iDRY Vacuum Kilns

Sponsors:

Andy Rooney the woodworker

Started by RichlandSawyer, May 28, 2006, 11:30:16 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

RichlandSawyer

Several years ago i was at a book sale and picked up an old copy of American Woodworker magazine. There is an interview with Andy Rooney of "60 minutes" fame about his woodworking and his shop. I wanted to share a bit of the article because it really hits home with me and i'm sure some of you can relate to.


A BIT ABOUT MY WOOD
By Andy Rooney

When i come home with wood i have found in some obscure sawmill, lumberyard or farmers barn, my wife invariably asks one of two questions:"Dont you have enough wood?" or alternately, "What are you going to do with that?"For me, having wood is an end in itself. I own boards that i would rather have hanging on my living room wall than a Rembrandt painting. At the bottom of my wood rack, I have stickered seven cherry boards 14ft long and 25 in wide at their widest point. I used to have eight but i made two tables out of one of them. I had to eliminate one car from the garage when i built the rack to accommodate it. I bought this wood from a man who had kept it in his barn for 20 years. I like the tables but they do not give me any more pleasure than do the seven boards. I have looked down at that cherry several thousand times in the ten years i've had it and derived pleasure on every occasion. What would i do with them that could be better than that.


I completely understand how Mr Rooney feels. I have boards in my shop that i just feel i could never do them justice in a piece of furniture so they just sit on the rack and i derive great pleasure just walking by and wiping my hand across the grain. Now that the bandmill is almost finished i'm afraid i'm gonna have a hard time letting go of all that beautiful lumber that comes off the mill. I wonder if betty ford has a wing for such a thing.

My name is Tony and i'm addicted to lumber
Every log i open up, a board falls out!!!

DanG

I knew there was something I liked about that Rooney guy. :) :)
"I don't feel like an old man.  I feel like a young man who has something wrong with him."  Dick Cavett
"Beat not thy sword into a plowshare, rather beat the sword of thine enemy into a plowshare."

rebocardo

Hey, that was great, thanks for sharing it :-)

UNCLEBUCK

I use to watch Andy Rooney when I lived in the old farmhouse with a black and white tv and only one channel . He would come on sunday nights at 6pm . I never knew he was a wood guy  ??? Isnt that something . 

What really blew me away was his buddy Charles Kuralt on sunday morning always pausing for a minute and showing that running stream out in Montana . Made a guy feel like wanting to go stand in a river .

I bet Andy would have been a fun guy to have a few kanoopers with  ;D
UNCLEBUCK    bridge burner/bridge mender

Mooseherder

Have you ever noticed the Desk he gives his commentary from?
Nice thick slab of something.

breederman

I think I remember that he made that desk.(but as one ages you rembember alot of things that may or not be true. ;D)
Together we got this !

Burlkraft

On 60 Minutes once he showed his desk, which he made from a walnut slab. You can never see it though cuz it has so much crap piled on it.
Why not just 1 pain free day?

isawlogs

  I have a board , well two boards that I dont think will ever get to be anything else but that , boards . Not that these boards have any value , only that  I got them from my grand father to make shelves with when I was younger   , now its been a few years since he has gone and lit a new star in the sky , these boards have moved with me since and are piled in my shop under a whole bunch of others , they will move again this summer to a new pile and again be piled under some more and be there for a long time before I use them , maybe some day I will find something worthy of them to be put into , but until then , they will be for me look at and remember the man that gave them to me .
A man does not always grow wise as he grows old , but he always grows old as he grows wise .

   Marcel

VA-Sawyer

Marcel,
Are those boards small enough to put in some kind of display case ? I think it would be neat to 'frame' them with a letter telling their story.
VA-Sawyer

brdmkr

You mean other folks actually use the lumber they cut?  How odd!

Seriously, my wife, Sweetness I call her, reminded me that I have yet to make a single thing from any of the wood I have milled :D

My back yard is beginning to look like a mini lumber yard.  I have wood stickered everywhere!  Maybe I have a problem?  NAH!
Lucas 618  Mahindra 4110, FEL and pallet forks, some cant hooks, and a dose of want-to

SwampDonkey

An old friend of mine, for which there is a thread dedicated in this forum, tied some artificial flies for me on request. He was an avid fly tyer and atlantic salmon fisherman. I made a unique box from cherry from the farm and used a mirror to display the flies as you look through the lid of the box. There is a picture posted in the depths of the forum someplace.  Don't look in my gallery to locate it because I think it was posted at an earlier time. ;D

I also have a bambo salmon fishing rod with a spare tip from grandfather. I don't remember him ever using it. But he bought it a long time ago, before my time. It's in an aluminum tube rod case safely tucked away. ;D
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

Engineer

I have the issue of AW with Andy Rooney in it.  I'm just like him, I can appreciate the wood for just being a piece of wood, you don't need to make something out of it.  I have two halves of an apple burl that is full of ant tunnels, it was a gift from a friend who works for a tree service.  He thought it was junk.  I cut it in half lengthwise to expose the ant tunnels and I can honestly say that I can never make something from that burl that will look better than the plain burl itself.   It's gonna get a place on a shelf in my shop and sit there forever.

Or I'll sell it on eBay...   :D :D ;)

SwampDonkey

QuoteI can honestly say that I can never make something from that burl that will look better than the plain burl itself.   It's gonna get a place on a shelf in my shop and sit there forever.


Or the ants will make new galleries in the shop, by golly. ;D :D :D
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

Engineer

The ants bailed as soon as they saw the bandsaw blade coming.   ;D

Thank You Sponsors!