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Welcome to The Splinter Report, where I gather the assorted interesting and amusing things I’ve seen in the woodworking world. This week we’re looking at a unique shop class program, a Shaker Museum, and a short horror story.
Tool News Quick Bites
Kreg Releases New Trim Router Accessories: The accessories include a door hinge routing jig, trim router base plate, trim router circle guide, and trim router edge guide. While none of it features any earth-shattering innovations, they do look to be thoughtfully made and competitively priced.
High School Woodshop: Luthier Edition
I have many formative memories of high school shop class. I can’t step up to a table saw without thinking about the safety lessons Mr. Ness impressed upon us in the pre-SawStop era. Students at Sisters High School in Sisters, Oregon, are getting different types of lessons than what I went through, though. Instead of end tables and cutting boards, they’re building guitars.
The unusual program began 30 years ago when former teacher Tony Cosby decided to go in a different direction. He partnered with Breedlove Guitar Company to design and launch a new curriculum where students would learn how to build each component of the guitar from scratch. Crosby worked with the Sisters School District and SFF Presents to get community backing and additional support to build the program.
That legacy today continues with the current Woods and Engineering teacher, Jason Chinchen. A multidisciplinary artist, Chinchen is a woodworker, musician, and tintype photographer. (He also enjoys mountain biking and the outdoors — Jason can we be BFFs?) He took the role over five years ago after Crosby retired, though he wasn’t sure he was even qualified at first.
It turns out, career and technical educators don’t need a teaching degree. So, I applied for the job and I was one of only two applicants and with a very specific set of skills ranging from CAD design and CNC work all the way to guitar making and construction… so, here I am.
Thank goodness for that, in a time when vocational classes are still underrepresented in public schools, this unique program continues to live on. Read more about this story, including the impact it’s had on the students in the program, at opg.org. Also be sure to check out this great video from PBS on the program as well.
Shaker Museum Getting a New Home
The Shaker Museum in Chatham, New York, is undertaking a huge project to create a permanent home for the museum. This will allow the museum’s collection to be on full-time display for the first time in over a decade. The spaces they currently occupy only allow for limited guided tours, or hosting temporary events. The project includes a comprehensive renovation of a Victorian-era hotel, as well as a connected modern building whose design “embodies and perpetuates the core ideals that were at the foundation of Shaker culture, applying them in a modern and relevant context and form.”
The merging of new and old. Image from Selldorf Architects.
This project has been a long time coming. The project was originally supposed to be finished by 2023 according to a NYT story, but the groundbreaking didn’t occur until last April. The new facility should be open to the public in 2028. The Shaker Museum collection is considered to be one of the most comprehensive in the country, so having it fully available to the public is a very exciting change.
Random Reddit: One Sentence Horror Story
I was scrolling Reddit the other day when I saw this post and almost fell out of my chair:
“Wobble dado on my radial arm saw” sounds like a song title about someone loosing all of their fingers.
For the uninitiated, radial arm saws have a (somewhat undeserved) reputation for being dangerous. Likewise, wobble dados carry the same (also somewhat undeserved) noteriety. Either one of them should be used with the upmost care, by an experienced woodworker. They should never be used together, especially not by a beginner. Because yes, this question was naturally posted to r/BeginnerWoodWorking by someone who was swapping a blade on their saw for the very first time.
Now I want to make it abundantly clear that I’m not shaming this person. I’m redacting their identity in case they don’t want their learning opportunity to be shown on such a public stage. The truth is that this is a very scary and dangerous scenario, especially with the blade mounted with so little thread on the nut. Not checking before going ahead with this setup could have very easily ended in a trip to the hospital. Thankfully the members of the subreddit not only gave excellent advice, but were very careful to be polite while doing so. And to their credit, the original poster recognized that they needed to go about their original task in a way that more alligned with their current skillset. A happy ending for a situation that could have ended much differently.
Out of Context Christopher Schwarz Quote
“The thing I sometimes neglect to mention is that boards (like cats) can behave unpredictably.”
Video of the Week: Another Music Video
This week, instead of a music video about woodworking, I’m sharing a music video from a woodworker. Yes, the aforementioned tech ed teacher Jason Chinchen has a YouTube channel where he occasionally shares videos of mountain biking, rock climbing, and playing stringed instruments. Soak in the music, reflect on your memories of high school shop class, and enjoy your Friday.
Anything interesting I missed this week, or that you want me to highlight in a future Splinter Report? Let me know on social media or drop me an email at cknoff@aimmedia.com.
