Found Great-grandpa this morning

[kmealy]

I was doing some repair and build work at the furniture bank this morning.  While walking from the work area to the office, I saw this chair sitting in inventory.   I asked one of the managers if she'd consider selling.   She did and I brought it home.  Someone probably just gave them "a dirty old chair."
 

 

It's a very classic design and has a genuine hickory bast woven seat.  It appears that maybe the front legs were turned or delicately carved a bead.  But otherwise, it's very similar to one I made.

In 1992, I took a week-long class in western NC with Drew Langsner at his farm.   It was a class in "Make a Chair from a Tree" by J. Alexander.  We started off Monday morning with a log, had a couple of field trips during the week, and left Friday noon with a chair.   Wedge, froe, drawknife, spokeshave, brace & bit, and chisel were the only tools we used all week.  Every piece has grain orientation to maximize strength of the joints (wet-dry joinery).  The posts were slightly wet and the rungs over-dried in a homemade kiln.   When the equalize, they lock in place.  28 years later, they're still no wobble in them.  Take that, dowel joints.   Since I didn't have a spare hickory tree that I could sacrifice for the bast, I used Shaker tape.

 

Edited June 22, 2020 by kmealy

[Gunny]

Wow!!

[Gunny]

Wow!!

[Gerald]

That is a nice chair, oh oh , two nice chairs

[Cal]

Great find Keith, I am sure that you will give it a good, loving home

[John Morris]

Keith, just saw this post, I'm heading out the door right now, but I just wanted to say, what a wonderful old chair you found! That is a chair-makers study dream. Great find!

Your two chairs are wonderful too!

[HARO50]

On 6/22/2020 at 5:52 PM, Gunny said:

Wow!!

You can say THAT again!

John