We are milling more lumber for a box build from our stock of quarter sawn sycamore. I always marvel at the figure of this lumber when we re-saw and open a board and reveal what has been hidden.
If you are not familiar with quarter sawn sycamore, the photos are of two boxes using the figured lumber. Amazing stuff. But, the real amazing thing about our stock of this material is the age of the tree that was felled and sawn into lumber.
The tree was 
more than 400 years old. It was felled to make way for a bridge project in Ohio, I was told. Whenever I mill this lumber, I think of the history that occurred in the lifetime of the tree. Shakespeare was alive and well. The first permanent English settlement in the Americas was founded in Jamestown. Galileo was studying the heavens with his telescope. Both World Wars came and went. All of that history, through the Rover landings on Mars, and now to be transformed into an heirloom spanning time in another form. Interesting existence for a piece of wood …
