A buttery voice for Obama

Norma "Duffy" Lyon works on a Harley-Davidson V-Rod motorcycle made of butter, Aug. 6, 2003. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)

by John McCormick, updated

Norma Duffield Stong Lyon does some of her best work in 40-degree temperatures, so she is certainly hardy enough to deal with January's Iowa caucus weather.

Lyon, who goes by "Duffy," is something of an Iowa icon, where she is known as the "Butter Cow Lady" for her work on such art forms as butter cows, a butter Elvis Presley, a butter Garth Brooks and a butter Smokey the Bear.

Yes, Ms. Lyon is a butter sculptor. She is also a new public voice for Sen. Barack Obama, whose campaign announced this morning that she is speaking in a new radio ad airing in the first-in-the-nation-caucus state.

“You know, you see a lot of manure in our line of work,” Lyon says in the ad. “It’s a lot like politics. You got to know what’s bull and what’s for real.”

Obama, however, did not visit her work during a lengthy tour of the Iowa State Fair in August. He visited an animal building, rode the bumper cars and competed in a midway game, but no visit to the butter sculpture, as is typical for most visiting candidates.

Tommy Vietor, Obama's Iowa spokesman, said the candidate did on another trip get a private viewing of a butter Obama logo Lyon made her him.

During the 60-second ad, called "For Us," Lyon praises Obama’s commitment to standing up to Washington special interests and for supporting rural America.

“Barack Obama’s got a real plan for rural America,” Lyon says. “And it’s gutsy because it looks out for us, not lobbyists. It ends huge payments to factory farms that drive family farms out of business and gets rid of income taxes for most Iowa seniors.”

Born in Nashville, Tenn., in 1929, Lyon's father was a newspaperman and the brother of Philip Stong, who wrote the popular novel "State Fair," according to a Des Moines Register biography on her. She started creating the Iowa State Fair's butter cow in 1960 and has done one every year since.

When she isn't sculpting, Lyon raises dairy cows and beef cattle with her husband on a farm outside Tama, Iowa. Her ad is linked here.