family and friends, Luckily old enough to have been around a certain generation that just did what needed doing.
both grandfathers could fix anything, and did so. both were masters of re engineering and did so constantly. I remember my fathers dad fixing a toaster with a pair of tin snips and a coffee can lid. He was from sweden and had been in the Military but left to follow my Granma to the States. He could hunt and fish amazingly well to boot, My father remembers him poaching deer with just a knife. I never saw it, but my dad is not prone to make up tales, and he said they would go out during the depression and my dad would sit in the car with his mom and gramps would go walking, a little while later, he would come out dragging a deer. No gun, just a old reground bayonet.
My Moms dad built anything, and everything, from his house, to his shop, his boat, and most of the wheeled stock that he used in his business. I was sent to his shop every day after school when my mom had to go to work, There I learned to weld, cut timber, set charges, and all sorts of other things. His work as a steam fitter/boiler shop put us in the middle of some pretty big factories and I was doing journey man labor at age 14. When big boilers were too big to take out of places or when they were torn down, we would cut them up, or get them pulled for salvage, The big boilers at Edison Electric needed to be descaled regularly and we used cinker charges to knock the scale down. That gave me the confidence to do what i wanted to do.
We had friends in Maine, way up in the Alagash, and they were great to learn from. One was Alton Wardwell who worked for the railroad, he lived in the woods most of the year, keeping an eye on the railroad spurs and fireroads. He was the first I saw who could take a flint and steel and make fire. There was another guy, name Ron, who was the first guy I saw who carried a rifle with him every where he went. He lived in a small house on the top end of one of the rivers that ran into canada. He had some state job regarding the rivers and he was just amazing to watch move a canoe thru the water. He never talked much, as he had seen a bit too much in the Ardennes, but he was never unkind to us kids.
From there is was a different time and kids were expected to explore, and we had family all over, up in maine, out on Nova Scotia, west into Minnesota and we got to travel a bit. I to this day get bemused looks from people who know me when they see my stuff and find something non standard and ask what i used to fix it. I just used a old screen door hinge pin to remake a new recoil spring guide for a old winchester .22 instead of spending 18 dollars on a 3 dollar part, ten minutes on the lathe and it was fixed.
I am very comfy in the woods, in fact between the woods and the waters, I am only relaxed now when I am there. Put me on a boat, and I feel at peace, put me in the woods, I am at home.
