James D. Randolph, better known as “Fuzzy” Randolph, was a “quirky” individual who left a lasting impression on students and staff at Waynesburg, and just about to everyone he performed his signature bagpipes for. One of those people that were left with a lasting memory of Fuzzy was Andrew Heisey, chairperson for the fine arts department.

He was impacted by Fuzzy so much that now, he is in the beginning stages of crafting a statue in his honor.

According to Heisey, the statue has yet to begin being built as he is still in the beginning stages of planning exactly what it is he wants to do.

“I haven’t started yet,” said Heisey. “I’ve been doing research at the moment. I’ve gone down to the museum here, and they have quite a collection of images of Fuzz. So, I’ve been collecting images of Fuzzy to see if I have the materials I need to create the representations of the image I want.”

Heisey said that it’s more of a challenge sculpting a person from just photographs.

“It’s really hard,” said Heisey, “It’s so much easier to make a sculpture of the real person, in person – it’s really hard to just go from images.”

What Heisey wants to do for his sculpture of Fuzzy is a technique he often teaches in one of his classes called a “head bust.”

“I really love teaching my students [this technique], so it will be a really good example for my students to see me do something like this,” he said.

The technique is part of a project that is assigned in one of Heisey’s many art classes. Doing this head bust is far from an easy task, even for someone as experienced as Heisey.

“The challenge here is how to create a likeness of someone and to show their personality,” said Heisey. “Fuzzy was an unusual individual here on campus. He always stood out. Not necessarily that he was a loud person, he was loud with bagpipes, but he just had some quirks that were really, really cool.”

According to Heisey, the first time he met Fuzzy was when he was in his office, what Heisey referred to as “the dungeon of Miller,” because he thought it was scary looking. Fuzzy was looking for something, and, at that time, Heisey noticed a muffin on his desk completely covered in ants. Fearing that Fuzzy would eat the ants, Heisey slid the muffin into the trash and brushed all the ants off the desk only to find out that Fuzzy was feeding them on purpose.

This was something he would do all the time: feed the bugs around his office.

“[Years ago], he also had a pet wasp, and somehow I need to capture that into the sculpture,” said Heisey.

At some point, at a much later date, Heisey would love to create a life-size statue of Fuzzy to possibly have sitting on a park bench, much like the Mr. Rogers statue, to honor the impact he had on everyone around him.

One of the biggest challenges for Heisey’s head bust sculpture is what kind of hat he should have Fuzzy wearing. He was well known for wearing several different hats on a daily basis so it has caused quite a conundrum for Heisey to decide.

“Do I put a kiltie band hat? Do I put the Waynesburg College cap that he often wore? I just have so many images of him and how do I capture it,” said Heisey.

Heisey plans on making the sculpture out of clay, and he hopes to get some donors in order to bronze the finished product.

Heisey’s statue is not the only thing at Waynesburg that is there in Fuzzy’s honor. The kiltie band was also renamed in his memory and now includes brand new uniforms and instruments with a logo depicting Fuzzy playing the bagpipes.

What is now known as the James D. Randolph Kiltie Band has a drum head featuring the new logo and continues to grow. One of Heisey’s hopes for the group is to be able to compete in local competition once they get enough members.

Fuzzy was considered a person, according to Heisey, as someone who could be “loud in a quiet way” and make anyone smile with his many quirks and interesting personality along with the fact he would sometimes surprise staff members with impromptu bagpipe performances.