Randall “Randy” Osborne
June 11, 1957 to June 2, 2010
Randy Osborne passed away at his home in Clyde, NC after an aggressive brain tumor shortened his time with us. Randy was a native and lifelong resident of Haywood County and was a well-respected electrical engineer and designer with Sutton-Kennerly Engineering of Asheville. He was survived by his parents, his wife Amy, three sons and a daughter, plus two stepsons and a step-daughter, a sister and four grandchildren.June 11, 1957 to June 2, 2010
Randy was a very accomplished woodworker and made several prize-winning pieces of furniture in the Arts and Crafts and Mission style. A long-time member of the Mid-West Tool Collectors Association, Randy was also co-founder of the Western NC Woodworkers Association and a contributing member of the NC Woodworker as "ozzie-x". His passion was collecting antique tools, with a special love for the tools of the H.C Marsh Tool Company of Rockford, IL. He managed to collect every bench, block and specialty plane manufactured by Marsh during their short 36 year span of manufacturing.
Here are a few examples of some of his Mission-style furniture. He entered several of his pieces in the western section of the NC State Fair and took several ribbons for his work. (Click on any photo to see a bigger version).
And a few pictures of his planes -- these were from the very first meeting of the Western NC Woodworkers Association which Randy co-founded with Steve DeWeese and me in 2006. Randy is standing in the first 2 pictures, while John Richards (and his first wife) and WNCWA co-founder Steve DeWeese look on in the second picture. In the 3rd picture from the left are Dan Campbell (dancam, long-time Treasurer of WNCWA) and Pete Mohr (Tekkadan) plus 2 other WNCWA members.
When Randy knew he had cancer that was beyond treatment, he took his wife on a week long cruise, visited family in several parts of the country and revealed to some of his closer friends about his plight. He didn't have much insurance to help his wife and their home was in poor shape. A big group of friends from his professional and woodworking life got together and completely renovated Randy's small home to make it a fitting place for his widow. Many contributed free materials and labor and while he was away on that cruise and trip, that house was transformed. Here are a few pictures of that effort and Randy with his wife a few weeks before he passed away.
One of the last two pictures is of the single plane that Randy searched for over many years -- a Marsh 5-1/4 -- he finally located it and paid well over $1,000 for it -- his passion was the line of metallic planes by the H.C. Marsh Company of Rockford, Illinois. Out of respect for one of Randy's personal goals to share his collection with fellow woodworkers and collectors, I finished a display cabinet he had designed and started and took the collection to two regional Mid-West Tool Collector Association meetings and to the National MWTCA meeting in Louisville, Kentucky, where it won two "Best-in-Show" ribbons.
My apologies for the length of this post, but Randy was a great friend and this tribute is long overdue.
Rob Payne (McRabbet)
