Pam Wright
Steve Morris says they don’t make ‘em like they used to.
The avid Sarnia woodworker is the proud owner of a 1915 band saw, a machine he uses almost every day.
“The old stuff is so much better. It will outlast me,” he said. “It’s heavier and built to last.”
Morris has been a home renovator the past 20 years and a woodworker since childhood.
He spends most of his spare time his double garage filled with woodworking machinery, much of it built between 1945 and 1950 in Guelph, Ont.
Lathes, drill presses, hand tools and a variety of saws fill much of the space, but the band saw is the crown jewel.
Morris bought the old Crescent on Kijiji for $100. Built in Leetonia, Ohio, it bears the original serial number - 1,142 - and a fresh coat of grey and red paint.
The saw has a one-horsepower Delta motor that could cut sheet metal, if need be, Morris said.
But its wood —white oak, maple, walnut— that he loves to work with, turning logs into furniture, jewel boxes and saltshakers.
His current project is a pepper mill made from a cherry tree that came down in his yard earlier this year.
Morris spent weeks restoring the old saw.
“They weren’t too fussy about esthetics,” he said. “They didn’t care what it looked like, as long as it worked.”
The native of Fredericton N.B., learned woodworking by watching his father, a craftsman and carpenter.
“Woodworking is becoming a lost art,” he said, adding he was glad to have experienced it as a boy.