I grew up in my grandfather, Dan Poe's, woodshop. He was actually my step-grandfather, the man my grandmother married after her first husband, my dad's father, passed away. He was an interesting character to say the least. Born and raised in Beckley, WV, he spent time in the coal mines, fought with his fellow Marines in WWII, and eventually ended up working for Ford Motor Company.
When he retired from Ford, Dan didn't want to just sit around in his rocking chair and watch the years pass by. He had some equipment and acquired more as the years passed. He set to making small pieces of furniture and eventually grew to making a variety of tables, gun cabinets, dry sinks, and the like. This was before the days of the internet, so his patterns were his own, his style was his own, and his development as a craftsman was all his own. He would often make what he referred to as "goofs", but he learned from those "goofs".
I was a very young boy, 5 or 6 years old, when I first ventured into his shop with him. He would let me pound nails into scrap wood while he worked on his projects. He would get me to hold pieces in place while he joined them together. I learned later that the clamps were probably doing most of the work, but it gave me something to keep my hands busy and he would always tell people that I helped him build the piece.
The first piece that I actually did help in the construction of was a three-legged table. We used his lathe to turn the legs individually. None of the legs were
exactly the same, but they were pretty close for a 10 year old kid using a lathe for the first time. That piece was prominently displayed in the foyer of their home as long as they lived there. Dan would always tell people that I made that table. It was source of pride for both of us although he deserved most of the credit.
I drifted away from the shop over the years of going to school, starting a family, and collecting a few careers. Dan passed away when I was a sophomore in college, and his shop sat idle, collecting dust for the most part since then. A middle-aged man now, I have been drawn back into the woodshop. It started with needing a custom mantle for my new home. Then there were some repairs that had to be done to furniture in my home. My church needed a large coffee table for a meeting area, so I again called on what I had learned to make that a reality. Being back in Dan's shop (the very same one I grew up in with the very same tools) reminded me of those times spent with him. My love of creating custom furniture resurfaced after many dormant years. Now I am spending more time with my personal history and I want to share that with others.
