John Economaki at Bridge City Toolworks has written up a nice overview of his visit to China on his blog here. It’s definitely worth reading. He also posted the video from his trip showing the Chinese woodworking show attendees making chopsticks in his booth.
You also can now sign up to receive more information about the release of Chopstick Master on its dedicated site.
— Christopher Schwarz
“What knowledge is this which thieves may steal, mice or moths eat up, fire or water destroy?”
— 13th-century Parisian preacher in a sermon on elaborately bound books.
We still have 109 postcards left to give away with copies of “Virtuoso” The Tool Cabinet and Workbench of Henry O. Studley,” which will be published next month.
So if you had given up hope that it was too late to get a postcard, it’s not.
The full-color 4×6 postcards will accompany the first 1,000 copies of “Virtuoso” purchased through Lost Art Press, whether you opted to pick it up at Handworks or have it shipped to you. “Virtuoso” is available with free domestic shipping if ordered before May 13, 2015.
— Christopher Schwarz
George Walker, one of the authors of “By Hand & Eye,” handed me a small box of tools yesterday as the Lie-Nielsen Hand Tool Event in Cincinnati was winding down.
The tools were intended for the students at my Hand Tool Immersion class this fall at the Marc Adams School of Woodworking. While some of the students have their own tools, many will need some of the basics to complete the tool chest we’re building.
I picked through the box of well-cared-for, user-grade tools and thanked George.
He picked up a Brown & Sharpe 12” combination square from the top of the pile that looked like it had seen a lot of years. It had a well-patinated standard head, plus the protractor and center-finding heads.
“When I was an apprentice, this was my square,” he said, smiling a bit.
I know that my face screwed up a bit when I replied: “You’re giving away your first combination square? You sure you want to do that?”
“Sure,” he said. “During the last several years I found I have a lot less need for rulers in my work.”
Touche, George. This fall some lucky beginning woodworker is going to end up with a sweet tool with an even better story behind it.
— Christopher Schwarz
Why was the grindstone placed in that obscure corner where no light ever comes? And why was so much care taken to adjust the belt so precisely that conjointly with any pressure of the tool on the stone the belt flies off? In the present instance, by a change in the locality of the shop, and a consequent re-setting of machines, these evils have been done away with, but the places are not a few where such things still exist.
This may seem to some an unimportant subject, but in the opinion of those who work with good tools it is not. I have never owned or managed a large manufacturing concern—nor a small one either—but in a shop employing between 500 and 800 men all the year round, a large proportion of whom consist of cabinet makers, car builders, finishers, some carpenters and pattern makers, we think that a grindstone kept in condition for grinding wood chisels and plane bits would be worth its keeping.
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