Popular Woodworking 2009-08 № 177, страница 55

The Woodwright's School

Check your cell phone and dozuki at the door.

Great Woodshops

BY CHRISTOPHER SCHWARZ

All by band. Roy Underbill's new school in North Carolina seeks to immerse students in a 1930s woodworking experience.

R

I Voy Underhill picks up the grungiest wooden jack plane you've ever seen and cradles the old tool tenderly in his work-hardened hands.

The tip ofthe plane's tote ismissing. The iron is dark and short. The wedge looks like it has been struck by a thousand golf balls. The entire stock ofthe plane is coveted in a jet-black substance, with the exception of three areas: the plane's sole, its tote and a band-shaped area at the toe.

"It's covered in mutton tallow," Underbill says about the plane. "They used it on everything. A lubricant."

Ifapropercollectorpickedupthisplane, he would do one of two things: Clean it until it gleamed or heave it into the burn pile with the rest ofthe world's grungy jacks. But for Underhill, this plane is almost a holy relic.

"This isthe rarity I'm into," Underhill says. "See where his hands were? Thisplane saw a tremendous amount of hard use."

Th is Greenslade h andpla ne belonged to Robert Simms, a traditionally trained English joiner who later worked restor ing piece s for Colonial Williamsburg. Simms got the plane from another joiner before hiin. And nowUnderhill has it. But the tool isn't under lock and key. It's a working tool and livesin a tool chest.

As Underhill explains the plane's provenance he picks a thick shaving from the tool's mouth. It's a fresh curl of pine or ash that he's been planing in his new shop and woodworking school in Pittsboro, N.C,

This plane is one of the dozens of tools Underhillhasbeen sharpeni ng and tuning in preparation for the fi rst classes of The Wood-wright's School, Underbill's latest venture in woodworking education. After 30 years of writing and hosting "The Woodwright's Shop" television show on PBS, Underhill has

62 t Popular Woodworking August 2009

decided to also offer classes in the style of handwork he demonstrates on the show.

Part ofthe Town

After he decided to open a woodworking school, he had to find the right location. So Underhillscouredthe North Carolinacoun-tryside until he happened upon Pittsboro, a tidy town of 2,500 outside the bustling

cities of Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill There he found a storefront with big bay windows that looks out on Hillsboro Street, Lhe town's main drag.

In addition to the other occupied storefronts, Underbill's school is next door to a vintage-looking ice cream parlor (compleLe with Lin ceiling) and directly in front of an appeal ingciLy pu b (comple Le wilh laps serv-

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