Sunday, July 06, 2025
A simple box
Saturday, July 05, 2025
Three tiny Tiner
Three of my tiner arrived safely in Stavanger, Norway, while the ship replica of the Restauration, departed there for a voyage to America celebrating the immigration of Norwegians in America. The Restauration was the first ship carrying Norwegian families to America. This is the bi-centennial year.
The tiny tiner are shown on a candle stand made from a piece of twice recycled Douglas Fir that had arrived in Stavanger as drift wood (a mast), then spent years as a barn timber before being crafted into a work of art.
The Restauration is expected to arrive in October.
Make, fix and create..
Friday, July 04, 2025
Today, happy 4th
Otto Salomon had suggested that the manual training Sloyd had two effects. One was economic in that it made us better workers. A second effect was formative, meaning that it had more general effects in making us more human. For that reason, it was offered to all people, including those going on to advance degrees, or jobs in religion or politics, for it would generate a respect for all labor, and sense to assess whether or not it was suitable work. As John Ruskin had said, Plane a plank or level a brick in its mortar and you'll have learn things that the lips of man could never tell. Though here, I'm making a feeble attempt to tell.
Are you worried about the world? Do something about it.
Make, fix and create...
Wednesday, July 02, 2025
twice the effect
If the purpose of schooling is only superficial, we do that quite well. If we are looking for deeper effect, we know how, and that is to make certain that the hands are engaged creatively in learning... that they are allowed to respond creatively with the hands to what the other senses have allowed them to feel.
ESSA, our Eureka Springs School of the Arts, has become one of my happy places because it is full of people learning to their deepest effect and are happily transformed be the experience. We may grow tired, and frustrated on occasion but the joy of creation wins out. We do things that we did not know that we could do, and in the process make the world a better place.
The photograph is the work of a friend and Arkansas Treasure, Hank Kaminsky. The words spell peace in a number of world languages, and as the globe spins our hands and fingers tell us we are living with the same hopes.
Make, fix and create...
Monday, June 30, 2025
small cabinets
I finished a five day class on making small cabinets at ESSA despite having had a stroke on December 1. It was a test for me of both endurance and temperament with it being the first 5 day class post stroke.
Tuesday, June 24, 2025
Why woodworking can be a political act
A democracy cannot endure if a large segment of its population is denied access to education which has relevance and meaning to its life. . . . This is one of the reasons why we must provide vocational education. What is more important, it is one of the reasons why we must have a valid conception of what vocational education is and what it isn’t. – John Dewey, 1919
A 2024 article titled “AI, Misinformation, and Manual Training," by noted woodworker Doug Stowe claims that eliminating shop class and related courses teaching a mix of manual and mental skills has left today’s students without the tools they need to combat misinformation in an age of artificial intelligence. Stowe’s argument is persuasive, and he makes it based on broad learning from texts ancient to modern plus decades of teaching woodworking at a progressive school in northwest Arkansas and blogging about the experience.— From a paper by Connie Goddard, "Lessons on Industrial Education."
In some situations folks are insufficiently experienced to see their connections with others. One of the primary lessons of Frobel's original Kindergartens.
Tomorrow I begin a five day class in making small cabinets. The photo is from my book about making small cabinets.
Make, fix and create...
Monday, June 23, 2025
I was asked...
Yesterday and next steps...
Make, fix and create...