Thread: On the subject of model A Fords and home built machinery---

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What an interesting topic, I too am from the generation of people that would make it work or make do with what they had.

My Dad worked away from home but I had a neighbor that kind of took over or made up for my dad not being around.

This man could do anything and he was not a big guy but that didn’t stop him. At times I was amazed at what he would build. His wife liked the Adirondack chairs so he built three but he added adjusters so they could be in different positions. John could do anything; I helped him build a house when I was 12 or 13 years old. I can remember us putting sheet rock up to the ceiling; it was hard trying to hold the long pieces while nailing them. John said I’m going to do some thinking tonight. By the time I got home from School, John had made a frame to hold the sheet rock. We would raised the frame, and once it was tight to the ceiling we would put dowels in the holes of the vertical 2x 4’s and nail it in place.

I wanted to paint my 55 Chevy. Not using anything other then spray cans I went to the town store that had hardware, auto parts, anything you could think of, and they had paint. I bought the paint and all that was required to do a paint job. Then I asked John if I could borrow his compressor, we got it set up masked off now where do I start.

John did most of the painting I would try and he would say watch this and that but I got my feet wet so in the future I had enough practice that I could do it.

Anytime I have to try to figure out something or fix something that I have never done before, I tell my wife it’s that John, Montgomery ingenuity. I try to show my grandkids how to do what I know but I believe our generation will be the last to make things work or use what we have to get by. It was nice thinking of John, he gone but not for gotten. Thanks for posting this thread.

Richard

It's kind of funny, my Grandpa used to do all kinds of things, I still have a retractable extension cord hanging in my garage that he made from an old vacume cleaner. I still use it all the time.
He's 95 now and just got re-married at 91, still making use of what he's got .(sorry)

Sean

My Grandfather died when he was about 86. He had really bad legs because he was a butcher all his life and going in and out of the freezer had affected him badly. To walk he had a cane and he built himself a pushcart that was sort of like a grocerystore shopping cart, except made from wood with bicycle tires in the back. It gave him the support he needed to walk around our property and to tend his garden.

That garden was his life, about 1 acre of every vegetable you could think of. Funny story, every year my Mom would ask him if the tomatoes were ripe yet and he would say "No, not ready yet Mrs.......pretty soon." However, he forgot to wipe the tomato seeds off of his face........he would always make sure he ate his fill before bringing any to the house for the rest of us.

Sadly, he died working. We found him and his overturned cart laying in the yard one day. I guess he died doing what he loved though.

Don

Engenuity and creative problem solving aren't dead, although I admit it has experienced some setbacks. I am only 32 years old and have lost track of whether that makes me generation X or Y, but I still pride myself on my engenuity. I am doing well for myself but still enjoy tinkering, fabricating parts for the family hot rod, or improving things around the house. Most of my generation is not interested in these things: working with your hands or doing manual labor. But there are still some of us who will pass the skills learned from of our fathers and grandfathers to our kids and grandkids.

Another perespective is that engenuity has just taken a different path. I can hang sheetrock, frame a house, and understand how a V-8 works but I could never program a computer or manage the kind of complicated electronics that many kids can now do in their sleep.