Home for a Misfit

Never in all the things I've endeavored to do has anything embodied the essence of who I am the way this shop does. And there have been a lot of varied Endeavors. Long distance bike rides, marathons, the Peace Corps, teaching in Milwaukee, working the trades, four years of rugby, nine years of soccer; none of it fits like this does. Working with people eager enough to learn about boats and woodworking to brave a Wisconsin Winter to enter a dark, dusty barn with no familiar faces, noise, and machines that can maim a person in all sorts of creative ways. Embarking on the next leg of a journey that started 15 years ago, to find another pathway to the ocean from the Headwaters of the Earth. Establishing the creative space to build things from scratch that will carry us on the best adventures of our lives. Enhancing connections and sharing resources to forge a more resilient community. A space that is old but not wasted, functional yet intimate, historical and still relevant, within walking distance of my house and a stone's throw from the river that will take me where I want to go.

So here I am, at an epic beginning, yet already so far along the path with stories to share, experiences that educate, and memories that will endure. Tonight I laid the first strip on the kayak that I hope to take me as far as New York. That journey is still a pipe dream, but the process of creation very much a reality. In this way, each segment of the Endeavor is approached as its own entity, worth while in its own right so every part of the journey is as self sustaining and fully realized as possible.

After a few weeks away from working directly on the boat, I got back into the barn last night to finally start stripping the boat. I had forgotten how much work this first strip would be, having to create a rolling bevel on the underside of the strip to mate it with another beveled strip mounted below (at the interface of the deck and hull). It took a while to get this established, but before long I was plying the end of the strip to the bow end of the boat, bending it to the curve of the stem. And suddenly, SNAP. It broke under the stress I was exerting. I took a deep breath, tried to exhale my stifled anger and loosened the staples securing it to the three closest station molds. I made a long diagonal cut through the strip to form half a scarf joint, and then took up a block plane to begin shaping the taper and the bevel, and scarf for a new piece to mate with the old. I glued and clamped it in place before working from the boat's midships toward the stern while the glue dried.

As I recalled milling this strip, its grain wasn't perfect to begin with, so it broke under its own weight upon lifting it the first time. It being of basswood for its lighter color, I fixed it with a scarf joint then, just as I finished doing at this moment instead of throwing it away. The bevel of the underside of the strip having already been revealed, I slipped into a rhythm as I fastened the strip to each station mold and progressed to the stern. I then came back to the new scarf joint, removed the clamps, and

started shaping the taper and bevel so it would easily bend into place at the front of the boat. I stapled the successive station molds and finally approached the bow stem. After several tries, the leg of a staple found purchase in the reluctant plywood. One last staple, and SNAP. I found an irregularity in the grain and the strip broke just two inches from the end of the boat. After a bit of an outburst, I cut off the last two feet of the strip, honed the cut for the newest scarf, shaped a replacement, and glued it in place. With that, I walked back up to the house to finally put an end to this God-forsaken day.

This evening I was in better spirits I went to the shop and conducted the routine of plugging in the lights, starting a fire, stocking firewood, and acclimating to the pace of the space. I fired up the air compressor, inspected the glue joint from the previous day, and within ten minutes of getting to work had the satisfaction of sending home the final staple in the first strip. There might have been a victory dance to commemorate this beginning, which culminated only after a couple hundred hours of building renovation, programming for fund raising, building a strongback, cutting molds, and mounting them in a way that didn't stray too far in the 5 directions that the lines of the boat could be botched. I am no longer preparing to build this boat. I am actually installing pieces that will forever be its anatomy. Best of all, I have less need to imagine the continuity of the curves that will comprise this vessel.

As I was fairing the curve of this strip, Bill and Marissa showed up to work on their antique duckboat. They have been working on this as long as I had been working on my kayak. Removing upward of 5 layers of paint (lead and all), dissecting rotted stems, decking, and chine rails, scribing and fitting prototype pieces, and extracting the shapes they needed from rough-sawn oak to recreate the beefy ends to this long-decaying relic. They were finally ready to install their stems.

We reviewed the process for dry fitting and fastening the pieces, mixing and applying epoxy, and how to make considerations for the other components of the boat yet to be re-created. The fantastical wonders of thickened epoxy, aka dookie schmutz, were about to be plucked from the distant horizon of a far of dream and actualized in the gap filling and adhering of the new stem to its home in the somewhat deteriorated bow of this 50+ year old boat.

The last dry fit was tested with a satisfying thunk as the new oak found its home among reli

c plywood and pine. Bill slathered on the epoxy and then added sawdust to thicken it till it offered the desired gap filling qualities. The two pieces of the stem were glued up and screwed

together, with the mating surface of the boat wet out and slathered with goo the consistency of sugar cookie batter. As the stem slid into place, it silently nested itself and plowed excess dookie schmutz out of the way in satisfying squeeze-out. We piloted the holes for the plank fasteners and Bill drove the stainless steel home. The squeeze out was scraped up and re-applied to other voids in the rails or gaps in the wood.

As we worked, stories and perspectives were exchanged about the Corona Virus (Covid-19) that's making the headlines and the prudence of calculated risk exposure. Giddiness cozied up to the realization that the first reproduced piece of this boat was going into place and saturated the atmosphere of the barn. When all was finished, we hoisted a beer in celebration.

So many nuances of respective projects cant be captured-just enjoyed for what they are. It reminds me of coming home from mountain bike trips in Colorado, unable to describe the experience to anyone who wasn't there. For that and this, you just gotta experience it to know the feeling of satisfaction when things go right and real progress is made toward an object of functional beauty.

In so many things I've done, there have been reasons why any given undertaking wasn't quite the perfect fit for me and who I feel myself to be. Too crude, consumption oriented, far from nature, tunnel visioned, or of substance that I just didn't relate with at a core level. But this shop, the programming, the rustic nature, remote location, orientation toward creativity, and relationships enriched-this is who I am. So if you want a glimpse into the heart and soul of Dave Mangin, come check out the barn at the Tomorrow River Homestead, current home of Art & Rugby Endeavors. Who knows, maybe you'll be inspired to join our community of learning, creating, experiencing, and sharing.