A World Made By Hand

I married into some good, crafty country folk. My wife had a bunch of flannel scarves as table runners at her bridal shower. Afterward the maid of honor got her aunt Diane to make them into a couple of beautiful handmade quilts for us. And my mother-in-law has had a tablecloth for 30 years. Each time they bring it out for a special occasion, they do a little drawing on it and have everyone sign it. This year she gave my wife her own tablecloth to start for our home. They were such meaningful gifts. It would solve our modern crisis of meaning if only we made things again.

Most people used to make things. They farmed or worked in the trades or manufacturing. They could see the tangible results of their efforts at the end of a day. Whereas too often the present-day workplace resembles a never-ending treadmill of tasks. Where the only tangible result is a biweekly paycheck or annual pay rise. But we are not our jobs. It is how we spend our free time that makes us who we are, and we should spend more of it making things. How much different would life feel if the things we used the most, were beautiful and handmade?

One person who not only asked himself this question, but took the answer to its logical conclusion, was the American naturalist Dick Proenneke. Who is best known for building a cabin in the remote Alaska wilderness where he lived by himself for 30 years. He wrote about it in his book One Man's Wilderness, and was the focus of a 2004 documentary Alone in the Wilderness, which aired on PBS after his death. Proennecke's love of nature, desire for solitude, and self-reliance inspired millions to take a hard look at their lives.

Born in Primrose, Iowa in 1916, Dick grew up on a farm where he learned to value hard work and the natural world. He did not enjoy high school and left after two years, working at odd jobs before he joined the Navy the day after Pearl Harbor. He spent almost two years there as a carpenter before, before contracting rheumatic fever, while in San Francisco waiting on a new assignment. He spent six months in the hospital, and was medically discharged at the end of the war. After which he decided to devote himself to regaining his health and strength.

After his discharge he became a diesel mechanic, and found his way to Alaska. He worked as a heavy equipment operator at the Naval Air Station at Kodiak for several years. Then as a diesel repairman and salmon fisherman until his retirement at age 51. He arrived at Twin Lakes on May 21, 1968, with only some hand tools. Over the next year Dick carefully handcrafter his cabin using materials he harvested himself from the site. The timbers were hand cut and fitted, on a base of gravel from the lake, with a fireplace made of nearby stones. Most of his furniture and possessions he made himself.

The title of this post is a nod to the novel World Made By Hand by James Howard Kunstler. In it for various reasons modern industry and infrastructure has broken down. People are forced to revert to craft economies and to do with less. Not the end of the world but the end of the world as we know it. Well Dick Proenneke chose to end the world as he knew it, and to live in a new world made by his own hands.

One irritating thing about rural America is how flooded it is with cheap goods imported from the third world via discount and big-box stores. How different would life feel if the things we used the most, were beautiful and handmade and we knew the makers? If we had potters and cutlers the same way we have butchers? One of my long-term goals is making more of our own stuff. Whether that is baking bread or building furniture. But as it gets more difficult to buy American, or buy for life, I also want to buy and restore more used things. Putting little pieces of the world to right. The life you build is your most compelling argument, and if we built more of it, and bought less it would speak that much louder.