Tobias:  Hello Stephen.  Thanks so much for joining us on The Woodworker Sessions. Please could you tell us a bit about yourself, what is/was your career and a little about your family and how you became a woodworker.

Stephen: I was born, raised and still live in Eastern New Mexico.  I have always had an intense interest in discovering how things are built and how they work. My parents patiently encouraged and supported my passion for designing and building. I am not your typical student. I learn best from hands-on experimenting and I struggled with learning in the traditional educational system. Growing up, it often took me two or even three times as long to complete school assignments as it took the other students.

I never enjoyed school until I found a refuge in the metal fabrication shop in high school.  It was there that I discovered that I could actually enjoy learning. I spent every spare moment I had in the metal shop. I owe a vast debt of gratitude to my shop teacher Terry Whitener for changing my life! He opened my eyes to a world of wonder, where one can create anything as long as you have the right skills and enough imagination!

Mr. Whitener took the time to teach me in a way that my brain could understand and process the information. He showed me the true value of learning. He helped me create my first large  scale project that was constructed from metal, not wood. When I was 16, I built a 16′ half-top stock trailer and the following year I was able to successfully build a utility flat-bed for the back of my truck!

My metal fabrication classes introduced me to the Future Farmers of America organization. Each year, my school held a fundraiser to benefit the FFA and I built a few items for these auctions from wood. It was during this time that I found my love for creating pieces in wood!

I was officially diagnosed with dyslexia towards the end of my senior year in high school. I went to college and even though I was successful, I did not enjoy the experience at all. My parents and I decided that I would be happier and more fulfilled if I were to follow my interests and natural abilities, so I left college and continued my education at woodworking institutes. 

First, I attended Rosewood Studio in Perth, Ontario. Here, Ron Barter, Jim Gavin and Adrian Ferrazzutti taught me the building blocks on which all of my woodworking knowledge sits. After Rosewood, I attended the Connecticut Valley School of Woodworking. It was here that I studied hands-on from many incredible woodworkers such as Bob van Dyke, Tim Spratlin, Mike Pekovitch, Steve Latta, Rick Angus, Mary May, Mike Mascelli and more! I learned an immense amount from each instructor and derived incredible enjoyment from seeing every one of these great artists at work. As they demonstrated their thought processes to me, I was able to understand how they differed from one another and produced their individual remarkable results.

The last school that I attended was The Furniture Institute of Massachusetts, under Philip Lowe.  My time there was short, but absolutely invaluable. I learned so much from the master and I only wish that I had more time to learn from him. Unfortunately, the school is now closed and Philip has passed, but his incredible knowledge lives on in the countless students that he taught.

I would like to encourage other students who struggle with learning in traditional classrooms to explore alternative educational opportunities. Albert Einstein has often been credited with saying “Everybody is a genius, but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will spend it’s whole life believing it is stupid”. This quote, whomever said it, changed my life and helped me to realize that value of being different. If everyone always thought the same way, there would be no innovation or progress. 

Woodworking has made me stop feeling like a fish trying to climb a tree!