Free for June: All 3 of our Substacks
Plus: James Krenov, the Hippie

In addition to this Lost Art Press blog (long live the blog!), we also write three other blogs hosted by Substack. These blogs go deep into woodworking topics we are passionate about. They're not for everyone. But they might be for you.

For the entire month of June we've removed the paywall from all three Substack blogs so visitors can look around, soak up all the information they like and decide if they would like more. All blogs offer both free and paid subscriptions. About one-third of the new posts on these blogs are free, so it's definitely worth paying absolutely nothing to check them out for a time.

And, like this blog, you won't be inundated with ads or spam on our other blogs. Here's some links and three of the most popular entries from each blog:

The American Peasant
This is my PG-13 unfiltered* writing voice. It's always about woodworking, but it delves into the ethics, scams and idiocy that permeates the craft at times. It explores vernacular furniture, the business of making furniture and (of course) off-color animal metaphors. There are more than 270 posts to read, and 13,000 subscribers. Here are three posts readers liked the most:

The Lesson of the Bearded Antiquarian

Make Money Making Things

No Viable Upgrade Path

Never Sponsored
After almost 50 combined years in the business, Megan and I know more about tools than we know what to do with. "Never Sponsored" is our blatantly frank reviews of tools – some great, some despicable. We can write these reviews because we don't have advertisers to please, and we don't do affiliate marketing or any other quid pro quo stuff. This new blog has 22 posts so far and nearly 3,500 subscribers. Some popular pieces:

Shapton Kuromaku Stones (the Only Ones to Buy)

The $%&@ They Don't Tell You About Diamond Stones

Tooley Park Scribers

The Anarchist's Apprentice
This year we brought on Kale Vogt to learn the craft of woodworking. And this brand new blog consists of diary accounts from Kale, Megan and me about the training process. The ups, down and sore wrists that come from learning to make furniture for a living. These entries are fairly personal, but they give some insight into the day-to-day working of a busy workshop. This blog has 2,300 subscribers and 19 posts to enjoy. Some highlights:

Kale's Chair is done; Now What?

Ja, They're Swedish

The Only Prescription is More Chairs

I hope you'll take a look at some of the writing. We try our best to keep it lively, pointed and useful. You don't have to sign up for any free trial or give your name or email address to poke around. (You know we hate that stuff.) Just click and go.

— Christopher Schwarz

'A Pre-Kerouac Hippie'

The following is excerpted from "James Krenov: Leave Fingerprints," by Brendan Bernhardt Gaffney.

After years of research and more than 150 interviews, Gaffney produced a definitive biography of Krenov, featuring historical documents, press clippings and hundreds of historical photographs. Gaffney traced Krenov's life from his birth in a small village in far-flung Russia, to China, Seattle, Alaska, Sweden and finally to Northern California where he founded the College of the Redwoods Fine Woodworking Program (now The Krenov School). The book brims with the details of Krenov's life that, until now, were known only to close friends and family.

[James] Krenov and his mother [Julia] arrived in Sweden in the winter of 1947-48, on the next leg of their life's continued adventure. Sweden had maintained neutrality throughout World War II, and was relatively unscathed compared to the neighboring continental countries, which were still in a state of Allied occupation and reconstruction. Krenov's passport bears a number of stamps from Norway, Occupied Denmark and Occupied Germany in his first year in Sweden; whatever stability he had in Seattle was soon traded for a renewed sense of adventure and independence in Europe.

"The war over, it was inevitable that I should go to Europe," Krenov later wrote in "A Cabinetmaker's Notebook." "I come from a family of restless people."

Krenov's friends at the Port of Seattle had told him that it was easy to find work in Sweden; after a short time around the continent, Krenov found work in a factory. Sweden's factories were a melting pot at the time – thousands of refugees had fled the continent and the strife of war-torn Europe for the stability of Sweden and its steady economy. Many of Krenov's coworkers, especially those from Poland and Czechoslovakia, were awaiting visas to the United States. Krenov would later call the environment "memorable," with a great degree of optimism and hope among his company of "peasants, professors, doctors, and common thieves" from the continent. Many were alone, some had come from the concentration camps of Nazi Germany and a majority had suffered as soldiers or prisoners of the conflict.