Village Soup
Newspaper Article

Thorndike Craftsman: 'Wood you be mine?'

By Andy Kekacs
Copy Editor

THORNDIKE (May 30): Pay attention, guys. Marriage proposals don’t get any better
than this.

Let’s just say you are a railroad machinist with a passion for woodworking. Every
once in a while — actually, more often than not — you spend too much time in the
shop, with just the wood and the tools, letting go of all the other tensions in life.
It’s a good life, but you’re single, and you also want to share your world with a
special person. Someone who not only loves you, but also understands that guys
just have to do things that make no sense, like spending all night in a woodshop
instead of going dancing.
Let’s say this special person happens to be a fifth-grade teacher at the Ames
School in Searsmont. Hmmm. Schools … teachers … students … apples. If you
were Travis Johnson of Thorndike, a plan would start to form.

Now, that's how to propose marriage! (Photo by Tina Shute)
It would involve woodworking, of course. An apple made out of wood. One that
looks something like a heart … a heart with a little wooden arrow through it.
What if the apple also had a removable top, and a space inside to hide a carefully
folded note. A note that said — you guessed it — “Will you marry me?”
Good plan. Plenty of shop time, and a hard-to-resist marriage proposal. But how to
present it?

At the school, of course. During an assembly. With dozens of kids watching. Who
could say no?

Travis Johnson and Patricia Ryan were married Oct. 8, 2005. Their first child, a girl,
is due in July.

Hmmm. Newlyweds … baby on the way … cradles … trains. Another plan starts to
take shape.

Almost 300 shop hours later, the soon-to-be-born Baby Johnson now has a
handmade wooden cradle in the shape of a railroad engine.
“The cradle also is designed to be a toy chest [when the child is older],” said the
32-year-old Johnson. “The hardest part was staying away from details, so she
wouldn’t get hurt by protuberances, or small pieces that fall off.”
For a fellow like Johnson, “staying away from details” is a major challenge. What
he really likes to make are incredibly detailed models like the locomotive in the
wood-and-glass case at his home.

All of the details are there. The locomotive is in the shop to be repaired. There is a
bit of spilled oil, and a rag to wipe it up. A trash can for the soiled rags.
Visual complexity is important to Johnson. The engine of the locomotive is under
repair. The valve cover is off, and a camshaft is visible. Because he builds the
models from the inside out, however, some of the details are hidden from view.
“You can’t see it [all]; you’ll never see it,” he said, “but I know it’s there.”

Johnson recently built a wooden firetruck for the new fire station in Brooks. Another
of his reproductions is in the headquarters of Loram Maintenance of Way Inc. in
Minnesota, where he worked before returning to Maine in 2004.

“I love the details,” he said. “Every one I do gets a little better. Really, I’m pushing
the envelope, especially for small parts. It’s very challenging.”

Johnson likes making models of heavy equipment. People who work with big iron
quickly fall in love with it, he said.

“Heavy equipment operators live in that equipment,” said Johnson. “It’s their lives.”
Johnson builds a half-dozen models a year: Skidders, cabooses, road graders,
Lombard log haulers (the world’s first tracked vehicle, invented in Waterville in
1901.) He prefers the sharp angles of heavy equipment; the curves of cars and
planes are a challenge.

“I tried to make a snowmobile once, but I couldn’t,” said Johnson, “so I made a trail
groomer instead.”

Much of Johnson’s lumber comes from his uncle’s sawmill next door. He’s never
done the same thing twice, and none of his models are scaled. But they have that
kind of artistic “rightness” that comes from seeing to the core of something and
then creating from that vision.

With 11 or 12 years and about 100 models under his belt, Johnson describes
himself as an intermediate-level woodworker. “The beauty is that you can always
get better,” he said. “It’s not like hockey, where you get to be 40 and can’t do it any
more.”

In fact, said Johnson, he is one of the youngest woodworkers around. He hosts an
online chat room for people interested in the craft, and he said most of then are
well past retirement. “Only a handful are in their 30s or 40s,” he said.
Johnson’s late grandfather also was a railroad machinist and part-time
woodworker. He favored wooden toys, and Johnson has some of the tools that he
once used.

But Johnson said his grandfather actually had little to do with either his interest in
woodworking or his choice of a career. “The funny thing is, we weren’t very close
[until a short time before he died in 2000.]”
School didn’t add much to Johnson’s love of the hobby, either. “I took woodworking
in school, and almost flunked out,” he said. “I was more interested in metal.”

But then he built a log house, on land in Thorndike that has been in his family for
generations.

“I started building the house and said, ‘This is kinda neat,’” Johnson said. “I began
building models in 1994 or 1995.”

What is the attraction?

“In the railroad, 100 percent of the job is focused on time,” he said. “When I get in
the wood shop, I forget what time it is. That’s the beauty of it; time doesn’t matter in
my shop.”

Johnson wants to make more models on commission. He doesn’t do it for the
money; the prices are ridiculously low for the number of hours he invests.

“I pretty much do it for the cost of the lumber and a little bit more,” he said. “I couldn’
t make a living at it; I’d have to charge too much. And if I did it full time, I probably
wouldn’t enjoy it any more.”

Johnson typically sells his models for $250-300, depending on the level of detail
involved. To learn more about his work, visit railroadmachinist.com/Wood-
Forestry_Home.html, or call Johnson at (207) 568-1003.
Over the years, Johnson has drifted away from power tools and now does much of
the work by hand. This year, he built a shop next door to his home, where a
collection of rollers, pulleys, machines and hand tools create woodworkers’
heaven.

“When I’m in a project, I’m obsessive-compulsive,” said Johnson. “The lawn work
goes to hell. I’ll spend 10-12 hours [a day] out here.”

That single-minded focus can be a bit tough on the apple of his eye, however. “She
calls herself a workshop widow,” said Johnson.

With a child on the way, finding time for woodworking could become much more
difficult.

Hmmm. Toddler … wood … playtime … rocking horse.
You know the rest of the story.


Based in Belfast, Copy Editor Andy Kekacs can be reached at 207-338-0484 or by
e-mail at andyk@villagesoup.com.