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    The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees
    The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees
    The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees
    Audiobook7 hours

    The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees

    Written by Robert Penn

    Narrated by Robert Penn

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Out of all the trees in the world, the ash is the most closely bound up with who we are. From tool handles to arrows, wheels and bowls to furniture and baseball bats, humans have made more and varied use of ash than any other kind of wood. Journeying across the English-speaking world, Robert Penn meets craftsmen with rare skills and a knowledge of the properties of ash developed over millennia. He finds that ancient traditions still thrive, and he reveals how the people working with this wood every day have a particular and intimate understanding of the physical world. Yet, Penn argues, the world's remaining ash forests also face urgent perils that threaten this unique repository of human history. Brimming with surprising research and vivid nature writing,#160;The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees#160;describes our ages-long relationship with forests and revels in the pleasure of making things by hand.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHighbridge Company
    Release dateJul 26, 2016
    ISBN9781681682259
    The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees
    Author

    Robert Penn

    Robert Penn has worked as a lawyer, waiter, contractor, DJ, photographer, and journalist-and has biked to every single job. He writes for the Financial Times, the Observer, and Condé Nast Traveller, as well as a host of cycling publications. Penn lives in Wales with his wife and three children.

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    Reviews for The Man Who Made Things Out of Trees

    4/5

    20 ratings5 reviews

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    • 4/5
      A fascinating account of the author's use of a single ash tree to make various different objects, through which he discusses the many and varied historical uses of ash trees over time, and visits with many of the folks still using ash wood to make useful objects. The one regrettable thing is a complete lack of photos (at least in the edition I read). 
    • 4/5
      I would not have thought a book about the ash tree would be that interesting. It's sort of a long-term human favorite wood due to its properties. It's all around us as tool handles, baseball bats, kitchen implements, sporting gear, trim, hoops - a generic white wood that is both strong and able to bend without snapping. The writing quality is high with a mix of biography, travel, cultural and natural history. There's a ton of interesting stuff here well told. I became so interested in the section about the medieval practice of eating from ash plates and bowls that I found a maker (in France none in the US) and ordered one. Such are the unexpected costs of reading.
    • 4/5
      When people think of making things from wood, the one that springs to mind is oak. But as magnificent as that tree is for buildings, ships and furniture, through the ages people have relied on another tree for tools, household objects, paddles and bats. That tree is ash.

      This tree is under threat now from a microscopic fungus that has come from the far east. Penn sets about a challenge of making, or having made as many objects made from a single ash tree. Partly to raise awareness of the trees plight, but also for the satisfaction of seeing a tree made into elegant and beautiful things for him to use. But first he had to find his tree. The genus Fraxinus is common in the northern hemisphere so it shouldn’t be too difficult. He is lucky enough to lease a small woodland, but there was no tree there suitable; fortunately he was to locate a tree with a strong straight trunk and a decent canopy from another local wood. Having felled it, it was taken to the saw mill to be cut into a number of planks of different dimensions, prior to a period of seasoning. This natural drying process is essential to turn a tree into useful timber.

      One of the most common uses for ash is tool handles. The experts are a little hazy about putting absolute date on when ash was first used, but it is safe to say that it has been used for several thousand years. The properties of ash make it the perfect material, it is tough, strong and flexible, not too heavy and the very act of handling the wood adds a patina to it making it nicer to handle. One of the last tool manufacturers in UK offer to turn some of his planks into axe handles, and he pays them a visit. In no time at all they are cut to shape, and sanded to the ideal shape. His first objects from that tree.

      Ash has numerous uses, and has been used in all forms of transport for years, including cars, buses, aircraft and of course carts. More wood is taken to a wheelwright where he sees flat wood turned into a perfect wheel, that if looked after will long outlive the original tree. Another hunk was taken to be made into bowls, that are now used daily for his breakfast. He visits Austria to have a toboggan made, America to see ash turned into a baseball bat and Ireland to have a hurley created. He commissions a desk to be made, and ends up with chopping boards, tent pegs, spoons, bookmarks, paddles, arrow, dominoes and even a catapult. In total he had seen 45 different objects created and had a total of 126 items. All from one tree. The sawdust and shaving kept him warm too, as nothing was wasted.

      More importantly as this tree was coppiced properly when he returned to the stump it was growing again and will produce again.

      This is a lovely book to read. Not only does his boundless enthusiasm come across on every page, but he is reminding us of the timeless quality of wood as a material. We learn that these crafts are not completely gone, but there are still a few talented individuals out there with the necessary skills to create practical and beautiful things. It is also a call to everyone to see what the benefits of having a properly managed woods can bring. He has not only got a collection of items that he will use for many years to come, but each time he uses them he has a direct link to the landscape around him.
    • 5/5
      It seems hard to believe that a book about a man cutting down a tree and getting people to make things out of it would be enthralling and moving, but it is. It expertly taps into some deep human need to have to own things made well out of wood. As I was reading I was lamenting that there was no such ode to our native New Zealand trees, many of them with beautiful hard-wearing timber that doesn't seem to be used or appreciated the way northern hemisphere trees are, with thousands of years of coexistence with people. I'm sending this book straight off to a timber engineer I know who makes his own furniture, and hoping he hasn't read it already.
    • 5/5
      This is a gem of a book. Rob Penn has had a lifelong love of trees and wooden artefacts. In 2014 he selected a mature ash tree in a forest and, with the aid of local experts, cut it down with a view to seeing how many useful items he could make, or have made for him, from the wood it yielded. The list of items is astounding. The book is, however, so much more than a simple catalogue of artefacts.Penn encounters some amazing artisans, all of whom share a deep love for working with wood, and take an immense pride in working to historic methods. Ash is one of our most prevalent trees, and archaeological evidence from around the world suggests that its wood has been used by humans for at least five thousand years. Among its many attractive qualities are its simple abundance, augmented by the fact that it grows very quickly, usually with a very even grain structure. When properly seasoned it also loses more of its natural moisture content that most similar woods, making it lighter than them.Penn travels the country to visit the specialist workers who make the various items for him. He offers a loving description of their workmanship, and the care and attention that they bring to their respective crafts. He also goes in to the history of the various items he commissions, which allows him to go off at tangents, for example explaining the history of the Irish game of hurling or chronicling the development of the toboggan. One chapter (The Crack of the Bat) sees him visiting America where he has a baseball bat made for him. This is a cue for a potted history of the baseball bat. I can imagine my friends rolling their eyes and smirking as they read that, feeling that a history of the baseball bat was just what they needed to make their lives complete, though I can assure them that this little adjunct was riveting, just as all his other sidebars are.Penn writes with great clarity but tremendous enthusiasm, and I was left feeling very envious of the various objects he amassed from his single felled tree.