Wood Shop

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One of my favorite classes in high school was wood shop because you got to build something real and beautiful that you could take home and be proud of.

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Wood Shop

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When I was a sophomore in high school, I took a class in wood shop. Mr Shuttlesworth was the wood shop teacher and was the same guy that caught my cousins and I writing on the fence behind the wood shop when I was in the sixth grade. He either didn’t remember or didn’t care as we got along fine. The shop was fully equipped with every kind of wood working tool there was. We started out with raw rough cut lumber and planed it down to 1 inch stock with a huge horizontal powered plane. I made most of my projects out of Willow as it was beautiful and the most inexpensive wood they stocked. My first project was a shoe shine box that turned out beautifully. I still have that box in my closet.

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The hand made shoe shine kit.

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My next project was a coffee table that I designed myself. I drew up the plans, rough planed it and glued several pieces of wood together to get the correct width. I replaned it to correct thickness, then cut the pieces to the correct length, sanded them to get off the machine marks, and put it together. I then fine sanded it and varnished it with four coats. The coffee table turned out fantastic and my Mom loved it.

The Wood Shop hand made coffee table.

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The rest of the year I made my Mom a Book Case which was the title subject of a previous blog called ” The Bookcase”. I also made her a set of Kitchen cabinets that were still in her home when she passed away in 2001. She had my hand made furniture in her home for 41 years. Mr Shuttlesworth was a fantastic teacher and the only event we had all year was the time Scott Dickerson cut his finger off with the band saw.

Thanks for reading Wood Shop,

Bill