(snip)

They are as rare as women are here, as far as I can tell. I blame lawyers
for that. There have been so many schools sued for injuries kids sustain in
shop class that many schools have just eliminated them from their programs.
I, on the other hand, went to a technical high school that had a machine
shop with lathes, milling machines, a metallurgy shop and a foundry. The
lathes were powered by an overhead belt and pulley system that were labeled
"Dept. of War" - that's how old they were. We started by creating a drawing
of a tool (a spanner wrench) freehand, then we learned to make mechanical
drawings from which we made a wooden pattern of the wrench, cast it in green
sand in the foundry and then machined it in machine shop. It was a great
way to learn engineering and I doubt very many students get their "hands
wet" like we did anymore.

Now you have me wandering whatever happened to that center punch I made
in 7th grade shop class. I've changed addresses half a dozen times or
more since then, so I doubt it is anywhere near daylight.

I presume that entire setup they had (lathes, casting room, etc) are all
long gone- thinking back, they wouldn't pass OSHA for grownups by modern
standards, much less having a room full of 7th grade boys playing with them.

--
aem sends..