VILLAGE READY FOR (SMALL) RESIDENTS

Small horses inhabit stalls in one of Bill Voelker's miniature barns. The gates on the stalls lock, and there's hay in the loft. The roof is made with 4,000 shake shingles.

The buildings that comprise Bill Voelker's village are on display at West End Grocery in Frohna. There are over a dozen structures in the intricate collection.

Using a table saw, Bill Voelker cuts a piece of cedar for the church he is building. His workshop is behind his home in Pocahontas.

An American flag flies outside the post office, there are desks and a blackboard inside the schoolhouse and bales of hay line the loft in the horse barn.

A cider barrel sits on the porch of a cabin not far from the smokehouse. Inside the cabin are tables and chairs near a fireplace loaded with seasoned wood.

And at the grain barn, within view of the jail and the general store, 4,000 shake shingles form a steeply angled roof.

There are over a dozen buildings in the village with no name, but the "contractor," Bill Voelker of Pocahontas, is working on another -- a church with a steeple and lots of pews inside.

Sound like a nice place to live -- it would be if you're a munchkin. Voelker's town is tiny -- the buildings average 18 inches in length and a foot in height. And all the intricate furnishings are to scale.

Although Voelker, 67, builds the structures in a workshop behind his home, the village is on display at West End Grocery in the east Perry County town of Frohna.

"People from all over the country have seen the village," said Voelker, a retired carpet cleaner from Cape Girardeau. "There's a big German Lutheran festival here every year, and they hear about the village through word of mouth."

The roofs come off the miniatures to show the detailed furnishings inside -- there's fruit and a pen and pencil on the school teacher's desk, for example. And there's a potbelly stove inside.

Voelker has tinkered with wood crafts for over 40 years, making objects with just a hand saw and a hammer, but about seven years ago a cabinetmaker helped him acquire a table saw "and then I got to moving on pretty good."

Cedar is used to fashion most of the buildings; the barns are built of sassafras, because, says Voelker, "it turns to a natural color of red after about four years ... it looks like it's 200 years old."

Voelker creates his buildings with pure imagination -- there are no designs, plans or blueprints. "I just get the idea in my head and start sawing.

"I've had some expert builders look at them and they don't know how the hell I do it without measuring anything, but the proportions come out perfect.

"I build them like I would a real house with studs, doors and hinges, and windows with glass."

Voelker gets most of his cedar and sassafras from local cabinetmakers. He uses half-inch nails "only where needed," and uses glue to attach the shingles to the roofs.

It took four months to build the horse barn, which has eight stalls and corn cribs, and the schoolhouse and smokehouse were completed in seven days.

Voelker says he's never displayed his village at a crafts show, but an example of his work can be seen in Cape Girardeau at the Antique Furniture and Craft Mall at 18 North Sprigg St.

He says he'll keep adding to his village: "Every building's an original, and I've still got a lot of work to do."