
Natural Bridge, VA
Photo: Pat Jarrett/Virginia Humanities
Mark Cline began making sculptures just after graduating high school. A part-time job had him working at Red Mill Manufacturing in Lyndhurst, near Waynesboro, mixing material for small resin statues. It was there where the owner of the company, John Sewell, showed him how to cast sculptures and sent him home with a five-gallon bucket of resin. From that point on, Cline’s path to roadside attraction notoriety was clear.
From making small resin creatures, Cline developed into making larger-than-life fiberglass monsters and roadside attractions. Dinosaur Kingdom II in Natural Bridge is his crown jewel, an attraction featuring an Old West-style Main Street, a slime monster theater, an alternative history depicting dinosaurs battling Civil War soldiers in the woods, and an interactive Sasquatch shooting gallery with pre-filled water guns. Recently, while sitting on a bench in the dinosaur forest, Cline shared that it is the sheer diversity of his projects that keeps him engaged.
Aside from fiberglass dinosaurs and roadside attractions, Cline is known for his haunted tours in Lexington, repairing and refurbishing so-called muffler men (tall promotional male figures that began popping up in the early 1960s), and his annual April Fools’ Day public installations in and around his Natural Bridge studio. His sculptures are always captivating and full of mirth, much like the man himself.