OldTools Archive

Recent Bios FAQ

-723 jay@a... 1970‑01‑01 DuBIOus

I'm of course refering to the fourth definition of dubious: 

         questionable as to value, quality, or origin.  

Well, as for origins, I'm from Pittsburgh, PA (hi Vince).

On to value and quality.  You oldtool galoots have a GOOD thing
here, and being an oldtool newbie (is there a name for that?)
I'm terribly hesitant to run up on the porch and spew supposed
knowledge your way--especially in the presence of oldtool pillars
like--well, you know who you are...  So I've lurked for a while,
and I like the tone.  (What I *don't* like is a mailbox full of mail--
but with the DIGEST option I heard about recently, that won't be
a problem.)

So you already know I'm a lurker--but only in this virtual tool
world.  In real life I'm a 31 year old graduate student at Cornell,
studying electical engineering with a minor in goofing off.  Well,
actually material science...  I love being a student.  Except for
the money.  Or lack of money.  (But no, no, I'm really *not* looking for
student discounts on purchases or anything.)  Actually, since I've
been at Cornell for six years, the end is *actually* in sight.  The
big challenge is making progress TOWARDS it.  But that's *my* problem.

Growing up, my Dad had a Norm-shop in the basement, with all sorts of 
cool Craftsman tools from a finer era.  He was and is amazing when it 
comes to home projects--not the fine woodworking variety, but the
clever engineering kind (not that the two aren't related--sorry
if this starts a flame war...)  The key characteristics of a "Dad" 
project are originality, ease of use, and gross underestimation of
time to completion.  Babbage would be proud.  While some of his
projects end up being as easy to use as a vi editor, God knows 
they're ALL original.  For example, Dad's new basement woodshop is kind 
of small for the number of tools he has.  Along one wall he's built his
radial arm saw into the middle of a 2'x16'x3' high table unit.  No big 
deal, but press a button, and a 10" portable planer slowly emerges from
the table like a Tomcat on an aircraft carrier elevator, stopping when
the infeed bed aligns to the table surface.  His 6" jointer pulls 
out like a drawer from the same table, and other power tools (8" table 
saw, routah table, 3-wheel bandsaw) are mounted on interchangable 
modules with standardized power and dust collector interconnection 
"ports".

I know some of you may be getting a little queezy with all this power 
tool talk, but there is a point: whether it's due to genetics or
environment, I'm bonkers about tools and woodworking because of
my Dad.  I'm sure many of you can relate.  Also, in junior high I
spent one night a week learning woodworking basics from a friend of
my Dad's.  Dad was into home improvement--this guy made furniture,
so I learned a lot from him, too.  So just a word of encouragement
to any of you who are taking time to pass some of your skills on
to younger folks--it's a very good thing, and you can even earn
a little tuition money to pay for all those expensive toys...

Growing up my Dad was also massively into home computers [1], and our 
basement was full of old electronics equipment.  My parents never 
pressured me into electrical engineering, though--it just kind of  
happened.  So I went to Penn State, got an M.S., and took a
job at GTE (Good Time Engineering) Government Systems near Boston.
Now I know you're thinking, "tools - Boston - Patrick - What a coup!",
but this was unfortunately before my "awakening" to things plugless.
For that I have rec.ww to thank, in that former romantic age before,
well, you know...

Several years ago a close friend of the family left a bunch of old
woodplanes (and some furniture, too) to various members of my
family.  At the time, I didn't know a hybrid from a hole in the
wall, and neither did any of my immediates.  A little while later in
rec.ww I discovered a curious people speaking in a strange tongue,
mainly numbers and something to do with rhinoceroses.  On a hunch,
I checked out my plane, and lo, there on it's end I saw the sacred
marking "No. 27".  The "thin" planes that hung as decoration on my
parents walls had other markings!  This was getting interesting!!
Before long I had convinced the rest of my family to either give
or trade me their planes.  My brother-in-law was a little unwilling
to give up his only plane, a Stanley #26, since he like to use
it around the house to trim doors as their house settled.
Fortunately I convinced him that a slightly rusty "Victory" brand
#4 would work just as well.  Ha!  :)  (please let me know if this 
Victory brand is actually worth anything--I've never researched it, 
but if it is, I bet I could trade him something else to get it 
back...) (Yes, it's "Victory" not "Victor"...)

Now before you go thinking that I'm some spoiled plane collector
standing on the shoulders of others, keep in mind that all these
planes were definitely user-class --and nothing fancy-- no #101 1/2s
lying around or anything.  Over the past two years I've learned that
Central NY isn't a bad place to do plane hunting, and I'm slowly
building a collection of tools which I can sort of rationalize.  
I'm mainly into Stanley, but you know what it's like when you've
spent a rainy Saturday afternoon running from Antique shop to yard
sale, discovering lots of glassware, a few pukey ducks, and a single
wooden jack plane lying in a corner with no tote, wedge or blade.
So to maintain my sanity, lately I've found myself purchasing all
sorts of old woodworking stuff--rulers, saws, marking tools (oh, 
only the cheaper ones, though.)  

My basement woodshop has a mixture of Norm-tools and handtools, and 
from time to time I crank out a wedding gift for a friend, or use my
limited time and skills to craft something *special* for someone 
(nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more...)  One nice benefit of 
being single is not having to argue over money spent on tools.  I
also think it can be argued that a plane collection is a useful
"potential relationship" litmus test--I find so few people actually 
give a rip about old tools that when you find a woman-friend
that actually picks up a plane and asks a follow-up question, 
it's almost a dead-giveaway that she's interested in you.  Of 
course this is all theory--it's never actually happened to me, 
but I live in hope...  :)  (Oh, another thing about me--I'm 
definitely not PC).  (For more on this facinating side of old tools, 
look for my new book, "Love and the (Perpetually) Single Plane 
Collector")

Okay, back to planes.  I started out collecting Stanley bench
planes.  As a woodworker, they're terribly easy to justify,
especially when your friends ask "So why do you have so MANY
of them?" and you grab a rough piece of wood and start demonstrating
why before they can change the subject.  Bench planes got me 
interested in the whole plane dating thing.  With Patrick 
O'Toolslinger's foundation-laying work, I came up with the 
Stanley Bench Plane Dating Page on the WWW:
 http://peta.ee.cornell.edu/~jay/ww/planes/dating/  
I'm hoping to improve the Dating Page in a number of ways in the next couple of months. First, Stan Faullin has graciously offered to photograph various features of his #4 for inclusion in the page. Second, I'm working on a frame-based version of the page that will be much easier on the eyes. Third, as a result of some strange internal compulsion, I'm finding myself interested in doing Web pages for other type studies. This last interest is quite strange, because I know it will take lots of time and only lengthen my stay in grad school, BUT I JUST DON'T CARE!!!!!!!!! Thanks to help from Lars Larson, a Stanley #71 & 71 1/2 type study is also currently in the works. If you have any type studies sitting around that you think would be useful to have on the Web, let me know. Or if you're the author of a type study, and you're willing to release a crippled "teaser" version of your study in exchange for some free advertising of the real thing, send me some e-mail. One last thing that's totally unrelated to woodworking: I have a dog and her name is Gwen. She's a furry white miniature American Eskimo Spitz that has an unquenchable thirst for attention, and the most faithful representation of unconditional love I've ever experienced. Well, not counting God and my parents... Anyway, she's been to as many antique dealers in the Northeast as I have, and she never seems to mind. Dogs are cool, and in my book they're the only love money *can* buy. http://peta.ee.cornell.edu/~jay/gwen/
Sorry this is kind of long--I guess I'm making up for lost time. I'll probably focus most of my contributions on trying to provide some useful Web pages. If you have any ideas on other kinds of plane information that would be useful to have on the Web, please let me know... At this rate, I may never graduate... (But at least I've got some cool planes and a roof over my head.) Jay Sutherland Ref: [1] J. Tomayko, "Electronic Computer for Home Operation (ECHO): The First Home Computer," IEEE Journal of the History of Computing, vol. 16, no. 3, Fall 1994, pp. 59-61. -- Jay Sutherland |\/| ** Gwen, jump. Good puppy! 113 Phillips Hall (,,) ** Ithaca, NY 14853 607/255-5034 o/ ---* gwenpup@i... jay@e... c==____(_\ http://peta.ee.cornell
http://peta.ee.cornell.edu/~jay/ \\= .edu/~jay/gwen/
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Recent Bios FAQ