Other exotics include: Carpincho from a water rodent native to Argentina and Uruguay and Capeskin, a South African hair sheep, a favorite for golf gloves.

Coon’s all time favorite glove leather is deer skin, soft, pliable and in good supply.

Leather for a glove must be uniform in thickness. Even split leather. He has tried horsehide, but was “bothered by it, because I love horses.”

Coon became a Boy Scout volunteer because as a sergeant training recruits he had noticed “former Boy Scouts did better, were better able to do things,” than the other young men. “This and the need to “find things to keep busy” after discharge from the army. A World War I veteran had advised “keep busy so things from the war won’t get you down,” he said. “Being busy helped,” he added.

He worked in the Boy Scout program over 30 y ears, receiving the Silver Beaver Award in 1967, the highest award an adult can earn. As troop leader in Des Moines, he had the largest troop ever in Iowa. He “took so many boys to summer camp that the troop needed three sites.”

He tried to teach “put your nose to the grind stone and work.” Also to “never be afraid of anything. Respect dangerous things, but don’t be afraid.”

He also helped with Girl Scouts and the YMCA.

Serving with the 82nd Reconnaissance Battalion, 2nd Army Division in the Battle of the Bulge Ardennes Offensive in Belgium, Coon saw many things he needed to forget. He was with the first unit to enter Belgium.

“It was amazing as we went across Europe, to find little kids speak English. I could hardly keep track of the languages as we crossed through France, Belgium, Netherlands and into Germany. “I felt sorry for the German prisoners. They hardly had anything to eat,” and were poorly dressed, he said. “They really liked American cigarettes.

“We were the first Americans (foreigners) to receive this award,” he said pointing to the long red cord — Belgium’s highest military award.

While he is “opposed to practically everything that has happened to the glove industry,” Coon still keeps a hand in the business by “designing gloves” and trying to “help the current manager of Trophy Gloves as much as possible.” His wife still works for Trophy Glove.

He recently designed a glove for a man who had “a big knot on the back of his hand and had lost a thumb. I finally got one that really fit,” he said.

“I have always tried to help other people and received no compensation. I never charged handicapped people” for custom fitted gloves. Sometimes they came back several times. “A cop in California with deformed hands recently ordered four pairs,” he said. “I could have gotten patents for my work, but never did. Maybe I should have....”