"From the sublime to the irreverent"

I was born in Dayton, Ohio during the latter part of WWII. My family settled on Long Island, 30 miles east of New York City, where I existed until going off to college. My Long Island years were spent playing the trumpet, being actively engaged in scouting activities, bike racing, wrestling, cross country running, sailing, and in general gearing up for college. I was able to snare a couple of scholarships (academic and athletic) to Syracuse University, where I quickly became immersed in the fraternity scene. I think I had a good time at Syracuse, based on what I have been told by others and my foggy recollections.

From about age eight, I was working in some way in the construction industry. My father was a superintendent for large construction projects on Long Island (hospitals, college campuses, etc.) and I was frequently put to work policing up job sites, watching money envelopes get distributed to building inspectors and union stewards, and eventually in Jr. high school, working out with a hammer.

After school, I enlisted in the Army (rather than being drafted), and ended up as a Green Beret officer serving in combat in the Far East. My "A" detachment was sited approximately 200 yards from the Cambodian border, in the middle of the main infiltration route into III Corps and on to Saigon. I was a busy soldier, and much of my darker art is a result of time spent in Viet Nam.

After returning from the Far East, I married a wonderful woman, who is still with me after almost 35 years. Our wedding was at the Ft. Meyer Chapel in Virginia, and after the reception, we headed west in our Volkswagen, loaded with all our worldly possessions. We ended up in Seattle, and have lived in the Puget Sound region ever since.

For the past 34 years, I have been a general contractor, boat manufacturer, and pre-purchase building inspector for investors and potential home purchasers.

My love for woodworking has been with me from a tender age. I helped my father build a small sailboat, and went on to build two more sailboats when I was in high school. I was an avid wood carver when I was involved in scouting, and have made furniture for our family and others throughout the years.

My love of woodturning has actually developed quite recently. I had an old Rockwell lathe gathering dust in my woodshop for years, that I had only experimented with once or twice up until the fall of 2000, when I decided it would be fun to try and produce a few small turned objects for Christmas presents. I had taken a jewelry class in 2000, and wanted hand-made containers for the jewelry gifts that I was producing. The boxes that I produced were from wood scraps, and the finials for the tops were of silver. I had such a good time producing them, and the results were so favorable, that I became hooked on woodturning big time.

Other than a couple of day sessions with Michael Hosaluk and Stewart Batty, I am a self-taught turner. I do not pre-plan any of my work (even my wood sculpture), and just go with the flow. A lot of my wood sculptures relate to experiences in my life, good and bad. I have found it quite challenging to have my thoughts and dreams become wooden objects. Most people don't have a clue as to what my art is all about, and I'm not about to try to explain it. People can draw their own thoughts or conclusions.

The die-hard purists out there do not consider a lot of my work woodturning. One of my more recent sculptures has more than 25 individual pieces that have been turned, sliced and diced and reassembled. It certainly is not a bowl, but contains more turned wood than a week's worth of work for most turners.

When I turn vessels, they typically end up highly textured. Many are colored or burned, and many have metal work. It would be sacrilege to butcher a wonderful burl or chunk of quilted maple, so there are also a few of my natural wood pieces floating around out there.

My goal in the next two to three years is to fully retire, and do nothing but wood art. It has become a passion that needs a lot of time, and I will be glad when it gets all the attention it deserves.