John D. Richards

John exhibited musical and artistic tendencies early in life, decorating his little sister's head with mashed potatoes and peas while beating joyously on a pan with a spoon..."My mother was amused but observed at the time, 'I enjoy you so much more when you're depressed.'

"After college, I taught English and Spanish for four long years while making and peddling art and music on the side. Then in 1963, I quit my job, moved to New York, studied art and did freelance display work for Bonwit Teller and Tiffany's and playing the four string banjo in my spare time.

"In the seventies, I formed a small string band called 'The Loud & Brassy Progressively Moist Jazz Band.' We played Ragtime and Dixieland standards and actually got gigs and were paid (usually with food and drinks). In the nineties I formed another band called 'The Pigeon Poop Paraders' but we soon changed the name in order to get work."

John also continued developing his art, opening a series of "Yummy Mud Puddles" in Provincetown, Massachusets., and then in Nyack, New York a few years later. After a move to Saint Augustine, Florida., he met and married Claudia Dunaway and together they started the infamous "Temple of Great Art No Spitting" to show their artistic output in clay, glass, wire, paper, pewter, steel, plaster and trash.

In 2003, John and Claudia moved to Burnsville, North Carolina, opened a new "Yummy Mud Puddle," and formed "Hot Duck Soup." The rest is history.