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WORKING WITH TOOLS is a 95-page publication of the Leisure League of America. The book's author, Harry J Hobbs, over about three decades, wrote numerous books dedicated to woodworking, including becoming co-author, in 1975, of the authoritative Know Your Woods: A Complete Guide To Trees, Woods, And Veneers.

(The senior author for Know Your Woods is always given as Albert Constantine, Jr. Constantine's wood and tool supply store -- http://www.constantines.com -- has served amateur woodworker's needs in woods and tools since 1812, many decades before the glut of wood and tool stores that we know today existed.

Albert Constantine, Jr., who died in 1967, left a legacy, and a philosophy:

"Woodworking isn't a miracle. It's something everyone can do. Today, more than ever before, people realize that they don't have to be a professional woodworker to success-fully work with wood. They're rediscovering wood."

Source: Wood Magazine, June 1986, p. 100

I will include more on the role of Constantine's in fostering the amateur woodworking movement in the narrative chapters.)

First, here's a little background on the Leisure League of America (LLA):

Earnest Elmo Calkins’ 1935 booklet, Care And Feeding Of Hobby Horses, launched this voluntary organization. (Calkins -- 1868-1964 -- was a noted figure in advertising in the 1930s -- for background, checkout this link.) For the LLA -- headquartered in the brandnew Rockefeller Center, built in New York City in 1929-34 -- the scope of leisure times activities was visualized as almost being limitless. Calkins’ booklet – the introduction is by Walter B. Pitkin -- lists approximately 700 ways to spend leisure and has a complete bibliography on most of these subjects to help you discover what hobby you would be most likely enjoy.

Calkins addresses issues such as 1, “Getting More Joy Out Of Life”; 2, “What Is Play?”, 3 “A Hobby Makes You Interesting To Other People”, 4, “The Things You Might Do”.

According to Calkins,

• Leisure is an opportunity to recreate energy and build up mental and physical health, both of which are essentials to happiness, whether in work or in play;

• Most people do not appreciate the value of physical activity;

• Too little foresight and planning are given to our leisure;

• Individual leisure-time activities should be chosen that will benefit the community as well as give pleasure to the individual;

• "Fantasy" is a rich possession of the human race, because through it we escape the burdens of life;

• Our present industrial system with the deadening influence of the automatic machine makes the right use of leisure of tremendous importance in preserving an enlightened citizenship.

Moreover, says Calkins, when we seriously address leisure, there are at least two matters that rise to the surface as the most significant: first, that there is a hobby for everybody, but, second, that each of us must in some way find for himself that thing that he really wants to do.

People who play at a craft or an art are called "amateurs"—to distinguish them from professionals who are paid for doing the same things—and the meaning of amateur is lover. An amateur is one who does for love what other folks do for money.

"Hobby" is merely a convenient and handy word to designate the favorite occupation of an amateur. It does not include all the recreations and amusements available for our choice. While all hobbies are recreations, not all recreations are hobbies. Among recreations games and sports must be included, and there are other pursuits, some of which are actually studies and belong in a class by themselves.

“For convenience in talking about them,” says Calkins, “we might roughly group the amusements, diversions, or occupations available for leisure into four large divisions or classes”:

1. Doing things

2. Making things

3. Acquiring things

4. Learning things

For example, 2. “Making things”, Calkins elaborates, “opens up a whole world of pleasant possibilities—to my mind the most fascinating field, but then I am prejudiced as I belong to that class which finds its greatest outlet, not in contesting with others, but in creating something for its own satisfaction.”

For Calkins, “making things" – remember this is the 1930s, with the focus on an urban setting -- included the arts, such as painting, drawing, sculpture, music, acting. But making things also the includes the “crafts” —wood carving, weaving, carpentry, bookbinding, and not mentioned, woodworking, an umbrella term that enlarges the scope of Calkins list above “wood carving” and “carpentry”.

At this point in his booklet, Calkins turns his focus to his distinctions between “doing things” and “making things” The great difference between doing things and making things, he declares is that doing things is more social. “You do things generally in company with other people, generally in competition or contest with others, while you make things by yourself.” On the other hand, making things is “frequently the chief resource of those who are either physically handicapped (not active, nor robust nor strong nor young enough to enjoy contests of strength or endurance), or possibly merely of a solitary disposition, happier when working by, themselves.”

And, finally, buried in the middle of the booklet is, the following observation:

All over the country there are springing up amateur work shops equipped with every manner of woodworking tools, both hand and power. Dr. Richard J. Shofield, an eminent physician of New York, has such a shop with more than a thousand tools some with power, such as lathe, band saw, automatic drill where he escapes from his patients. Another New Yorker, distinguished neurologist, spends a month each year as a workman in a high-class cabinet-maker's shop on the East side.

Calkins also states in his Nation's Business article, "Depression is the Fashion,” July, 1932, v 20, p. 7:

… THE first week in December [1931] I walked into the largest hardware store in New York to buy a new sort of scroll saw. This saw was developed and perfected and put into production last summer. It had been vigorously circularized among that large and growing group of amateur wood-workers of which I am one. I had received a tip from a fellow craftsman that it was "the goods," I had seen a demonstration of it in that very store two months before. I was already sold. I came to buy.

But as the salesman booked the order he remarked: "I don't know that I can make delivery before Christmas."

I should explain that my wife and I had made a compact to spend only $20 on each other's present this year, in view of difficulties in balancing the budget and pressing claims elsewhere. The price of the saw was $19.50.

(Since the info that Calkins gives us in his July, 1932 article in the Nation's Business is very sketchy -- e.g., not giving readers the name of the manufacturer of the scroll saw, nor the name of the hardware store in New York, just for fun, I posted a question on the Old Woodworking Machines discussion board. The subsequent discussion on OWWM was both lively and imaginative: most likely the manufacturer is Delta, and model is "Delta No. 700", and the hardware is Hammacher Schlemmer. Here are links first link -- second link -- third link -- to photos of the 700, and here's link to a pdf version of the manual for the Deltal No 700 scroll saw, both posted on OWWM's website --scroll down.) Keith Bohn, an active OWWM member and specialist in the history of Delta woodworking machinery, is responsible for naming the manufacturer and model -- see post # 84627.)

Here are the Delta ads in Popular Science for the 1931 November and December issues - both these ads leave little doubt about Calkins' conviction that this new saw was "the goods", to repeat the enthusiasim he expresses above.

(My apologies for how heavy-handed my jpgs are -- as this project moves along, I hope to achieve more skill in creating more respectable web pages)

In the Delta ad in December 1931 issue of Popular Science, notice the emphasis on the saw's

"24-inch capacity" and that it can "saw wood 2 inches thick".

More background on the Leisure League of America

I have located a few publications that note the LLA, including a 1953 monthly newsletter of the Royal Bank of Canada, which addresses businessmen’s leisure activities and hobbies, one of which is woodworking.

Two other articles, contemporary to the LLA’s formation, are: first, For the journal, Hygeia, a Dr. J Mace Andress conducted a [monthly?] department, “School and Health,” designed to draw the attention of Hygeia’s readers to topics worthy of their attention. In volume 12, [precise month is missing], 1934 Andress writes about “Promoting Worthy Use of Leisure” :

ALTHOUGH it is difficult to prophesy the future, educators and social workers are quite well agreed that the worthy use of leisure will be one of the greatest educational and social problems. In fact it is not necessary to anticipate what will happen within the next few years, because the question of what to do with one's leisure is with us now.

To meet this situation the Leisure League of America has been established in New York City. It is a nonprofit organization designed to be self supporting. Its purpose is to suggest interesting things that individuals may do in their leisure and to aid them in finding the particular things they like best to do. Books written by international authorities ... are now in preparation.

Second, an anonymous article in Liberty Digest, 117 April 28, 1934, p. 38, "Spending Leisure Time":

Even just plain frittering away of spare time is to go by the boards. At least that is the plan of the newly-organized LLA Inc., which has, as its main objective, the recommending and distributing of hobbies. It has listed nearly 700 known ways of employing leisure time, and has opened headquarters at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, New York.

Going at it scientifically, the league says it will address itself to two classes of prospective hobbyists: (1) To those who can't think up a hobby for themselves and (2) to those who wouldn't know how to go about riding one if they could. The assumption is that many people are potential story writers, or fish fanciers, or hooked rug artists, or what have you. The league's function is to bring out these "submerged powers." Bridge and golf, two national pastimes, are to be frowned upon by the hobbyists as lacking in creative substance.

Below is reprinted several chapters from what I think is the first publication dedicated to assisting wannabe amateur woodworkers actually begin woodworking.

A publication of the Leisure League of America, it reflects at least two conditions:

first, the problems associated with wide-scale unemployment in America, fomented by the Great Crash and the Depression, and

second, by the reduction of weekly hours of work. For the Great Depression and unemployment, checkout this wickipedia entry. For accessible background on the reduction of weekly hours of work, click on this link to Robert Whaples online encyclopedia article.

During the 1930s, the great economic and technological advances of the 1920s, especially electrification and the "industrial revolution in the kitchen," where we saw a massive installation of electric refrigerators, cooking ranges, clothes washing machines, and the like, continued, though the pace slowed.

(This link leads to a very extensive treatment of the American economy in the 1920s decade.)

(The "industrial revolution in the kitchen" concept comes from Ruth Schwartz Cowan, "The Industrial Revolution in the Home," in The Social Shaping of Technology, Donald MacKenzie and Judy Wajcman, eds., 2d ed., Buckingham, England: Open University Press, 1999, p 283-284. Along with many other details of the 1920s, I will deal with Cowan's concept of an industrial revolution in the kitchen in more detail in Chapter 4. Later in 2006, when I get access, I will upload more info on the Leisure League of America.)

Document 10: WORKING WITH TOOLS, by Harry J. Hobbs. New York: Leisure League of America, 1935

TABLE OF CONTENTS

I FUN IN A WORKSHOP 9

II MAKING ROOM FOR THE WORKSHOP 13

If there's room in the basement, look no further. Attic is second choice. Proper lighting fixtures at low cost. How to prepare the workshop floor.

III TOOLS YOU NEED 16

Which ones to buy first. How much they cost. When to add power tools. Construction of simple tool panels and cabinets. Arranging your workshop for convenience.

IV USE AND CARE OF TOOLS 27

What each tool is used for. Keeping them in good condition. Preventing rust. How to go about your work. Joints and how to cut them. Choosing a screw that won't split your wood.

V WHAT TO MAKE 55

Build your own workbench. How to read working drawings and blueprints. Simple household furniture you can make. Wood-carving.

VI HOW TO IDENTIFY POPULAR WOODS 77

Twelve woods commonly used. Distinguished by color and grain. Hardwoods. Softwoods. Best uses for each.

VII How TO FINISH WOOD 82

Types of finishes and how to gain them. Repairing damaged surfaces. Care of brushes. Handy reference chart of finishes.

Chapter I: FUN IN A WORKSHOP

Tucked away in a closet of one of the swankiest of New York's apartment hotels there happens to be a woodworker's bench, a power lathe and an amazing assortment of hand tools ready, at a moment's notice, to make the sawdust fly!

Any night between the hours of eight and eleven o'clock apartment neighbors above, below and adjoining the workshop apartment are likely to hold up their game of bridge to identify the blows of a hammer or the groan of a saw.

If you were to trace down this nightly clamor to discover what and who is behind it you would find yourself standing in a richly furnished living room gazing into a small adjoin¬ing room that was meant for a closet but that is at present filled to capacity with a workbench, a motorized lathe, shelves laden with scrap lumber and in the center of the shop a man, middle-aged, the vice president of a staggeringly large corporation during the day, but at this moment a typical home craftsman working in his shirt sleeves over the bench.

This individual, whose name I am not privileged to disclose, became a craftsman only a few years ago when one of his young sons teased him into building a model sailboat. For that job he had to acquire a few tools, and by the time he had finished he had awakened an intense desire to build something else, anything else just to be building. That is about the way most craftsmen are made. They start out to make some special project and end up with a workshop and a barrel of fun.

If an apartment house closet measuring less than six feet wide by six feet deep can accommodate all of the essential tools and equipment necessary to an amateur craftsman's workshop there is little truth to the objection, "But I haven't the space required by a workshop." As a matter of fact it is possible to establish a workshop in a limited way even though your only workbench is the kitchen table. Space certainly is a valuable asset to any craftsman's work, but it is not a requisite.

This clothes' closet workshop is neither the smallest nor the strangest of my acquaintance. I have seen home workshops surviving, even flourishing, in a chest of drawers. One shop in particular housed all of its tools in the two lower drawers of a colonial chest. The tools consisted mainly of a set of hand carving chisels, a plane, handsaw, wooden mallet, two files, some sandpaper and glue, and a set of four small "C" clamps. The only workbench accessible to the owner of the tools was the kitchen table. Any evening when the creative spirit urged him to ply chisel to wood he simply transported the two chest drawers to the kitchen.

The smallest shop, or rather I should say the smallest tool equipment, to have achieved the greatest reward to my knowledge consists of a pair of embroidery scissors borrowed from the family sewing box. Supplementing this ingenious tool, were a razor blade with a handle attached, and a file. In justice to those earnest craftsmen who have spent thousands, (that's right, thousands) of dollars on elaborate workshop tools of every description, we can hardly call the scissors-razor blade-file triumvirate a work-shop. It is merely tool equipment. Yet the fingers behind these instruments fabricated a model ship of such expert workmanship that the model won first place in a national model-building contest in which craftsman of all ages competed. The award for this piece of work came in the form of a free cruise for him and wife aboard one of the finest liners afloat.

Swinging to the other extreme, we find home workshops that look like a merger between a carpenter shop and a machine shop. In more than one backyard, we can find build¬ings erected solely for the use of a hobby workshop. Maxfield Parrish, the well-known painter, has established a workshop on the lower floor of a two-story structure. The upper floor is used as his studio. When the light or the mood is not right for painting, he comes downstairs to try his hand at the lathe.

But workshops of these enormous proportions are not for the beginner to envy. They are something we are curious to see but will likely never have the desire to own nor the luxury to afford. Our workshop may very sensibly be restricted to only those tools for which we have a definite and constant use. It is a much better display of wisdom and talents to allow your resourcefulness to take the place of highly specialized tools. And unless you want to spend a bushel of money think twice before you buy a new piece of equipment. Be certain that you have a genuine need for it and that no tool you have already purchased can be maneuvered to pinch-hit for the new one.

Strange as it may seem, even the gay nineties knew the benefits of a workshop. Among the home craftsmen of that era was none other than the eminent Oliver Wendell Holmes, doctor and poet. To young friend Edward Bok (author of The Americanization of Edward Bok ) [preceding link is to the full text on Project Gutenberg] he said: "Do you know that I am a full-fledged carpenter? No? Well, I am. You know I am a doctor," he explained, "and this shop is my medicine. I believe that every man must have a hobby that is as different from his regular work as it is possible to be. It is not good for a man to work all the time at one thing. We doctors call it a safety-valve, and it is. I would much rather you would forget all that I have written than that you should forget what I tell you about a safety-valve."

Since the time of Oliver Wendell Holmes, craftsmanship has exerted a contagious influence upon celebrities. With headliners from the leading professions stealing away from the limelight to spend a few hours in a workshop, you will never want for better company. A partial roll call would include such names as John Barrymore, Walter Huston, [Anthony] Tony Wons, Seth Parker, Glenn "Pop" Warner and Vincent Astor.

Deems Taylor, a foremost American composer -- "The King's Henchman", "Peter Ibbetson", etc.-- is one of the most avid of craftsmen. In defense of his shop, if it needs defense, he says,

Most of us are so clever at one or two things that we have let ourselves be pretty helpless at everything else. If you can cook a meal, sew on a button, and use a saw and hammer, you can face almost any situation. If you can't do these things, you may be a railroad president, but you are not a completely self-reliant human being.

[I am investigating the biographies and archival records on these individuals -- in , hoping to locate more info, and perhaps -- even photographs. For example, by following up on the Deems Taylor connection to woodworking, I located an article -- called simply "Chores" -- commsissioned by Cosmospolitan, July, 1936, p 21, and 102 --in which he articulates an enthusiasm for amateur woodworking. as well, he notes that the author and producer, Ben Hecht, and the movie director Richard Bolslawski, are also avid amateur woodworkers.

Candidly, it makes me uncomfortable to only be able to cite amateur woodworkers that are also celebrities, strongly suggesting -- incorrectly, I hope -- that during the Depression, woodworking was only something that elites could undertake. Since I don't think that this is the case, I will continue to search for additional evidence.]

Chapter II: MAKING ROOM FOR THE WORKSHOP

If the basement can accommodate the new workshop, look no further, but select as dry a corner as possible, away from the laundry tubs, to prevent your lumber from warping and your tools from rusting. And don't move in next door to the furnace. Too much heat is bad for you and worse for the lumber. Plan the location now for the shop you hope to have some day. Later on you may want to partition the space by erecting studs between the floor and the ceiling beams to serve as a framework for wallboard. Then you will have the luxury of added wall space for hanging tool cabinets and you can lock the workshop.

The attic is a good second choice. Although it has an advantage in being drier than the basement, ordinarily some special provision will have to be made for heat in the winter. Then, too, there's some objection to carrying a ten-foot plank through the house and up the stairs to your shop, but there is an easy way around this objection -- simply make it a practice to cut unwieldy lumber into shorter lengths in the garage before transporting the stock to the attic. When the garage itself is sufficiently large for workbench and tool cabinets it can be converted into as practical a home work-shop as basement or attic.

One craftsman of my acquaintance has converted an old stable into a workshop and installed a small stove for winter comfort. In the summer time he erects a small bench on a pair of saw horses outside the shop under a spreading chestnut. Another craftsman of curiously inventive mind recently confided in me that he plans to buy a discarded streetcar for $25.00 and have it moved for $25.00 additional to his back yard. This old relic is to become his workshop.

Wherever you set up your workshop you will have to begin by cleaning house. Clear everything out of the allotted space and, if possible, whitewash the walls and ceiling. While it will not always be practical to cover the ceiling, particu¬larly if the shop is in a basement having an intricately beamed ceiling, the walls can ordinarily be covered without much difficulty. The advantage gained in added candle power in your electric lighting system is several times worth the trouble. Whitewash is purchasable in powder form at about forty cents a bag at hardware stores. It requires only mixing with water and adding a little rock salt. It should be applied freely with a wide brush.

Since most of your time in a home workshop will be spent after dark, you need good light. Don't try to get by with a 50-watt light bulb hanging from the middle of the ceiling without a reflector. You should have a 120-watt bulb and a reflector, costing as little as twenty-five cents, so arranged that the unit can be moved easily to throw its light directly on any part of the workbench. Equipped with a rubber cable that can be doubled and taped to form a loop, the light can be suspended on a length of wire strung across the workshop ceiling and can then be moved along the wire to any desired spot. If the looped section of cable is wound with electrician's tape and checked occasionally, the electric wire need never become bare from excessive use.

It is likely that the workshop floor, also, will require some preparation. If the floor is concrete it can be treated in several different ways, the easiest of which is fortunately the cheapest. After washing it clean with soap and water, spread on a solution of silicate of soda ("water glass" such as the housewife uses for preserving eggs) and when dry cover the entire floor with liquid floor wax. Occasionally thereafter shake powdered floor wax over the sections sub¬jected to heaviest wear. This surface will prevent cement dust from rising. Two coats of a special paint prepared for cement will do just as well, but the cost is much higher. Likewise, linoleum could be laid over the floor if a felt lining and a mastic cement are used, but linoleum is even a greater luxury than paint.

Before any coating is applied to a concrete floor, all cracks should be filled with a mixture of one part cement to three parts of sand with a small amount of lime added -- about one-tenth as much lime as cement.

If the floor of the workshop is made of wood, again paint or linoleum could be used, but the more practical treatment consists of nothing more than a thick coat of liquid floor wax which is afterwards built up with powdered wax. This surface keeps down the dust, can be cleaned easily and will prove to be long-wearing.

Chapter III: TOOLS YOU NEED

Since the nucleus of practically all workshops is essentially the same we can name the kinds of tools you will need for a start and later on take up in detail several bypaths of the workshop and the specialized equipment it requires.

Woodworking tools are the ones to begin with. When the owner has learned the rudiments of this type of work, when he has learned how best to hold a chisel and the scores of kindred tricks of the trade which only practice can teach him, he is ready to expand his workshop to include such power tools and metalworking tools as he may find occasion to use. Even though he may have definitely decided to acquire power tools at a later time the investment in hand tools for woodworking will not be stagnated. Hand tools are essential to every shop whether or not it can boast of power tools.

As I have pointed out in the first chapter, there is hardly any such thing as a minimum list of tools. Craftsmanship can be practiced to a limited extent with no more tools than you can put in an overnight bag; but if a reasonable variety of woodwork is to be done you will find a need for all of the tools listed in the first group.

These prices are only approximate and are listed for the sole purpose of giving the beginner a basis for figuring the cost of his prospective workshop.

This assortment includes only those tools which form a nucleus of a workshop and it has been compiled with a two-fold purpose: first, the group gives you enough tools of different uses to build any number of novelties, gifts and pieces of small furniture; and secondly, it represents a complement of tools that will remain in service even though you constantly add new tools. Admittedly, you can buy a cheaper crosscut saw, cheaper chisels and planes, but they will not give satisfactory service. Edged tools -- tools used for cutting -- must be of good quality steel or they will never sharpen to your expectation. Too, a hammer can be bought for as little as $2.00 but the head is a soft casting that is apt to chip off to the hazard of the worker. Other tools, especially those designated as "miscellaneous" can be bought safely at a low price, ranging from 5¢ for a gimlet (although it is an edged tool, it need not be an expensive one) to 20¢ for a universal bevel.

Several tools that could very well facilitate many work-shop operations have been omitted in the interest of econ¬omy, and others have been chosen because they can serve in several capacities. For instance, a back saw is eventually needed for the cutting of accurate joints, but until one can be added, the crosscut saw will pinch-hit. Furthermore, a rip saw would be welcome, but again the crosscut can do this work. Two good quality chisels, 1/4" and 3/4", have been listed as essential, and one cheap 1" chisel has been included to perform rough work until a wider range of sizes can be purchased. Because of its lower cost and greater capacity a bar clamp has been shown in preference to hand screws and "C" clamps, both of which must be added later.

Additions to the Small Workshop should include some of the following equipment.

POWER TOOLS IN THE WORKSHOP

When the time comes to buy a power tool, the jig saw should be first choice. This machine is the least dangerous in the hands of the amateur and is therefore the machine for him to make his mistakes on. This little tool, the father of the jig saw puzzle, is more capable of turning out complete projects than any other power tool. All sorts of fret-work designs, complete in themselves, can be cut out on this tool. Wall brackets of various types, book ends, inlaid pictures, wall ornaments, block letters, and other projects are samples of jig saw work. Without an accompanying motor jig saws cost from $3.00 to $20.00. A secondhand motor in good condition can be bought ordinarily for as little as $3.00 from a garage or a hardware store.

It is interesting to learn that Leonardo da Vinci, renowned painter of "The Last Supper," is credited with the invention of the jig saw.

The lathe normally should be the second power tool added to a workshop. More than any other tool the lathe extends the working scope of the shop, because without this tool, turnings are not possible. Two types of wood turnings are made on the lathe: (1) spindle turnings such as chair legs, table legs, candlesticks and other pieces requiring the outside contours of the work to be rounded; (2) faceplate turnings, one end of which must be hollowed or turned out, as a bowl or tray.

The third power tool to be added to the average work-shop should be either the drill press or the bench saw. The drill press is the jack-of-all-trades in the workshop. It can drill, sand, rout, mortise, carve, dovetail, and grind. Certainly no other power tool rivals this versatility. To the initiated craftsman these words spell l-a-b-o-r, if they must be done by hand. The drill press, then, is a real labor-saver and therefore is usually credited with third place, ahead of the bench saw.

Of course the bench saw, too, is a labor-saver but it cannot perform as many different types of work. Used chiefly for ripping and crosscutting boards the bench saw saves a lot of time but does not greatly extend the scope of the crafts-man's work. When the circular saw blade is replaced by special blades known as dado blades, the bench saw can be used for cutting grooves of any desired depth.

The jointer, used for planing stock, the bandsaw for fast cutting, and the spindle shaper for cutting fancy moldings can be added later to complete the power tool equipment.

ARRANGEMENT OF TOOLS

If you want to become a good craftsman you will have to lay out your workshop and arrange your tools in the interest of convenience. Forget about how your workshop will look when it is assembled and give all of your attention to its workability. It is a very fine thing to have all of your tools arranged in an orderly manner around the wall but neatness and eye appeal should never be gained at the sacrifice of convenience. Remember that a panel of tools placed out of reach of a workbench costs you a few dozen steps every time you want to use another tool and slows up your work materially. The frontispiece illustration shows a typical small workshop laid out for convenience.

Since nearly all work begins and ends at the workbench, that piece of equipment is the nucleus of the workshop and as such it should be given the best location. It would seem logical to place the workbench under a window in the desire to have good light, but actually this reasoning is false because most of us spend our evenings, not our days, in the workshop. Moreover a cellar or attic window is seldom a good source of light. It is much better to place your work-bench against a wall that offers an unobstructed surface so that tool panels and wall cabinets can be placed above and at the sides of the bench. Allow plenty of room betweeneach end of the bench and the nearest wall. Because your woodworker's vise will be placed near the left end of your bench, never put this end nearer to a corner than two or three feet. More space at this end is recommended because you will frequently have to clamp a long board in the vise and you may have to let it extend a foot or more beyond the bench. A workbench the beginner can construct is presented on page 54 with complete working drawings.

Those craftsmen who can keep their workshops spick-and-span are few. Most of us as we go along acquire so many odds and ends of scrap lumber which our Scotch instinct won't let us throw away that eventually we have to designate an entire corner for lumber. Regardless of your good intentions to keep your lumber pile neat you will find it more convenient to reserve a corner for this purpose right in the beginning.

If you have an old table that has been retired from active duty because of its scarred top or wobbly legs, you have a new use for it. Tighten the legs if necessary with screws and if that is not a sufficient remedy, nail cross braces from the legs to the aprons. Don't attempt to repaint this table because it is going to serve as your finishing bench and in the course of a few weeks you would never be able to recog¬nize the finish. A finishing bench is admittedly something of a luxury; yet if it can be had at no additional cost by all means make use of it. Place the finishing table as far from the workbench and lumber pile as is practical. It should be against the wall and not too close to the door of your workshop, and if your workshop is not partitioned off, placed in the spot least accessible to other members of the family. This precaution is taken so that when someone enters the workshop they will be unlikely to brush against a freshly painted project which you have left on your finishing table. Don't establish your finishing department close to the fur¬nace and at any cost keep it away from the coal bin. Ideally

BIBLIOGRAPHY

HOME CRAFTSMANSHIP, by Emanuele Stieri. Published by Whittlesey House. Price, $2.50.

ONE-EVENING PROJECTS, [by Harry J. Hobbs] a collection of small projects. Published by The Home Craftsman Magazine. Price, 50 cents.

PRACTICAL DELTA PROJECTS. Published by Delta Mfg. Co., Milwaukee, Wis. Price, 10 cents.

YOU CAN MAKE IT.

Two booklets by this title, prepared by the U. S. Department of Commerce, are available from the Superintendent of Documents, Washington, D. C. Price, 10 cents each.

THINGS TO MAKE FOR THE LAWN AND GARDEN, by William W. Klenke. Published by Manual Arts Press. Price, 50 cents.

WOODCARVING AS A HOBBY, by Herbert W. Faulkner. Published by Harper and Bros. Price, $2.00.

HOW TO WORK WITH TOOLS AND WOOD. Published by Stanley Tool Co. Price $1.00.

IDENTIFICATION OF FURNITURE WOODS, by Arthur Koehler.

Available from Superintendent of Documents, Washington, D. C. Price, 25 cents.

WOOD FINISHING-PLAIN AND DECORATIVE, by F. N. Vanderwalker. Published by Frederick J. Drake and Co. Price, $2.00.

Series of four books on use of power tools: Vol. I The Bench Saw, Jointer and Shaper; Vol. 2 The Drill Press; Vol. 3 The Lathe; Vol. 4 The Band Saw and Jig Saw. Published by Walker-Turner Co., Plainfield, N. J. Price, 50 cents each.