We are thrilled to announce that we will offer a scholarship class this fall for six African-American woodworkers that will be taught by our long-time friend and hand-tool woodworker Jerome Bias.
The class will run from Nov. 27 to Dec. 1, 2023, at our storefront in Covington, Ky. The scholarships include tuition, materials and lunch every day. All African Americans are encouraged to apply: men, women, straight, gay, beginners, intermediates, whatever. No previous woodworking experience is necessary. Just a passion for learning the craft.
During the five-day class, Jerome will show students how to build a six-board chest using hand tools, white pine and traditional tapered nails. The chests can be personalized with different mouldings and details on the feet. These chests are fantastic as blanket chests at the foot of a bed or for storing hand tools in a workshop.
But just as important as the chest, students will learn to wield handplanes, chisels, hammers and handsaws – the core tools of a trade shared by many of our ancestors.
Jerome is a talented woodworker, chef and interpreter living in North Carolina. In addition to building furniture, Jerome has worked as an interpreter at Old Salem Museum and Gardens and has studied the life and work of 19th-century African American woodworker Thomas Day. He has also presented his work at Colonial Williamsburg and regularly travels to former plantations to cook traditional meals as a way to enable African American visitors to connect with how their ancestors expressed hope and love while still enslaved.
Applying for the scholarship is easy. Simply send an email to: scholarship@lostartpress.com by Sept. 15, 2023. In the email, please let us know:
- Your name and where you live.
- A few sentences about any woodworking experience you’ve had so far.
- A few sentences about why you want to attend this class.
And don’t worry if you don’t have a lot of tools. We will be able to loan students the essential tools for the class.
Finally, please share this post with any African-American woodworker (or wanna-be woodworker) you know. We want to cast as wide a net as possible.
— Christopher Schwarz
P.S. Whenever we offer scholarships for woodworkers who have been traditionally excluded from the craft, we often hear the cry: Why not offer scholarships based on need? Our answer: We already do that. All of my teaching outside of my shop (Florida School of Woodwork; Marc Adams School of Woodworking) goes to fund need-based scholarships at those schools. I teach for free; all the money goes to scholarship funds. During my career, I have contributed tens of thousands of dollars to the Roger Cliffe Memorial Foundation, which supplies woodworking scholarships for veterans and people who face financial hardship. So please, before you take a swing at us, please know that we seek to help anyone get into the craft. These scholarships are just one of the ways we do it.
