While I do not classify myself a master craftsman by any means I do love woodworking whenever I can find the time to do it. I got started in woodworking by watching my father who was very talented in many different fields. He was a machinist by trade and he too did woodworking as a hobby of sorts. I say hobby of sorts because back in the 40's and 50's a lot of what he designed and made was more out of necessity than just plain fun.

By the time I was ten years old I was running woodworking and metal working machinery on my own. While I had a lot of failures back in those days I also learned a lot and eventually became more proficient.


Today I run my own company, Tooling Research Incorporated, out of Walpole, Massachusetts. The company is an engineering/machine design house and is a full service machine shop. Even at 72 years old this company still takes up a majority of my time so my woodworking and carving projects are few, but I do enjoy getting lost in the occasional woodworking project once in a while, especially on the cold winter days up here in Maine where I now reside. I would love to have more time to devote to my hobbies.

Everything I have done so far, from oak fireplace mantels to designing and building screen houses and tool sheds has been either for my own personal use or as gifts to others.


I love watching woodworking shows and getting the magazines. I am particularly fascinated by those shows depicting woodworking as it was done more than a century ago. I think woodworkers are some of the most innovative people on the planet.

I've always been an avid woodworker but several years ago I was reading a book on chip carving so I bought a few tools and started in. One of my first projects was to dress up a rather plain mantel by carving a custom panel. Below is the result.

This dragon carving was made for a friend in Ecuador.