Timber framing isn’t a traditional part of the American high school experience. In fact, it’s quite rare. But thanks to strict state funding guidelines and the imagination of crafty biology teacher Blair Mahar, the thousands-year-old practice is thriving on the campus of Hoosac Valley.
“Back in 2012 we did a $40 million remodel of Hoosac. So literally, the building was gutted. For one year, we moved out and we came back in. And because of the way that money works from Boston, Chapter 74 money, we're not allowed to compete with McCann for tech courses. They're the local tech school, and we're not. So, we lost, at that time we moved back in, we lost the wood shop, we lost the auto hobby shop, we lost the welding shop.”
Mahar – Hoosac Valley High class of ’87 – was approached by the then-Hoosac Valley principal to see if he could think of a tech ed class that wouldn’t conflict with McCann Technical School’s vocational curriculum in nearby North Adams. He thought of a recent undertaking he’d embarked on drawing on the wisdom of North America’s preeminent timber framer: architect, builder, and author Jack Sobon, a founding member of both the Timber Framers Guild of North America and the Traditional Timberframe Research and Advisory Group.
“I had just built a sugar house on my property in Savoy. I do maple syrup, and it was a timber frame. I read all Jack's books, and I watched a couple YouTube videos, and I built a 12 by 16 timber frame. So, I said, ‘yeah, I could probably do a timber frame class.’”
So, the principal secured grant money to pay for tools, and Mahar and others cleaned up a classroom that had been used for storing computers and desks.
“We gutted the room, and then moved in, taught one class that year, and then the next year, taught two sections, and then it's grown ever since.”
This year saw the program expand into a new advanced class offering for the first time, and it has already seen graduates make careers out of the craft. Its growth has been nurtured by an unexpected and somewhat miraculous connection between generations of the Hoosac Valley community.
In 2017, an early class of Mahar’s timber framing students built a structure for Ramblewild, an adventure park that offers zip lining, ropes courses, and more on its campus in Lanesborough. The story made the local news, and caught the eye of a surprised reader with more than a passing interest in both Hoosac Valley and timber framing.
“I saw an article newspaper about this guy, Blair Mahar, who's teaching a timber frame course at my alma mater. And I said, now what, what's up with this?” he laughed. “This is my school!”
That’s North America’s preeminent timber framer Jack Sobon himself, Hoosac Valley High graduate, class of ’73. For Mahar, what happened next was beyond his wildest dreams.
“I came home from work one day and there's a message on my machine," he told WAMC. "I hit play, and he was so humble. He's like, ‘Hello Mr. Mahar, my name is Jack Sobon.’ And he was like, ‘I'm a timber frame enthusiast. And I saw your article in the paper, and I'd like to be involved in some way.’ I'm like, yeah, timber frame enthusiast, right? Yeah! So modest. I gave him a call, we chatted for about an hour, and at that time he volunteered to whatever he could to help out and give back.”
For the last dozen years, Sobon has helped tutor Mahar’s students on the craft of timber framing.
“I've been coming down for classes here and there, showing how to sharpen tools, how to cut a mortise, how to cut a tenon rafter seat, etc." he said. "It's just been great giving back to my old school.”
Sobon – a tall, quiet, broad-shouldered man with a bushy beard – was raised in Adams and studied at the Rhode Island School of Design in Providence following Hoosac Valley. After being exposed to timber framing by Hancock-based historic barn restorer Richard Babcock in 1976, he rejected a career in urban design to stay in the wooded hills of Western Massachusetts. Sobon says that the sheer longevity of the over 7,000-year-old building style he’s dedicated his life to speaks to its effectiveness as well as its ability to reconnect humanity to the living natural world around it.
“If you go to a regular construction site, the people that are installing things never saw the trees where the wood came from, never saw the quarry where the stone came from, or the brick factories where the bricks were made," said Sobon. "They never saw any of that. So, they're removed from building. Whereas with timber framing, you're put back into it, you're part of that tradition again, that history, that hands-on craft, that's been handed down to us for so many years.”
On April 15, Hoosac Valley held a ceremonial groundbreaking on the timber framing class’s biggest project to date: the construction of a student-designed-and-built outdoor classroom on the school campus. Students like 18-year-old Connor Griffin – an athlete and lifelong Cheshire resident who intends on joining the Marine Corps after he graduates – told WAMC he’d advise anyone at the school to try out timber framing.
“I think it's really special program for our school specifically because we're more of a sports, academic school. To have an opportunity to get hands-on in a shop and actually do some, I guess, unconventional, more blue-collar work- I think it’s an amazing opportunity for the students here to get some experience in that field who didn't choose to go to McCann,” Griffin said.
17-year-old Anna Elizabeth Thurston, also of Cheshire, says that timber framing is the perfect fusion of creativity and engineering, which she’d like to pursue after high school.
“I'm also an artist myself, so I really do like to draw all the time, and combining this engineering stuff with the art, it's really fun," she told WAMC. "And it is very artistic- You take your time when you're chiseling things down, you don't rush, you make it look pretty and nice. But definitely it has influenced which kind of engineering I want to do. I'm leaning more towards mechanical or aerospace at the moment. And the design element too.”
It'll be months until the outdoor classroom the students in Mahar’s class designed is actually realized on the Hoosac Valley campus. But Thurston says it’s well worth the wait.
“It's kind of like something to look forward to, right?" she said. "You're being a part of something that's bigger. And also, just like having your work being obviously, being in the advanced class, you're like, wow, this is really cool- Having your work be good, and then knowing that it's going to come up in the end, and then also looking forward to after I'm graduated, coming back, seeing the school again, and being able to be a part of the raising day is going to be awesome.”
