In another order, they shipped several of Tudy’s handmade "possibles" bags and more knives. “Every time a package showed up and I got to open it, it was like Christmas—they were a goldmine,” Eilertson said.

One of the last contacts the couple had with Eilertson came on a Friday evening, when they got word that the production needed five long knives and sheaths for DiCaprio’s character. The couple had two days to get them made and shipped back to Canada. At the time, Bud didn’t have any metal on hand, he said. So he put out the word, and found someone with two old crosscut saws. The steel from those saws became the knives DiCaprio uses in the film.

“Leo’s knife was a big discussion,” Eilertson said. “Not only where to hang it, but what type of blade should it have, what kind of damage could it do to a bear, that kind of thing,” he said.

With the props made by the Smiths, “we didn’t have to do anything further to them,” he said. “They were camera ready.” In fact, “it was inspiration to use what they had done to age and distress the rest of the things we had in the same way.”