Like most woodworkers, Shorty Stubbs got her start through a family member's encouragement. Her path to this hobby, however, started even earlier than most – back in the days of potty training. No singing Elmos for her back in the day, not even "encouragement charts" from
http://www.toilet-tattoos.com.
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Nope, Shorty's grandmother (who was an excellent carver of her own pipes) would hand her the one of the first wood products with which she became familiar: the leftover tubes from the toilet paper rolls she had unfurled all over the house.
"I have a deep respect for all forms of wood," Shorty says today, "in whatever form I find it: I particularly appreciate the lamination techniques used by 19th century German immigrant John Henry Belter, and I also appreciate wood pulp."
Shorty's life path, as is the case for many of the woodworkers we feature in this section, wended away from wood for a while, as she made brief forays into expressing herself through such media as modeling clay or the fabric arts.
When she was in high school, however, she caught sight of a drill press within the confines of the high school shop. "I had a hall pass to go to the restroom, and the shop was nearby. They didn't usually leave the doors open to the shop, but they did that day, and I just felt like that beautiful machine was calling to me."
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In those pre-Title IX days, Shorty was not allowed to take shop in school. The drilll press's siren song, however, was not to be denied. Her grandmother, by this time, had passed away, and Shorty said, "I decided that I could honor her memory better by using all the shop tools I could rather than funking around with fabric like I was doing. That just wasn't her, you know?"
As part of her homage, Shorty returned to the materials her grandmother had introduced to her. She gained machine skills by apprenticing to a neighborhood wheelwright , and then pursued further woodworking education through Harvard University, where her sculptural objects and dissertation on the theological implications of the wood pulping process earned her an MFA.
"Those letters might look good after a name," Shorty said, "but what they don't tell you is that nobody pays worth squat for an employee with an MFA."
Learning this lesson the hard way upon graduation, she sought for methods of supporting herself – and turned to the obvious: selling her work.
"My first customer was a little old lady who was a customer of the convenience store where I was working as a clerk to support myself," Shorty said. "I had some time to kill, so I was putting the finishing touches of stain on a sculpture behind the counter, and she caught sight of it when she came in.
"I thought she was like to have a heart attack right there. She said it was perfect for her place – she could throw away the crocheted doilies over the extra rolls that her friends were foisting on her at the senior center and make her own style statement. She paid me 300 bucks."
And a career was born.
"From there, I started getting a trickle of other customers: people would visit this old lady and see my work, and she was always very happy to tell them where she got it. Eventually, I was able to quit the convenience store job and support myself full-time with my woodworking projects.
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"What really helped was that this little old lady was an occasional volunteeer docent at the local art museum, and she brought me to the attention of the curator when they had an exhibit 'From Functional to Fashionable,' which was lots of artists who made high-end objects from things that others might cast off as purely functional. Being part of that exhibit really helped my career take off, and was the impetus behind my being commissioned a few years later to do a piece that's in MOMA. (It's near the ladies' rooms – I think that's somebody's idea of a joke.)"
Shorty, of course, sees her work as no joke. "It's pretty intense," she says. "I'm always looking for new ideas, and honing my woodworking skills at the same time. I still love using the drill press – I think it will always be my favorite tool – but the band saw is important to my work, too, and I've recently started experimenting with what I can do with a double-end tenoner."
She is also meticulous about applying the finish to her work. She experiments in this area, as well, but is partial to shellac. "It comes from bug doots, you know, so I just think it's….apropos," she explained.
"I love what I do, and I have my grandmother to thank. I think of her, with her pipe clenched in her teeth, every time I take a roll off and plan my next project."