TR Tolzmann, hand chair caner since 1972

TR Tolzmann, hand chair caner. Since 1972. I also refinish furniture in what I think is the traditional way. Hand chair caning is work that makes me feel good. Why? It re-enlivens tradition—hand work—a craft. It makes something usable again—restores it, as it were. It can use skill and dedication in the caning—the doing. The skill is a natural trait—good with my hands, it seems to be an inherent trait. It seems the skill is essentially wanting to do it well.

I am offering hand chair caning itself again.

 I am offering to hand cane chairs again.

131 West 2nd Street, Suite 120; Duluth, Minnesota 55802 By appointment or chance. (218) 737-7884 timtolzmann@gmail.com

Lessons I Provide

 

Lessons in:
​whistling, singing, French horn playing, refinishing, repair, caning, upholstering, furniture building
Tim Tolzmann
Duluth, Minnesota, USA
(218) 737-7884
timtolzmann@gmail.com

Traditional Furniture Refinishing

 Furniture Refinishing: "You are an artist at furniture refinishing."--Mercedes Ann (Overby) Tolzmann

I've seen some furniture worth refinishing.

I've seen some furniture with perfect finishes that I was asked to refinish. They were all black color--very dark. I think these owners were prejudiced against black colored finishes.

A piece with a worn-out finish--why not? If it's fine under the finish. Why not?

"Above all--do no harm."

Do no harm to the furniture, yourself, the environment, etc.

These perfect finish pieces would have required hurting myself, the environment, and perhaps the furniture as well. They each had been previously refinished.

The first one presented to me had been very recently refinished, stained black and poly-urethaned. Stripped by some means first. The owner had bought it, a rocking chair, that day. He wanted me to refinish it so it wouldn't be black.

I won't remove poly urethane.

The other two, three actually, pieces I was asked simply because they were blackened, were blackened because the finish that had been applied darkened over time. The refinishers all harmed the pieces.

Two of those furniture pieces (not the poly-urethaned one) had real thick finishes in pristine condition. I thought, and think, that they had been refinished quite a few years previously. The finishes were so thick and hard that removing them would be difficult and if not toxic and/or poisonous, then damaging to the wood. The fourth piece I accepted for refinishing, but circumstances didn't allow me to do it. I let the owner know, and gave her contact information for another refinisher. The owner complained of the language of him. "Every other word was...." she said. Actually, I remember I called the owner and brought the furniture to the other refinisher. I heard the owner speak later about the refinisher. The quality of the work, if he actually did the job, was not mentioned.

Why did I get into professional furniture refinishing? My adoptive dad, Raymond Frederick Tolzmann, was born in 1920. His parents had a farm, but August, Dad's dad, also house painted and decorated. Tolzmann Decorating was the oldest continuous family business in the Forest Lake, Minnesota United States area. It still might be; I don't know if Terry Lee Tolzmann, Raymond's son, is still active or not. This is February 2022. Terry was still working the last I saw him, in 2017.

In Summer 1966 I began sub-contracting for Raymond. During all school vacations, as a painter and decorator. After the summer of 1970, I attended University for some months. In December 1971 I was instructed in the Maharishi Transcendental Meditation Technique. Later that month I demanded to do that work again for Mr. Tolzmann, Dad. I started January 2, 1972. And continued fulltime until sometime in April or May of that year. I became ill and rested a few days. When I felt recovered, I had physical sensations in my heart when thinking about going back to work; I told Dad that. He said, "Then you shouldn't do this kind of work." Then he asked if I would work just one more day, the tomorrow--moving the exterior house stain compressor/sprayer unit along the ground for him as he sprayed the siding of a new house I had helped with in the interior--so he wouldn't have to come down from the plank. I said will you pay me $2.50 an hour. He said, "Of course." I did; he did.

Two factors in refinishing that are usually considered are old finish removal and new finish application.

"Finish". To finish is to complete. To complete the piece of furniture. Is anything ever done once and for all? Something like furniture certainly cannot be thought to ever be complete. Else why would there be furniture refinishing?  Or re-upholstering, or repair?

We live in an "Age of Science", a scientific age. Chemistry is a science. We live in a "Chemical Age". An age of chemistry. Some people play with chemicals. Some people have gotten money with chemicals.

Using chemicals to refinish furniture, I have found to be wasteful. Of my time, energy, speech, and ability.

Mechanical finish removal is faster, better, and cost-efficient. Chemicals do an ugly job--the wood is "uglified" by chemicals.

I posit that a man-made chemical could not do otherwise to a naturally occurring substance such as wood. Have you ever seen otherwise? Perhaps you haven't mechanically removed an old furniture finish.

I posit that a "real", useful in the real sense of the word, furniture "finish" will never need removal.

A valuable wood protectant only improves with time.

Why is, or has, wood been used to make furniture? Stone or metal could have and still be used.

Wood is an insulator. It is easily workable, malleable, as it were. It is light-weight.

And if it is not coated, but protected and enriched, it can and will be cherished forever. Why not?

So, remove old finish with a knife, such as an "electrician's knife". There is a locking blade one I bought a few years ago. Hold perpendicularly to the surface to be scraped--one hand on the handle, the other gripping the blade. Usually push. Try to take off only the finish--no wood.

Or use a wire brush--only stiff enough to work. Usually push. Try to remove only finish.

Ultimately smooth, if necessary, with a softer wire brush, or steel wool. Use the best quality--maybe Liberon brand. Use a brush to dust off the piece.

For carved areas, you might file a standard (not Phillips) screwdriver to a shape that will work for you to scrape carvings.

Scrape in the direction of the wood's grain. 

On "turned" pieces, such as on chairs or table legs, even then in direction of grain. Be intelligent--do it right. Think (consider the job).

For a new "finish". Organic food grade raw, and refined flax oil. Flax oil is linseed oil. Put some in a paint can (available new with a lid). Buyable at better hardware stores. Pint or quart size.

Put some bee's wax in it. A lump of bee's wax. It keeps the oil fresh--non-rancid and perhaps thickens the oil if it dissolves in it.

Brush on the wood. Let soak-in. Let soak-in and apply more.

Of course don't let it start to dry not soaked-in. Use your ability to think.

An ongoing process--the furniture is ongoing, isn't it?

Why Do We Come Here?

 I was adopted. I was probably removed from my mother's vicinity immediately after the cutting of the umbilical cord. I don't know if I ever saw her. Nor my father. My mother's name was Shirley Reuss. My alleged father was said to be Norwegian.

I have a memory of being with my adoptive mother and asking her, "How did I get here?"

Dr. Wally Devasier recommended a book to me, Thinking and Destiny, by Harold Waldwin Percival. Percival wrote that a child asks that question when about four years old, because his soul enters the body then. Something like that. The child knows that he came from somewhere else and doesn't know how he got into his body and life, with his associates such as parents or others where he is at that time.

My adoptive mother told me then, I think it was, that I had been adopted.

Plato is said to have written that we choose our parents before we are born. I have also heard or read that we make a contract, before birth, including such as when we will die.

What Will We See?

 I have always gotten what I needed, when I needed it. You have too. I want what I need when I need it. I don't have to make a point of wanting. I will always have what I want, when I need it. copyright 2021 Timothy Raymond Tolzmann 

We Will See

 I think I will write a bit about living. I never had a mother I knew. I was raised by someone, sort of. She was not my mother. Adopted. Did not know me in a real sense of knowing. Made decisions which she could not really know how to do. It would seem so. She made her husband, adopted Dad of me, make me work for him. Enslavement. Destruction of health. Taking away chance for "a life". Dad told her, "Tim can't do that kind of work." She countermanded him. Disabled to earn a living. Destroyed faith in adoptive parents. In society. In justice. In opportunity for conventional life. To earn a living. To marry. To be a person. Poisoned me literally at work everyday of work. Brain damage from it. Respiratory damage. Circulatory damage. Heart damage. Mind damage. Social damage. Economic sabotage. Educational lack. Life was not livable until I could be free of parents. Just survive until then. Not really living. No respect from parents. No right to be a person. No right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Not able to make decisions--destroyed. De-humanized.