Following esteemed galoot Bill Taggart's lead, I too have just opted in
the Galootaclause celebration, and am now updating my bio with the
following information:

Bottom Line Up Front: 49-year-old former Army guy with a teenaged
daughter, a 4-year old boy and a 3-year old girl, living in an old turn-of-the-
century four-square in La Crosse, WI. Married to a SWMBO far smarter
than he who works from home in her PJs because she can. Madly obsessed
with the art of restoring rusty tools, with a particular emphasis on
saws. More details follow for those with time on their hands. . . .

Recently retired Special Forces Colonel who hung up 28 years of service
last December when I redeployed from Afghanistan, where my crew and I
ran a training compound for the Afghan National Army throughout 2007. I
spent roughly half of my military career with assignments in the 5th,
10th and 12th Special Forces Groups (Airborne), and spent much of the
other half of my career in the ROTC business, where I served as an
Assistant Professor of Military Science and Professor of Military
Science in upstate New York and Southwest Wisconsin (La Crosse), where I
presently live. Other assignments throughout my career have taken me to
Korea, Germany, Panama, Hawaii, Northern California, Georgia and North
Carolina. LOL--I've been wearing a uniform since age 11, when I joined
the Boy Scouts. It was in the Boy Scouts where I learned the following
values: service to community and country, gun control (as in hitting
your target!), and protecting the environment--values that are seldom,
well, valued anymore. I confess to a Teddy Roosevelt blend of politics
as a result, and tend to annoy both liberals and conservatives. Blind
dogma stinks, and I hate seeing ouur country divided along cultural
lines between red and blue states. I like thinking for myself.

All this travel and training formulated a strong desire to build my own
(damned) house out of locally-procured and recycled (if possible)
materials, and that the house should remain off-grid, powered by solar
panels. I built this house south of La Crosse nine years ago; it's of
timber-framed construction, and insulated with plastered strawbales
(anyone ever heard of strawbale construction?). The house is powered by
the sun with eight, 100-watt solar panels, and I obtain household water
needs some 200-year-old piece of technology called a water ram (that the
Amish still use). Not that the device itself is 200 years old, just the
concept regarding how it works. I built my own with PVC and galvanized
metal fittings, and it's powered by the water gushing out of the eye of
one of my springs that promote the cyclic action of two check valves,
which harness the energy and inertia of moving water, pumping it 275'
laterally and 18' vertically from the source to my house. I describe all
my cabin's operating systems at my website found below my signature
block. This phase of my life can best be characterized as 'Earth First!
meets the NRA. . . .'

>From my obsession to build my own (damned) house, thereby meeting
>Maslow's hierarchy of needs on my own terms, sprang an obsession with
>the craft of timber-framing. I began collecting vintage chisels,
>mallets, axes, and slicks, and away I went, crafting large joints,
>building crew-served sawhorses, a saw bench, and a Roubo workbench
>(inspired by Chris Schwarz's excellent article in the Fall 2005 issue
>of WoodWorking magazine. This activity led to an increased fascination
>with vintage hand tools, and by then, I had fallen well down the
>slippery slope that SWMB cocks a disapproving eyebrow to this day on my
>activity. One thing I kept realizing during this stage, was that I
>thought it rather unAmerican to rely so much a a couple of cheap
>Japanese saws to make my saw cuts. Loved the way they worked, but
>working with them just didn't sit right with me. I'm no xenophobe, but
>(dammit) I wanted to learn to saw 'Merican! Hence, my foray into Pete
>Taran's most excellent web site at vintagesaws.com, and down the slope
>I went. But here I digress. . . I was about to leave the Army and had
>to figure out what I really wanted to be when I grew up. In my neurotic
>madness, I turned to eBbay.

So--to justify my endless fascination with vintage tools, I began
restoring tools and selling them on eBay, determined to find a niche in
the galoot world, where I could modestly supplement my Army retirement--
besides, most businesses hiring officers tend to shy away from overpaid
Colonels unless you're seeking employment somewhere in the military
industrial complex, and I'd decided that becoming a contractor for the
defense department wasn't where I wanted to go. Back to eBay. My wife
calles this my 'hobby-job' and would really rather see me wash more
clothes and do more dishes. Here I must confess that recall from active
duty for another Afghan or an Iraq assignment beckoned. You see, the
Army is like a diseased, disloyal prostitute you keep dragging your butt
back to time and again, because you just can't let the old wench go and
you love her. But sooner or later, you just have to grow up. Determined
to adapt to civilian life, I renewed my commitment to spend spend most
of my time chasing our 3 and 4-year-olds around our old four-square
house in La Crosse, do more clothes and dishes, teach part-time at the
local community college (speech and written communication), and seek
every spare moment to work on my tools and my off-grid cabin south of
town. At any rate, there I was one night hovering over my Roubo,
flattening the benchtop in prep to saw up some lumber I milled from my
property to make yet another Chris Schwarz project, and I realized that
it was high time I got around to sharpening up my Simonds mitre saw
driving my Millers Falls Langdon Acme Size 2 1/2 No. 75 mitre box. I was
intimidated by this, because I had royally butchered a rather nice
thumbhole PHILADA-vintage Disston D8 rip saw in an earlier attempt. But
I was determined to sharpen my own (damned) saw. The light bulb flashed
over my head, I didn't wreck the Simonds, and I wound up shooting down
the slippery slope faster than a greased pig in an Arkansas mud-flat. I
madly began procuring saws, sharpening them, disciplining myself to
leave no flats, and selling them on eBay. One after the other. Got
better and better at it, and before I knew it, people began contacting
me for sharpening work. Built a web site. Worked on one of Chris
Schwarz's saws, and he was kind enough to post an entry on how I did it
on the WoodWorking blog. All of a sudden one day, a dozen saws showed up
on my doorstep, and even deeper into the mysterious shadows of
sharpening Valhalla I marched, armed with a growing inventory of taper
files and a clearly defined post-retirement mission.

My obsession grows--it's worse than cigarettes, Copenhagen and crack
cocaine, this saw addiction. I digress. Now I want to follow in the
footsteps of esteemed Galoots Pete Taran and Mike Wenzloff by producing
my own line of saws. So we'll see where this obsession leads. . . .

I thoroughly enjoy absorbing the wisdom of fellow Galoots on the porch
like a sea sponge chock full of wisdom absorbed thru old tool osmosis.
This is an incredible dynamic, an honorable pursuit of all that's good
in a Luddite, and I salute all of you who so freely share your insight.
I hope to reciprocate in kind one day.

Happy Galootaclause,

Mark in La Crosse

Mark Harrell www.technoprimitives.com technoprimitive6@t...

  ----- Original Message ----- From: Bill Taggart To: 'Jim Esten' ;
  'oldtools' Sent: Thursday, October 30, 2008 7:38 AM Subject: RE:
  [OldTools] Galootaclaus Opt In is OPEN!!

  Well then.

  I just opted in and noticed that the roolz for Galootaclaus require an
  up-to-date bio. I don't think I've posted a bio in a few years at at
  this point. I'll keep it brief.

  Born in Morristown, NJ, 9/11/1966. Graduated from Lehigh University,
  Bethelehem, PA, 1988, B.S. Biology. Went into the environmental field.
  Got married in 1990 to a girl I met in Biology lab. First daughter
  born 1996; second daughter born 1998.

  Became interested in handyman-type stuff by watching Bob Vila on the
  original TOH back in the late 1970's/early 1980's (I think that was
  the time period). My dad bought an old farmhouse built around the
  turn of the 20th Century and we spent years doing a lot of our own
  fixing up.

  Became interested in woodworking by watching Nahm on NYWS.

  Bought my first house in 1990, set up a tiny "workshop" in the
  basement. Acquired an old Shopsmith 10ER and a few other power tools
  (jigsaw, drill).

  Attended a craft fair and saw a guy making Windsor chairs with
  drawknife, shave horse and spoke shave. WOW. Very cool. Started to
  ponder anteek hand tools.

  Bought a Type 11 #5C at a barn sale from a very old guy who said he
  was unloading all his stuff before he died so his kids didn't have to
  deal with it. IIRC, I paid $12. My very first anteek tewl!! (Later
  stolen from me by Nathan Lindsey along with several other nice tools,
  but that's another long story).

  Started researching the plane, discovered the Old Tools Front Porch
  mailing list (that was probably about 1996? Or so?). Spent WAY too
  much time on the list every night - as evidenced by this exchange with
  List Prose Master Laureate Tom Price:
  http://homepage.mac.com/galoot_9/words_of_advice.html

  My job during the 1990's involved extensive business travel all over
  the continental U.S., so I spent about 11 years acquiring all kinds of
  tools from anteek mauls, flee markets, yard sales, estate auctions,
  etc. I was in acquisition mode. Bought lots of tools; kept some good
  ones; sold a lot of others (including some really good ones).

  Took a 6-week blacksmithing class sometime around 2000 or so
  and loved it.

  At the end of the 1990's I was burned out on travel, tired of my job,
  decided it was time for a career change. After 2-3 years of pondering,
  I ended up going to law school.

  In 2002, moved from NJ to VA to attend University of Richmond School
  of Law. Dropped off the Old Tools list for a while to focus on law
  school work.

  Graduated in 2005 summa cum laude, 1/164 (hey, sometimes ya gotta blow
  yer own horn, ya know?). Went to work for the Tax & ERISA team of
  Hunton & Williams LLP, a very large international law firm in
  Richmond, VA.

  Just a cuppla weeks ago I switched from Tax to Environmental Law -
  returning to what I know.

  Last year I built a workshop and moved all my stuff in - I have
  too much stuff!! In addition to Old Tools, I also hang out a lot
  at www.owwm.org and www.owwm.com. I have acquired several nice
  pieces of old woodworking machinery and am in the process of
  restoring all of them.

  I occasionally volunteer at a local living history museum and do
  simple blacksmithing demonstrations in 1860's period clothing.

  My website (which is sorely in need of updated):
  http://home.comcast.net/~ilikerust/

  - Bill Taggart

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