Big River Specialty Company was born in 1995 to Larry & Lynn Decker and family on thier eastern Iowa farm near the town of Bernard in Dubuque County. Farming was our lifeblood, but consolidation in the hog business forced us to reconsider the work we did. Starting in January of '95 we purchased the rights to make our Screaming Hawk Deer Whistle and several other urethane items. As time went on we expanded our products to include birding items, birdhouses, squirrel houses, and then, the Peace On Earth "stone", concrete shaped like a real stone with that timeless message. We made quite a number of these, but in the course of doing business we were asked if we could personalize a real stone enough times that we decided it was time to learn. Already owning an old 125cfm compressor and sandblaster, it was just a matter of learning which materials worked best and how to use them correctly.

Since that time our rock engraving business has blossomed into a wonderful niche. We now do sandblast engraving on site as well as here at home, have a laser engraver for glass and wood and even some stone, and do engraving on purchased benches both concrete and stone. And we still sell the Screaming Hawk Deer Whistle.

Now that our kids have grown up it's all pretty much up to dad to do the engraving work, but luckily we have our son Matt living in the house next door on the farm and doing our computer and technical work. His business is called

Emily married Conrad in May 2010 and joined him in San Diego CA labor day weekend. He is stationed at the naval base there. She transferred from John Deere Dubuque works to John Deere Water in San Diego and San Marcos as an engineer. Emily was my stencil cutter all through high school and continues to provide "encouragement".

Suzy, our baby, attends the University of Northern Iowa (UNI) in Cedar Falls. She is my main painter for those special projects that need extra care and a steady hand with an artists brush.