PRINTERS AND BLACKSMITHS, PEOPLE YOU MEET

Paul Quyle, left, brought his printer friend, Mark, from Campbell, CA. as his guest to meet us last night while we hashed over some CCTV business. Mark is a modern printer and Paul has a printing press from 1899. Paul gathered his type set and molds and showed how it was done in three videos. One of the videos can be seen on the link below, the next two will follow on the same website.

http://tinyurl.com/24p6jub 

 Paul is a fascinating person from so many angles its hard to choose one. He is a blacksmith, a master potter, printer, and retired teacher. 

He studied Marine Biology, art, he took welding classes, saddle making, veterinary medicine. He has a woodworking shop, orchards and gardens.
He entered the printing trade from necessity, to print labels for his clay business instead of tediously hand stamping them. Now, he is a master printer and  has over 120 printers in his collection. But, the 1899 press, one of only 12 in the world, rarely gets used.
Paul, at 82, remembers the days when trade secrets were jealously guarded. If he couldn't get into a guild, he'd figure out how to do the task himself, whether it was printing, making clay that didn't explode, building a house or a kiln, he would do it. You forge something, fix something, make your own tools, a philosophy that today seems arcane in a throw-away, assembly line style of doing things. Self sufficiency is as ancient as the rocks where passing on skills to the next generation is the natural order of things. It works for the Quyles where a new generation of family artisans now run the ranch,  a winery, the pottery and continue what Paul started while he still plays with printing and blacksmithing.

 People drop in all the time to see the works on Highway 4, just above Murphys, along with the pottery, paintings, glass work, and wine tasting from Bryce Station Winery.

Here students of Paul's work in his blacksmith shop.

OSO BUCO, HUMANE SOCIETY, AND AUTO CLUBS

My cousin Terri Cardoza is the hostess extraordinaire. Here she dishes up oso buco with her neighbor Millie Freitas watching, who is pushing 90 very hard, and a genuine character in her own right. Richard Cardoza hungrily watches. Countless times I've sat at their table and enjoyed bountiful meals and wonderful evenings of cards and/or dice. Millie inspires me to Dare-to-be-100, as she stays actively involved with her garden and neighbors. Terri has adopted the philosophy of the American Humane Society which basically postulates that if you take animals to the pound that are active in your neighborhood, others will soon move in to claim their territory. You never rid yourself of strays. Instead, you have neighborhood strays "fixed", thus keeping them actively hunting mice, gophers, etc. and preventing a cat population from exploding. She has trapped 25 cats and had them fixed with cooperative vets and help from the Humane Society. Richard, an excellent mechanic, belongs to a car club and has restored many interesting vehicles over the years. His current favorite is a 1969 Camaro. Besides cars, he has an unbelieveable electric train set-up that takes up a whole room; he barbeques in the summer and you couldn't ask for a better friend than Richard. His current ride of choice is a 1969 Camaro. Jim met them for the first time and, of course, they made him feel right at home. I feel so lucky that we are family.