OldTools Archive

Recent Bios FAQ

125484 Joshua Clark <jclark@h...> 2003‑12‑08 Bio Update: Joshua Clark
Well, I might as well follow the crowd and post a bio update as well. A
lot has changed since I joined the list almost four years ago..

I am a Unix Systems Administrator for a software development company in
NY. I started with woodworking about four years ago.  At first I was
misguided and invested in several tailed daemons. At the time, SWMBO and I
lived in a small condo.  My shop consisted of 1/2 of the living room.  As
it turns out, operating a belt sander and circular saw in the house wasn't
a good thing for our relationship. I bought a book from Stanley on
woodworking with hand tools and bought my first plane. Soon after I
discovered the porch, and it was all downhill from there.

I started to attend auctions, tag sales, etc and, along with the help of
the Porch, I acquired a decent set of user tools. During the next few
years I completed several projects, enough to justify having commandeered
the coat closet to hold my hand tools.  My biggest project to date was an
oak bed which I finished only 3 months behind schedule.

My wife and I were married in May of 2003, and just celebrated our
six-month anniversary. Two months ago we moved from Stamford, Connecticut
to Oxford, a  more rural area.  We have a nice little house on 3 acres
full of birch, beech, and maple trees. My shop is now in half of our
two-car garage.  What difference!

As far as tools are concerned, I have two main interests.  Saws are my
first love.  I found myself enamored with them straight away for some
reason. Maybe it was because they're fairly inexpensive compared to
planes. I've a small assortment of saws, most of which I use on a regular
basis. I "collect" small (14 inch) Disston panel saws and saws made by
Harvey Peace. I don't recall how I got into Peace saws, perhaps it was
because by Grandfather grew up in Brooklyn.  I've been researching and
collecting examples of H.W. Peace's saws and I'm attempting to put
together a web page for reference.

I'm also interested in making and using wooden planes. I was lucky enough
to take some wonderful classes on making wooden planes, one hosted by our
own Tod Herrli.  One of these days I intend to start making some planes,
once I get the shop settled, perhaps.  I've got a load of quartersawn
beech waiting to be turned into planes that's drying at the moment.. It
was almost dry, until the roof blew off the stack during one of those big
storms this fall. I didn't realize it for quite some time, and the pile
got pretty wet.  Big disappointment.

Speaking of web pages, I have a small site with some old tool content:
http://www.hyperkitten.com. I have a couple of project pages on frame
saws, moldings, etc. as well as two important pages from the early years
of the list by one Jay Southerland. The first is the Stanley Plane Dating
Page, which has a great flowchart to help you date your plane, amongst
other things. The second is the router plane type study, which is a great
read. These pages were lost over time, but a few years ago several of use
were able to recover them using the Wayback Machine. The plane type study
gets almost 3000 hits per month, so there must be quite a few Galoots out
there :) I also collect old tool related advertisements, most from the
1920's. I've scanned many of these ads and made them avaialble on my site.
I've learned a lot from these ads, and really enjoy them. I've got another
update coming soon with additional three dozen ads.

So, that's me in a nutshell.  I still consider myself a novice Galoot, and
I'm constantly learning from the members of the Porch.  I've made some
great friends here over the past few years.  Thanks for that gentle push
down the slope..

Thanks for listening,
	-Josh in CT-



Recent Bios FAQ