an unusual request/opportunity from a fellow woodworker
A guy I see often enough in my favorite woodworking forum dropped me a PM about swinging up to his area of Central CA to give him a hand with wood from 7 logs of claro walnut he got from someone for free. They were all between 2' and 3.5' in diameter, and between 5.5' and 7.5' long. The largest log I've hauled myself was 2' wide by 16" long, and it was over 230lbs. These things would have needed some kind of driveable lift to move them, but he's already had them slabbed at a sawmill into a bunch of 1"-1.25" thick planks, and 15 various chunks for turning on the lathe.
He mentioned in his post about this score that he would get some 'employees' to help him unload, stack, and sticker it for air-drying. I can only assume that in the last 2 days he decided to ask me instead of them to save money, or perhaps simply to help them. As payment, he said he'd share in the score with me, so I'd be driving home with probably a decent pile of claro walnut, which is a really pretty, dark hardwood. Here's a plate made out of it, for example. You know it's a better wood when it's really difficult to find it in dimensioned lumber form anywhere online, instead finding it slabbed with natural edges, as seen here, here, and here. What I'd get would look more like these.
If I do this, and I'd kinda like to do this, because it's the kind of thing - meeting new people, driving to distant places, acting on opportunities, etc. - that I always avoid like the plague (trying to be more extroverted in 2010), then I need to come up with something better to use it for than another end-grain cutting board made of cubes. That would just be wrong. Claro (Juglans hindsii) has such nice, rare long-grain, it really should be seen, and kept together as much as possible, as in this table. The nice thing is that people lose their minds and pay improbable sums of money for things created in quality hardwoods. I only need one example here of a Sam Maloof style rocker done in claro walnut with some holly highlights and inlays, which is going here for $28,000. I know.
I'm not making anything worth anywhere close to that any time soon, but the point is I can make the same thing out of poplar from Home Depot, or claro walnut for free from this guy, and probably get 5-10x the price for the latter without changing any other variables, or even buying the wood in the first place. Maloof, btw, was a real class-act of a woodworker who eschewed aesthetics in favor of comfort and usefulness, mass production (and lucrative offers therein) for old-world craftsmanship, and worked with hand tools exclusively - nothing powered. He just died last year at 93. The news that went around the woodworking community for this legend, who has pieces in the Smithsonian and White House collections was my introduction to him, and after reading a few articles and anecdotal stories about him from some of his friends, I got the sense that he didn't just live long, but lived 'right.' It didn't seem so much that he died as that he had simply finished up the last page of a great life story, something I'd want to watch as a documentary someday.
I read an anecdote written by a random furniture maker who had embarked on building the iconic Maloof rocker, but found himself fumbling, especially with all of the hand-planing work. Expecting no reply, but hoping for one, he wrote to the aging Sam and explained his block plane trouble in particular. Sam wrote back a long letter full of pointers, and shipped him a block plane that he had made. The plane was remarkably unnatractive, because Sam didn't care about form as much as function, especially in his tools, but it turned out to be by far the most comfortable the woodworker had used, and now it's one of his go-to tools for a great deal of the work. Oh, and he was able to use it and the notes to finish up the rocker properly.
I see this kind of generous sharing going on a lot in the woodworking forums all the time, more so than I've seen in any other online community I've joined. It's routine to have someone write that a tool broke and have some other guy comment that he has 2, and would be glad to ship it to him for free, or for the shipping charge. They're all always trading around quality wood, too, and one guy in particular, who owns a woodworking business, gives things away all the time. He wanted me to load up my truck with those huge euc logs and drive to his place up north somewhere so he could slab them all for me for free. He's also several times now given away free literally flatbeds stacked high with lumber that he's cut and dried at his company to local schools for their woodworking departments, saving one of them from being cut from the curriculum after school budget cuts. Another guy heard I'm collecting wood samples and gave me a list of things he's going to cut up and wants to send me a box to help me out, for no reason other than to be nice. It's touching, and ever-present in there, and something I'd like to join in a bit this year. I certainly have a lot of wood here, and it would make me happy to share it, and to free up some space.
He mentioned in his post about this score that he would get some 'employees' to help him unload, stack, and sticker it for air-drying. I can only assume that in the last 2 days he decided to ask me instead of them to save money, or perhaps simply to help them. As payment, he said he'd share in the score with me, so I'd be driving home with probably a decent pile of claro walnut, which is a really pretty, dark hardwood. Here's a plate made out of it, for example. You know it's a better wood when it's really difficult to find it in dimensioned lumber form anywhere online, instead finding it slabbed with natural edges, as seen here, here, and here. What I'd get would look more like these.
If I do this, and I'd kinda like to do this, because it's the kind of thing - meeting new people, driving to distant places, acting on opportunities, etc. - that I always avoid like the plague (trying to be more extroverted in 2010), then I need to come up with something better to use it for than another end-grain cutting board made of cubes. That would just be wrong. Claro (Juglans hindsii) has such nice, rare long-grain, it really should be seen, and kept together as much as possible, as in this table. The nice thing is that people lose their minds and pay improbable sums of money for things created in quality hardwoods. I only need one example here of a Sam Maloof style rocker done in claro walnut with some holly highlights and inlays, which is going here for $28,000. I know.
I'm not making anything worth anywhere close to that any time soon, but the point is I can make the same thing out of poplar from Home Depot, or claro walnut for free from this guy, and probably get 5-10x the price for the latter without changing any other variables, or even buying the wood in the first place. Maloof, btw, was a real class-act of a woodworker who eschewed aesthetics in favor of comfort and usefulness, mass production (and lucrative offers therein) for old-world craftsmanship, and worked with hand tools exclusively - nothing powered. He just died last year at 93. The news that went around the woodworking community for this legend, who has pieces in the Smithsonian and White House collections was my introduction to him, and after reading a few articles and anecdotal stories about him from some of his friends, I got the sense that he didn't just live long, but lived 'right.' It didn't seem so much that he died as that he had simply finished up the last page of a great life story, something I'd want to watch as a documentary someday.
I read an anecdote written by a random furniture maker who had embarked on building the iconic Maloof rocker, but found himself fumbling, especially with all of the hand-planing work. Expecting no reply, but hoping for one, he wrote to the aging Sam and explained his block plane trouble in particular. Sam wrote back a long letter full of pointers, and shipped him a block plane that he had made. The plane was remarkably unnatractive, because Sam didn't care about form as much as function, especially in his tools, but it turned out to be by far the most comfortable the woodworker had used, and now it's one of his go-to tools for a great deal of the work. Oh, and he was able to use it and the notes to finish up the rocker properly.
I see this kind of generous sharing going on a lot in the woodworking forums all the time, more so than I've seen in any other online community I've joined. It's routine to have someone write that a tool broke and have some other guy comment that he has 2, and would be glad to ship it to him for free, or for the shipping charge. They're all always trading around quality wood, too, and one guy in particular, who owns a woodworking business, gives things away all the time. He wanted me to load up my truck with those huge euc logs and drive to his place up north somewhere so he could slab them all for me for free. He's also several times now given away free literally flatbeds stacked high with lumber that he's cut and dried at his company to local schools for their woodworking departments, saving one of them from being cut from the curriculum after school budget cuts. Another guy heard I'm collecting wood samples and gave me a list of things he's going to cut up and wants to send me a box to help me out, for no reason other than to be nice. It's touching, and ever-present in there, and something I'd like to join in a bit this year. I certainly have a lot of wood here, and it would make me happy to share it, and to free up some space.