Flintknapping Convention Hospitality Suite Runs Out of Band-Aids Within First Hour

The 31st Annual Knap-In, held this past weekend at the Lumpkin County Fairgrounds in Dahlonega, Georgia, exhausted its entire first-aid supply of 500 adhesive bandages within the first sixty-seven minutes of the event's opening knapping session. 'We've been doing this for thirty-one years,' said organizer Burt Hammerstone. 'Every year we bring more Band-Aids. Every year we run out. I don't know what I expected.' The Knap-In, which attracts approximately 200 knappers ranging from beginners to master practitioners, features open-air knapping stations where participants spend the weekend reducing stone cores into projectile points, blades, and scrapers using hammerstones, copper billets, and antler pressure flakers — all tools that produce razor-sharp flakes as a byproduct. 'The debitage field around a working knapper's station is essentially a minefield of micro-blades,' explained first-aid volunteer Carla Cortex, who treated forty-three lacerations in the first hour. 'People cut themselves on the tools, on the debitage, on the finished products, and — in one memorable case this morning — on a piece of chert that was still in the packaging.' The injuries, while numerous, were universally minor. Knappers are philosophical about blood loss. 'Show me a knapper without scars on their hands and I'll show you someone who started yesterday,' said veteran practitioner Silas Flake, whose fingers bore what he described as 'thirty years of learning opportunities.' Emergency supplies were replenished by noon after a volunteer made a trip to three local pharmacies, purchasing what one cashier described as 'a suspicious amount of first-aid supplies.' The volunteer reportedly told the cashier that the supplies were for 'a rock convention,' which did not reduce suspicion. Organizers have announced that next year's Knap-In will feature an on-site paramedic. The paramedic has been briefed that 'everyone will be bleeding, and it's normal.'