An Arts and Crafts Family - Part the First

Between my wife Kay and I, we have dabbled in several of the craft art forms. Kay is extremely talented in this field, where I now just stick to wood work most of the time. This usually entails making frames for Kay's wonderful works of art.
I learnt the basics of rope tying (or as they call it, bends and hitches, in the Navy, or macrame in yuppie circles) while I was in HMAS Cerberus, The Royal Australian Navy Recruit School depot at Crib Point in Victoria. This basic knowledge afforded me the opportunity to develop my own style of decorative rope work. But I think it shouldn't be called rope work as it is Navy-related. There is only one rope on board a ship and that is the bell rope. All other 'ropes' are referred to as 'lines', 'hawsers' etc.

My first ship was HMAS Melbourne, an aircraft carrier, and when she was decommissioned in 1982, she was stripped of all brass work and that was melted down to make miniature ship's bells which were offered for sale. I was fortunate enough to obtain one and went about making a bell rope for this  prized collector's item. Of course it was quite a while since I had dabbled much in bends, hitches and plaits, apart from teaching the basics while an Instructor Chief Petty Officer with the Naval Reserve Cadets (as they were then known). I bought several lanyards from Naval Stores and set about rekindling the grey cells to try to produce something that would look sort of OK. You can see the result. I made several attempts, and after a lot of frustration, settled on a mixture of plaits and Turk's Heads. It has become a bit bent and battered over the years but I don't want to pull it apart and repair it as it denotes a very important era of my life. My sea time.

Needlework was the mainstay of sailors in sailing ship days where sails were required to be repaired regularly. A term still used in the Navy is "Make and Mend", which means that you have time off from your regular duties to relax. But in sailing ship days it had a completely different meaning. You would cease your regular duties and plied your skills to making and mending the ship's equipment such as sails, lines, braces, etc. That brings another term to mind - "Splice the Main Brace". Now it means that every sailor gets an extra beer issue free to mark an auspicious occasion such as the death of Winston Churchill, the adoption of a new White Ensign for the Navy (I Spliced the Main Brace on both of these), or the death and succession of a King or Queen. Actually, it originally meant that the main brace on board a ship had to be replaced and spliced, which was a tremendously arduous task and the completion was rewarded with an extra tot of rum.

I had quite a large workshop/shed back home in Tasmania and my love of wood working and the often cheap availability of tools and machines from garage sales, sparked my interest in making something worthwhile and satisfying. So, I began making my own plaques and emblems depicting my Service life. Clocks also became an integral part of my leisure time as I didn't have that much to occupy my mind in the bleak winter days in Tassie. I made Naval Association clocks and then advanced to making stylised Tasmanian clocks, which I used to sell to international students for a quite reasonable price for them to take home as souvenirs and were much cheaper than the mass produced ones that were available and then branched out to include other ex-Service Associations of which I was a member. Some examples are below.

HMAS Melbourne and Naval Association plaques

Naval Association clock

 

 

Tassie Clock with Vietnam Veterans' Plaque

When we left Tasmania I had to sell most of my tools as we weren't sure whther we would have the space here in Yamanto to set up another workshop or not. As it turned out, we didn't!!! So, consequently, my clock and plaque making is currently at an extended halt!!!

This is enough for now. The more intricate stuff really needs its own page, so watch out for "An Arts and Crafts Family - Part the Second".