Established Materials Technology: Front Page
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Hands to Work: The Practical Artistry of David DeYoung
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By Lynne Robinson
Posted on:
6/4/2009 12:00:00 AM...
Amid smooth curls of wood and hand tools nearly a century old, things of strength and beauty emerge from David DeYoung’s hands.
There are favorite projects, “many of them uncompleted,” says the immediate past chair of the TMS Aluminum Committee. He has a particular fondness for a clever work organizer that he designed for his wife, Joan, from walnut that he found five miles from his western Pennsylvania home. A pencil post bed awaiting final carving details is also a source of pride.
“I like to use a lot of hand tools the way woodworkers from 150 years ago did,” said DeYoung, who prefers selecting his own rough cut lumber at a local sawmill. “It requires a fair bit of thinking and problem solving to make something useful that is also nice to look at.”
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David DeYoung works on a shave horse as he shapes Windsor chair spindles with a drawknife.
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Although DeYoung traces his initial interest in woodworking to a youth jigsaw his parents gave him one distant Christmas, his hobby took on new life—and meaning—when he discovered it could help him create a comfortable, nurturing environment for his sons, Henry and Andrew, both now in their early 20s.
Building Comfort
Henry has completed his first year of Ph.D. study in computer science at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), Pittsburgh, while Andrew is also attending CMU as a chemistry major in his junior year. Somewhat legendary in their hometown school district, both graduated from high school with the highest possible scores on seven Advanced Placement tests each and both have continued to earn extraordinary academic distinction ever since.
Both were also diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy, a progressive muscle-weakening condition, when they were toddlers.
In addition to managing the rigors of Henry and Andrew’s academic commitments, much of the day in the DeYoung household revolves around completing daily activities that most take for granted. Both young men depend on motorized wheelchairs for mobility and require a painstaking pulmonary regimen to compensate for their weakened chest muscles. Limited use of their own hands means that they rely on the hands of others for many of their needs, including scribing the mounds of work required of their studies. Their father’s hands, in particular, have made it possible for them to enjoy many ordinary pleasures—like looking out a window—that would otherwise have been out of reach.
“After my sons were diagnosed, I realized that there were things that I could make that would really help out—things that I couldn’t buy because they really didn’t exist,” DeYoung said. Over the years, for instance, DeYoung has crafted numerous “therapy tables” that enabled him and his wife to work at a comfortable height while caring for their sons. DeYoung’s therapy tables also traveled with Henry and Andrew to public grade school and high school, and eventually found second lives as router tables for his wood shop once the boys outgrew them. Determining that standard medical equipment cabinets were too awkward for his family’s needs, DeYoung made his own, drawing compliments from the visiting health professionals who also used them.
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DeYoung in front of the home he designed for his family, along with a recently completed Shaker-style writing table.
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DeYoung’s most ambitious project, however, was the one-story house that he designed and had built from scratch to the specific needs of his family.
“I picked a plan out of a book and modified it quite a bit,” said DeYoung. “We had been living in a two-story house with our sons and knew at that point what we needed and didn’t need.”
DeYoung said he also drew on his experiences with his father, who died of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig's disease, before Henry was born.
“I didn’t realize it at the time, but seeing what my father needed was a learning experience that prepared me to help my sons,” DeYoung said. That’s why an important feature of the DeYoung house is windows that are low to the ground, “because people in wheelchairs have a hard time seeing out most windows,” said DeYoung.
DeYoung also converted a small bedroom into a large bathroom with a roll-in shower and widened the hallway considerably to handle wheelchairs and equipment. Another major undertaking was designing the garage so that it could accommodate the family’s wheelchair van and allow Henry and Andrew to enter the house without contending with a change in level. Based on advice given to him by an architect at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, DeYoung devised an open floor plan in the living area that has enabled his family to share meals and other everyday experiences comfortably and conveniently. “As the boys have grown, they’ve not outgrown the house,” said DeYoung.
Gifts of Reflection
DeYoung’s hands-on, problem-solving approach to life is also evident in his work with the Ingot and Solidification Division at the Alcoa Technical Center in New Kensington, Pennsylvania. As technical consultant, his current focus is replacing conventional aluminum production technology, while also being responsible for trouble shooting and process improvement in casting plants both in the United States and Europe. A pathway to some of these solutions has been through his work as a volunteer with TMS. Describing his experience as Cast Shop Technology subject chair for Light Metals 2007, as well as managing the technical program presented at that year’s TMS Annual Meeting, he said, “That was a really outstanding opportunity because I got to know so many people involved with casting from all over the world.”
As the editor of Light Metals 2008, DeYoung said he appreciated the chance to review papers and become exposed to topics that he typically wouldn’t have pursued. He said of his many years of involvement with the Aluminum Committee, “It’s very different than a work environment. Everyone is volunteering and working together to benefit the field, even though they would be competitors in a different situation.”
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Trying out the new chair made at this year’s woodworking school.
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Although work and family are his highest priorities, DeYoung said his woodworking hobby fits as a way to help him gain perspective on the other demands in his life. “It helps me think when I do something with my hands,” he said. “When you’re stuck on a problem, it helps to leave it so that you can come back at it differently. Working on a wood project helps me get away from things for a while, so I can start looking at them from a different point.”
DeYoung’s family is happy to help him find those moments of reflection in any way they can. Andrew, for one, has become expert at bidding for his father’s prized, antique hand tools on eBay. However, a particularly special gift to DeYoung from his family for the last several years has been a week-long learning retreat at Kelly Mehler’s School of Woodworking, nestled in the Appalachian mountains of Kentucky. “I really didn’t want to go at first, because I didn’t want to spend the time away from home,” said DeYoung. “But when I went the first time, I discovered I could learn more in a solid week at the school than I could two or three years on my own. It’s fun being with seven or eight people for a week who have the same interests and abilities as you. I just get immersed in the work the entire time.”
Making Possibilities Happen
This year’s woodworking project at the school is a continuous arm Windsor chair, which Joan DeYoung said will be hers. As the person who DeYoung credits for “making everything possible,” Mrs. DeYoung manages her sons’ daily care, while also commanding the combined forces of church volunteers, high school scribes, educators, and health professionals who enable them to achieve their academic dreams. “They are really no different from other students,” said Mrs. DeYoung. “They like to study. That’s what they enjoy and that is what they want to do.”
She has particular praise for CMU, saying “Henry recently calculated that he would still be a sophomore in college instead of getting his doctorate, if it wasn’t for their support.” To work around the difficulties attending lectures would pose, CMU digitally records most of Henry’s and Andrew’s classes, which they can then download from the Internet. When Andrew took a chemistry lab, the university arranged for a graduate student to be his “hands” to perform the physical aspects of the experiments while Andrew dictated specific instructions.
“The people at CMU have gone out their way to help my sons,” said DeYoung. “They just look at their abilities. Their physical disabilities are just another obstacle or problem to solve.”
Lynne Robinson is the news and feature writer for Materials Technology@TMS.
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