The Young Apprentice

Just recently, I got too thinking about my journey as an apprentice carpenter and in particular buying my first set of hand tools.

With my first weeks wages I bought a set of blue chip wood chisels and a few weeks later I bought a No.5 Stanley hand plane. Over the years I built up a good selection of hand tools that were put to good use. I carried them from job site too job site in a green canvas tool sack and learned many a trick from other carpenters.

By the 1990s power tools came into play i.e. the circular saw, power planer and drills and again these tools came into play for many years.

Today I look at the young apprentice carpenter and I wonder are we losing the skills of our fore fathers the men who built it all with just hand tools.

It’s 2023 and the young apprentice carpenters tool kit consists of cordless power tools. While these tools are very much needed, the use of hand tools is less and less. Indeed the older carpenters are fewer on site. There’s a certain joy in using hand tools, weather it’s a hand chisel or a hand saw to start and finish a project. I do hope the young apprentice carpenters remain using hand tools and if not they are missing out on a skill and a craft which has been crafted for hundreds of years.

I hope and feel the need to invest more time in teaching the next generation of apprentice carpenters.

A first year apprentice, power tools form the bulk of their tool kit these days.

But the humble chisel is not gone yet!