Thanks John
The kind of story that adds a glint (tear) to one's eye and the kind of
father we should aim to be.
Eric Hammarberg
Associate Director of Preservation
Associate
LZA Technology
641 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10011-2014
Telephone: 917.661.8176 (Direct)
Mobile: 917.439.3537
Fax: 917.661.8177 (Direct)
email: [log in to unmask]
-----Original Message-----
From: John Leeke, Preservation Consultant
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Monday, April 22, 2002 11:54 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Bent-Nail Ethic (long)
Bent-Nail Ethic
When I was about ten years old, growing up in College View, Nebraska, they
started building a new Catholic Cathedral just two blocks away from our
house. I watched the steel and masonry structure rise up into the sky, but
was more fascinated by a growing pile of junk lumber over in one corner of
the construction yard. This wood had a brownish color and the boards and
timbers were thicker than the wood I was used to working with in my dad's
cabinetmaking shop. My fingers itched to handle these rough boards and three
of them just happened to turn up in my dad's shop. I planed off the edge of
one board with my wooden plane. Sssssnick, sssssnick, sssssnick, shavings
curled off the edge revealing a smooth surface with a deep brown grain that
shimmered with a reddish glow--not walnut, not mahogany, excitedly I
thought, this strange wood is something exotic, a rare treasure. Of course,
my dad noticed the unusual boards right away and wondered, in no uncertain
terms, exactly where I got them. I confessed, "Got 'em at the Cathedral.
Looked like junk." I stammered, trying to excuse my theft. "Alright," he
admonished, "you're hauling these boards back over there right now, and
apologizing to The Cardinal." I carefully laid my plane on the bench as
tears welled up in my eyes. I drug the boards slowly up the hill, the ends
dragging along behind scruffing up the dirt in the gutter. Trudging,
trudging along, the boards were a lot heavier than when I brought them home
and it struck me that my end was surely near. Dad was right behind me making
sure I went all the way. Then one of the boards slipped, scraping up my fore
arm, and hit the pavement with clap. I turned to pick up the board, my eyes
caught his and burst into tears. Dad knelt down and helped me gathered up
the boards. His strong hand settled on my shoulder, I glanced up and he
observed, "This wood is too nice for junk," with a hint of a twinkle in his
eye. Together we carried those heavy boards, end by end, on up to the
Cathedral, and right into the Cardinal's office. I remember sweatin' it out
in there, with my dad and The Cardinal. I can't recall at all what was said,
but somehow we all walked out of there like we were old friends. Those three
boards were mine, and I was grinning. The Cardinal walked us out to the
construction site, introduced us to the foreman, and we walked away from
there that day with permission to haul away as much of that "junk lumber" as
we wanted. Looking back now, I see my dad always held us kids responsible
for our actions, but also provided an escape hatch for us to wiggle through.
Every week a truckload of crates holding big slabs of marble and carved
statues arrived at the Cathedral site. I came just as often to haul the
empty crates over to our shop. I made friends with the tradesmen, and they
showed me how to get more work done in less time "easy is as easy does." I
learned how to knock apart a crate with the weight of a sledge hammer, how
to tuck a little block of wood under the claw of the hammer to ease out a
nail without breaking the handle, and how to wrench out a long spike with a
heavy crowbar. One day the foreman told me not to leave any more of my bent
nails laying around. When I started bending over picking them up, one by
one, a couple of the masons laughed at me with a joke about "bending over
for bent nails." It made me mad, but one old carpenter shouted them down,
reached over into his tool box and pulled out the biggest magnet I ever saw.
It had a handle and I could walk around with that magnet hanging down and
the nails would jump right up out of the dust and stick to the magnet. Then
they called me "Johnny Jump Up" and we all had a laugh. After that they
always called me "Johnny Jump Up" and I felt like part of the crew. I ask
the old carpenter what kind of wood the crates were made of. He didn't know
but the foreman said the crates were from Italy, so it must be some of that
Italian wood. They always seemed happy to see me coming and let me do my own
work on the crates. One day those same two masons took pity on me dragging
the boards and timbers home by hand. They showed me how build a lumber dolly
with an old roller skate. Over the next two years I could often be seen
trundling my roller skate rig down the hill--a tall stack of boards and
timbers with a bucket of bent nails balance up on top rattling away.
That wood was fine stuff. It planed up real nice, never warped or twisted
and seemed to melt away from the sharp steely edges of my carving tools like
it was butter. We saved that wood for the finest cabinets and furniture. It
took shellac and hand-rubbed oil with a depth of finish that you could reach
right into. We never did learn exactly what kind of wood it was. We just
called it Italian Crate Wood.
After a year or so all those bent nails from the crates had accumulating
into quite a pile over in a back corner of the shop. One day Dad said,
"Clear out all those nails and take them on over to Vint's." Now there were
two strange things about nails in our shop. We never bought any nails, yet
we always had plenty. And, since I was a little kid it was always my job to
take any bent nails over to our neighbor Vint across the road who was
retired. I would run over to Vint's with a hand full of bent nails, Vint
would thank me kindly, then head down into his cellar. Strange. My dad
explained Vint's involvement with nails like this. Vint had just one passion
and just one pastime. His passion was a never ending war with the squirrels
who dug holes all across his front lawn. To ease his mind from this struggle
Vint's pastime was the peaceful occupation of straightening bent nails. It
was a bad year for squirrels and when I began to arrive with buckets and
buckets full of bent nails I became Vint's friend for life. My dad advised
me to stick with Vint for a while and help him out with his nails. So, for
several weeks that summer I worked with Vint.
That first day Vint gave me a tour of his cellar, which was set up as a
single purpose workshop. Right in the middle of the floor was a tree stump
with a short length of railroad rail mounted on it, a hammer laying on the
rail and a wooden chair beside the stump. Vint had lined all four walls from
floor to ceiling with bins made of one-gallon olive oil tins tilted on an
angle. He showed me his system for categorizing all the nails by metal,
length and type. He had all the usual nails that I knew: common, finish,
brads and spikes made of plain steel, galvanized and copper.. These took up
just one wall. The other three walls contained a wonderment of tenterhooks,
ringshanks, sprigs, rosehead, cut, etc.., made of aluminum, bronze, wrought
iron, monel metal, bronze and more.. At lunchtime Vint and I went up stairs,
grabbed a quick sandwich and headed back down to the cellar. Vint tied a
leather apron around his waist, sat down, picked up his hammer and a nail
and began tamping it on the rail. He held that nail up to the light, gave it
one more tamp and handed it to me, saying, "I guess you know where that goes
by now," with a nod of his head as a clue he was already starting on the
next nail. After a while I knew where a few of the nails went and the pace
picked up, but he was always a little ahead of me. Just for fun he would
match is tamp, tamp, tamp, with my own tramp, tramp, tramp as I walked
around and around the cellar. I learned more about the types of nails, where
they belonged and the pace quickened. Vint had me running around his cellar
in circles all afternoon. Then, when I would be over in one corner of the
cellar looking for the tenterhooks, I hear a plink over in the other corner.
On my next nail I'd hear plink, plink on opposite sides of the cellar. I
looked at Vint, he grinned and showed me his amazing trick. He was tossing
the nails into the correct bins from the middle of the cellar. It was the
end of the day so Vint suggested, "Tomorrow bring your favorite hammer."
When I showed up the next morning there were two stumps and two chairs in
the middle of the cellar and Vint was just sliding another section of
railroad rail out from under the nail bins.
One day we were tamping away on the nails and there was a frantic commotion
at one of the cellar windows. A squirrel was trapped in the window well.
Vint got a wild look in his eyes and snarled, "I hate those squirrels," but
then his eyes melted and he smiled to say, "but, I love my neighbors. So, I
help out as a I can by giving them nails when ever they need some."
That summer I learned a lot about nails, and a lot about life working with
Vint and his nails. By August I was back working hard in the shop, making a
set of furniture out of the Italian wood with my dad. Sometimes after a long
day I'd be drifting off to sleep in my bed and could hear a faint tink,
tink, tink. It was Vint, working into the night on his nails. Tink, tink.
Tink.
After the Cathedral was complete my dad thought it would be nice to thank
the church for all the hardwood and lessons learned. So, I made a bench for
the Cardinal out of some of that nice Italian Crate Wood , with carvings at
each end, all held together with a few of Vint's bent nails.
John Leeke
April 2002,
College View, Nebraska
--
To terminate puerile preservation prattling among pals and the
uncoffee-ed, or to change your settings, go to:
<http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/bullamanka-pinheads.html>
--
To terminate puerile preservation prattling among pals and the
uncoffee-ed, or to change your settings, go to:
<http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/bullamanka-pinheads.html>
|
