New-found treasure

[Rick Barton]

Cool thread guys.

[Mike Brady]

Thanks for sharing, everyone.  It makes it even sweeter.

[museumguy]

My Dad and I weren't real close, even growing up. It's a long story that seems so wrong now. I do remember a few projects together, quite enjoyable times. There are a few things that I remember very fondly and wisely. First, he told me to always buy the best tools that I could, even if I had to save for them. Second, he had a large, handmade tool box. In it were a couple handsaws, a square or 2, a brace and some bits, an eggbeater drill and a few other assorted tools. When he died in 2014, we were not on speaking terms. My sister got everything, she deserved it and I didn't feel slighted in any way. I asked about the tool box and she said that it was no longer around. My heart sank. Fast forward a few years and I was helping her move some stuff and there in the corner was our Dad's toolbox. My eyes widened and teared up at the same time. I opened it and about half of the tools were still there. I asked about it and she forgot that she had it. I am supposed to get it just haven't gotten around to it. I have some replacement tools to go in it to fill it back up as best I can remember.

The other thing is I remember all of the Craftsman tools my Dad had. I got his 1/4" drive socket set. Every now and then I pull it out and use it. When I do, I grin and look upward and smile. I realize now that the differences we had were ridiculous and unwarranted. I miss him every day.

[BrokenOlMarine]

My Stepfather passed unexpectedly in 1981 while I was still on active duty, and I was supposed to get all his tools.  A two and a half car garage full.  I wanted nothing else, though he was heavily insured.  The tools were a big deal as he owned a construction company that died in the crash of the small businesses in the late 70s..  He was still doing custom cabinets and trim work on the side...  I came home on leave to find that my Mother had remarried and she and her new hubby had burned thru a six figure insurance settlement and sold off all the tools when they sold the nice house in the countryside and moved into the city. 

(What? The tools? We figured you wouldn't have room for all those tools and wouldn't want to pay storage so rather than move them....?) 
They had burned thru that money as well, and "couldn't remember exactly what they got for the tools, but it "wasn't much." (Yeah, right, I KNEW what was in the shop.)
His personal tool box was all that was left.  I TOOK that, and neither of them had the nerve to try and stop me.

His hammer, plane, square, and few other items were in that box and I still use the plane today.  His hammer hangs over my bench.  That small block plane is the go to for everyday trimming, although I have others for specific jobs.  It's the first plane I grab unless there are reasons not to use it.  I still feel close to him when I put that plane to wood.  Congratulations on acquiring a piece of family history.  His old box is in terrible shape and I have told myself for all these years it needs to go, but ... it's still there, in the shop, holding a place like a memory. 
  It will be here as long as I am.

[Tynyyn]

When my dad passed away about six years ago he had a works shop most folks would drool over. It was a converted apartment with four rooms. A bedroom, a bath, and a small kitchen and the main room was the living room. In the bedroom he stored all of his off-cut pieces of wood. Nare not a straight piece of wood nor a square piece of plywood. Hmmm. The bathroom looked like somebody had taken a dust collector and stuck the end of the hose into the room and let all the dust settle on the toilet, tub, and sink. About an inch of dust covered everything. The kitchen was where he kept his finishing supplies and paint. Slapdash and hurried is how I would say his organizational skills were in how he put things on shelves and drawers. No rhyme or reason as to where anything went.

The main room contained a huge island where most of his assembly took place. Doubled sided so all his tools could be fit underneath in the cabinet space. Dad was not a woodworker by trade. He was an air conditioning man and a general contract builder. His skills with fine wood working were more like cromagnum man using a tree branch to beat something. But he tried. He didn't have too many fine woodworking tools. But he did have a whole bunch of 5/4 red oak planks six to ten inches wide and ten feet long. I should have gotten more than what I did, but I just didn't have enough room on my truck to take them all.

I got a few electrical tools, a four inch skill saw. Neat little tool for cutting in tight areas. Most of what he had were duplicates of what I already processed and I really didn't feel like stuffing my small shop with things I'd never use. I wish I could have taken the shed that the oak lumber was stored within. As a kid my dad worked on an Air Force base. The Air Force tore down some housing units and threw away the wall boards into a land fill. Dad went to the land fill after work and pulled the boards out and brought then home. He told my brother and myself to pull all of the nails out of the boards so he could use them to build a shed. I cursed underneath my breath yet pulled nails for the summer. The shed was finally built and he began to store thing in it. But what made the shed so valuable was the lumber was California old growth red wood. Yea, that simple 20 x 20 shed was worth about $10,000. Wish I could have transported it to may house.

But such is life. When one person passes away we try to make the memory live on as best we can. I still have a hammer from my grandfather. It had a rubberized handle and dog gone it if it doesn't just seem to have been build just for my hand. Great feel.

[woodworking-guy]

I inherited some tools from my Grandpa, some of the most cherished ones I have !

[JimReed@Tallahassee]

When my grandfather retired, he set up a little woodworking shop and purchased a 10" Homecraft bandsaw for it. I acquired that saw upon his death when I was 12 and have had it ever since. It traveled all around the country and survived a divorce and being stored  in apartment closets. Odd that he only had the saw for ten or twelve years and I have had it for 56 years and it is still referred to as "Granddaddy's Saw".

[Cecil]

Very cool !

My Dad got his dad's planes.  My dad's son has them now!  I use them often.

[Stwood_]

Cool stories.