[geeks] PM Home Handyman Encyclopedia & Guide (1961)

[Nadine Miller]

Bill Bradford wrote:
> I recently came across a 4-volume set of the Popular Mechanics Illustrated
> Home Handyman Encyclopedia & Guide (from 1961) in the bargain bin at a
> local used book store.  Of course, I grabbed them.
> 
> The ~4000 pages of projects are amazing - it's basically your grandparents'
> equivalent of MAKE Magazine.  Tons of the projects wouldn't even be printed
> today due to liability concerns.
> 
> Everything from planning/building/remodeling a house, woodworking,
> metalworking, making your own boat/go-cart/children's playground equipment,
> indoor shooting ranges, to gardening, farming, and equipment to make
> handling your animals easier.
> 
> Over the past four days I've taken pictures of the title pages and
> illustrations for the most interesting articles, and put them up on Flickr.
> I've also contacted Popular Mechanics to see about getting permission to
> break out the scanner and make proper PDFs of the best projects.

My dad has tons of these kinds of books and magazines on his shelves. 
He has been a tinkerer his whole life, though now he's relegated to 
software due to the loss of motor control his particular brand of 
Parkinson's (muscle wasting, loss of fine control) has laid on him.

Mom has been threatening to put them on the curb for decades.  I keep 
threatening to come and stay for a month or two and put them on eBay to 
pay for a nice cruise or something for them. :-)  Sometimes when I go to 
visit, I just poke around in the basement--it's all clean and packed up, 
so it's like snooping for Christmas presents in some ways.

It's very, very clear where I get my personality traits from.

=Nadine=