I recall, I think, two articles in FWW about Jimmy Carter’s woodworking. Would that all US presidents took up woodworking, eh? It might improve them quite a bit. 🙂
From the perspective of a Brit, Jimmy Carter always seemed a very good and human person, something that can’t be said about many US presidents. I read this, describing something of his essence:
Carter’s blend of moral authority and folksy charisma produced moments of unusually frank national dialogue. In a 1979 speech, he spoke semi-spontaneously for half an hour about a “crisis of confidence” – “a fundamental threat to American democracy … nearly invisible in ordinary ways”. Americans had fallen into a worship of “self-indulgence and consumption”, he said, only to learn “that piling up material goods cannot fill the emptiness of lives which have no confidence or purpose”.
That was some prescience. As I recall, his popularity following that speech increased a lot – but was gradually undermined by the usual suspects and their Panglossian Pollyannaristic yelps of inglorious “positivity” about self-indulgent consumerism being the wonderful end of history.
I wonder if FWW will do a third article about the man and his woodworking? I hope so.
Replies
Please leave the politics out of woodworking. This President was a good woodworker and produced some fine woodworking in their life. Why mudding the waters here with politics. I think most reading this periodical want to see the best of what others produce with their hands, minds and hearts.
Politics?
Jimmy Carter expressed in the above quote something reflected in his woodwork - a belief in the personal and individual life rather than one dictated by a thoughtless consumerism. You can find a related theme in another thread hereabouts concerning the handcrafted rather than the mass-produced.
If you think that this is "politics" of some divisive kind this perhaps reflects the current oversensitivity to any and everything as an emblem of some sort of "us vs them". Jimmy Carter seemed a good man who looked for a kind of virtue sort by many woodworkers - a desire to create useful things of intrinsic value, both to be creative himself and to take part in a self-sustaining community of such folk.
spot on, lat_axe.
There was not a single political statement in his post, lol.
Hit the nail on the head with "sensitive"
He was a wonderful individual. As I was laying in bed this morning listening to the news about him from some individual who worked with him, I was thinking how much he accomplished after his presidency. I suddenly realized that he left the Presidency around 56 years old. I am 56 years old. It gives me great hope that I can still accomplish great things and that it’s possible the best is yet to come.
This isn’t political. Carter is probably the only president in the last century that could swing a hammer, and he was an accomplished woodworker.
Something I did not know until a couple years ago was that Carter, then an officer on a US Navy nuclear submarine, came to Chalk River, Ontario to aid in “the world’s first nuclear accident”. His aid in leading a crew was extremely valuable. As a Canadian I’m embarrassed I had never before heard the story.
Rest in peace Jimmy. Your kind will be missed!
I live in Atlanta GA and am a long time customer and fan of Highland Woodworking (formally known as Highland Hardware). Many years ago I attended a presentation there by either Tage Frid or Sam Maloof, I can't remember which, as I've seen both of them present there. In any case, during the presentation the presenter paused for a second and then said "next slide Mr. President". I turned around and there was Jimmy Carter manning the slide projector!!! It was so very cool.
I was also fortunate to have done some design work for the Jimmy Carter Library which was built after he left office. There were probably 3 or 4 of his woodworking projects displayed in the center.
Nice story, thanks for sharing it.
That's cool, thanks!
Here's the first FWW article on a former woodworker..
Jimmy Carter, Woodworker
A visit with the former president, and drawings of his porch swing
By Jim Cummins #46–May/June 1984 Issue
Synopsis: Jim Cummins spent some time with former President Jimmy Carter, in the days before he became known for supporting Habitat for Humanity and his proficiency with a hammer. Carter can swap sawdust stories with anybody. As a teen, he used to participate in a competition to determine from plans the length, pitch, and valley angle of a rafter, then with hand tools, cut it to fit. One year, he won. He made more than fifty pieces of furniture, and for their vacation cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains, he made furniture from wood recycled from the house where his wife, Rosalynn, was born. His favorite tools are a drawknife and some spokeshaves, he says, and he shows his sense of humor: he saved and framed the first dovetail he ever made, following directions in one of Tage Frid’s book. More information about his proficiency and skills at woodworking follow these stories, and side information drawings and directions on how to build a porch swing that Carter designed.
https://www.finewoodworking.com/1984/06/01/jimmy-carter-woodworker
There's another article about the man in FWW #174:
https://www.finewoodworking.com/2004/12/01/jimmy-carter-on-woodworking
Thanks for posting this. Jimmy Carter was a sort of role model for me in many ways - his woodworking and involvement in Habitat for Humanity among them.
I’ll go find his “Crisis of Confidence” speech on YouTube and listen to it again. He was probably the last president who understood simpler times, the value of making things with your own hands, growing up and working on a farm, conservation and more.
Ever since then, we’ve all been referred to as “consumers” in the media about a thousand times a day … the primary value of a human being in modern society being determined by how much $$ they spend every month.
In FWW #167 (2004 Annual Tools & Shops Issue), page 88, there is an all-wood handscrew that Jimmy Carter made from trees on his property, and he mentions that the screwbox and tap that he used to make it were the only compensation he accepted from making a speech at an unnamed university. Contrast that with the exorbitant fees that other former presidents have charged.
This was twenty years ago, and I only remember this because I had a large cabinetmaker's toolchest I made, based on Duncan Phyfe's documented toolchest but with a second sliding till and some decorative veneered surfaces, featured in the same article as his contribution.