The hand carved animals originated from Kenya, and were hand crafted by villagers and collected over the years by Dennis and Nancy Darrow. Each piece is carved out of a single piece of wood. 

The animals were purchased at the old North Indiana Conferences held at Purdue Univiversity in West Lafayette, Indiana. Tom Frost, UMC missionary, and his wife were very involved in African missions. Every year they would bring back handcarved artifacts to sell and return the money back to the villagers who crafted them. The program was named, “Missions Marketing” and items were available at the Wesley Foundation on the Purdue Campus.