PAGE 6 - WEST CHAVEN HIGHLIGHTS - SKITEMBER 15, 198a
Grizzled Veterans Practice Skills
Learned During Lifetimes At Firm
HICKORY — If the Walker
Construction Company of Hick
ory were a baseball team, then it
would be the kind they alw'ays
show in the movies. The team
with the grizzled veterans who
know their way around every
ballpark in the league and the
rookies waiting in the dugout.
looking for their chance to move
up the batting order.
That impression probably
comes from the fact that Walker
Construction has no less than
three employees who have been
awarded Outstanding Master
Craftsmen honors by the North
Carolina Department of Labor,
more than any other company in
the State. This rare concentra
tion of craftsman-level talent
gives the company’s training
program a tremendous boost as
junior employees get a chance to
learn valuable, advanced con
struction skills along side highly
qualified craftsmen.
"We specialize in most any
typeofbuildingwork.’’company
president Glen Walker says with
the same grin he uses to inform
newcomers of the company’s
not-so-distant founding in 1978.
Indeed, the company employs a
wide range of construction w'ork-
ers, carpenters, and other craft
workers to complete its varied
projects across western North
Carolina. While Walker presently
employs a total of about 60 peo
ple, skilled workers well versed
in the intricacies of modern con
struction work are one commodi
ty that Walker says is almost im
possible to find in the needed
amount.
"When you start a company,’’
he says, "you just about have to
grow your own employees." As a
strong supporter of the North
Carolina Department of Labor's
voluntary apprenticeship prog
ram. Walker and the already ex
pert workers that he has do what
they can to pass on their know
ledge to a new' generation of
craftsmen.
The three Walker Construction
craftsmen who have won Depart
ment of Labor awards for their
outstanding abilities are carpen
ter Melvin Eckard, cabinetmaker
Harold Noe. and project superin
tendent Bill Williams. Together,
they form a core of construction
expertise that Walker hopes to
expand upon in the next several
years.
SEEDS {
O i
FROM
THE Y
SOWER'
Mkhjei A. (iuiJii
A third grade teacher asked
her class. "Why did the Puritans
come to America?"
"To worship in their own way."
said a boy. "and to make others
do the same."
But God doesn't make you
worship Him, if you don't want to.
You were created by God. and
you live in a world made by God.
You are what you are because
He made you that way.
What you do. matters to God.
Where you go after you die, mat
ters to God.
He wants to save you from sin
and its consequences, and to en
joy the happiness of heaven
forever But the choice is up to
you.
The Bible says. "Whoever
wants to. let Him come." Come
to Him. won t you?
When Friend fell,
he called for Help,
but Confusion came instead.
K
At lost Help came,
and Help knew whot to do.
In times of emergency,
are you Help? If not, learn
Red Cross First Aid
where you work -
or call your local chapter.
+
AtiH'rkan
Hi-fi Cnis.s
The on the-job training and
apprenticeship efforts offei re
wards to all concerned. Better
trained workers enhance a com
pany's reputation and avoid
making costly mistakes. Begin
ning workers learn good work
habits and skills from experts.
True master craftsmen also
usually make substantially bet
ter wages than those with less
training, for example. Walker
construction pays its most highly
skilled workers $8.50-$12 an
hour, not counting overtime pay.
Harold Noe
Harold Noe, 44, says that in his
case, becoming a heavy hitter in
the cabinet making craft was a
combinaticn of his love for work
ing with wood and the shortage
of jobs in his native Kentucky.
“There was no work in the coal
mining area," he says, recount
ing how he and his family moved
to North Carolina in 1962. The
move became a very auspicious
one for Noe as he soon found
work in the furniture manufac
turing industry around Hickor>'.
He absorbed the secrets of the
wood worker’s art as he helped
other more experienced crafts
men. and learned to use the va
rious saws and tools of the trade.
Eventually, Noe even took clas
ses to learn how to read bluep
rints so that he could transform
designs into real pieces of
cabinetry, furniture, and finely
milled woodwork without assist
ance.
Today, he is the premier crafts
man of Walker Construction’s
cabinetry shop, which is located
along w'ith the company’s other
office, appropriately enough, in
oneof Hickory’s oldest industrial
buildings, a former saw mill.
There under the big wooden
beams and hand-made metal fit
tings. Noe practices his craft in
much the same way cabinetmak
ers traditionally have made their
works, except that his saws and
tools are more likely to be elec
tric powered.
Dean’s List
The following students were
named to the Dean’s List at
Craven Community College for
the summer quarter:
Bruce L. Watt, Bridgeton; Nan
cy G. Strickland, Cove City
Sherj'l L. Ogle. Ernul; Amy W
Woolard, Ernul; Charles L
Bryan, Allen L. Campbell, Bar
bara M. Harris, Jeffrey R
Midgett and Cassie S. Oates
Vanceboro.
In order to be named to the
Dean’s List, students must aver
age 3.5 or belter grade-point aver
age out of a possible 4.0 on at
least 12 quarter hours of course-
work.
School Volunteers
To Meet Sept. 21
The Vanceboro Farm Life
Elementary School will hold reg
istration for volunteers from 8:30
a.m. until 3:30 p.m. Sept. 21 in the
volunteers’ room at the school or
at the front office.
An orientation for volunteers
will be held at the school Sept. 28.
Assignments and scheduling
will be completed at the meeting.
Otherwise the same personal
care is given to the work as al
ways, he says. Noe sometimes
even keeps the work of past arti
sans alive by restoring and re
building aging woodwork. When
Walker Construction recently re
modeled and restored the histor
ic "Old Rock School” in Valdese
into a community center, Noe re
paired or replaced many of the
structure's deteriorating mid-
1900s era windows and frames.
After inspecting the more heal
thy, original woodwork slated to
remain, he deduced how to re
place and repair others so that
when finished and in place, they
were virtually identical to their
80 year old neighbors.
Other projects in which Noe
has taken particular pride in
clude building the replacement
cabinets for the Lenoir Rhyne
College student center and the
distinctive diamond-shaped win
dows of Hickory's St. Albans
Episcopal Church. But no matter
what the project, it is Noe's
crafismanship which is of prim
ary importance to the company’s
customers in this age of prefabri
cated cabinets, windows, and
wood trim. "We don’t try to mass
produce anything,” Noe says.
He feels that part of the plea
sure in being a cabinetmaker, in
stead of just one member of a
commercial carpentry crew, is
that he works on sm^ler, more
specialized projects. This means
that he can build something from
start to finish with his own
hands. "I eiyoy seeing something
made nicely and coming out a
finished product.” he says.
So, what does a cabinetmaker
do for relaxation after a day of
sawing, shaping, and drilling
wood? Noe likes to get into his
wood shop at home and make
something, of course. His main
project for a long time has been
to create a set of black walnut
furniture, one of his favorite
woods. With a china cabinet and
desk already made, these days
Noe is at work on a kitchen table
and chairs. "I like working with
wood,” he says smiling.
Melvin Eckard
It seems natural for someone
with a great deal of skill, talent,
and fascination for one subject to
specialize in mastering it. Melvin
Eckard breaks the rule. For Eck
ard, 48, the challenge is not how
to specialize his skills as a
carpenter, it is how to expand
them. He likes to "start at the
footings and finish at the roof,”
Eckard says, when he goes to
work on a new construction site.
Eckard moves through most
projects accepting responsibility
to finish a bewildering number of
construction tasks using a vast
array of tools and hardware, and
yet still meeting what Walker de
scribes admiringly as a "best in
the business” standard for each
assignment. By combining his 25
years of construction carpentry
experience with an obviously
natural fiair for comprehending
how things should go together.
Eckard has become something of
an in-house legend at Walker
Construction.
For example, many super
visors would normally cringe at
the thought of letting the same
worker who formed a solid con
crete wall in their project’s initial
phase, come back to install the
final delicate trim and hardware
at its completion. Yet, Walker
Construction supervisors vie
among themsleves trying to get
Ekrkard assigned to their projects
from the ground breaking to the
ribbon cutting.
The carpenter from Conover
takes such things in casual
stride, tackling whatever unlike
ly series of assignments come his
way. He credits virtually all his
skill as a heavy construction
carpenter to what he calls his "on
the job” education. However,
Eckard’s deft sense of movement
among the girders and machin
ery perhaps more accurately re
flect skills gained as a long-time
dedicated hunting and fishing
enthusiast.
Eckard’s philosophy of creat
ing new structures is simple:
build good foundations. While
the public usually judges con
struction projects by how im
pressively its steel and wood
skeleton rises into the air, Eckard
worries most about the part
down in the pit. The base,
anchoring points, and footings,
he believes are the heart of a pro
ject. After all, no one wants to
build a fine structure on a poor
foundation, and in any case, no
body can continue building until
"you get the footings poured,” he
says.
He also takes a true crafts
man’s stance toward the influx of
new, high-tech machinery that
has arrived on the construction
scene in recent years. The moto
rized back hoes, cranes, concrete
pouring machines and other
powerful tools of today simply
perform tasks that laborers once
did through sheer strength, he
says; they do not replace skill
and training. However, this new
machine age has created the
greatest changes to take place
during his career, Eckard says.
Whenever new machines arrive,
he says the carpenters and work
ers go through a period of trial
and error, learning what new
capabilities are at their finger
tips. "You got to try it,” he says,
to learn how a machine can help.
Bill Williams
The third member of the mas
ter craftsmen group at Walker
Construction, Bill Williams, is
easily the delegation’s senior
member. At a very unnoticeable
61 years of age, Williams brings
over 40 years of construction and
carpentry experience to his work
as a project superintendent.
His lean, heavily suntanned
face and arms give testimony to
the months and years that he has
prowled through muddy western
North Carolina construction
sites. Williams still spends his
averajge day out in the sun,
watching every detail of the con
struction placed in his care. “I’ve
always epjoyed outdoors work,”
he says during a recent interview
on the Catawba Valley Technical
College campus where his crew
is completing a new health care
teaching facility for the school.
As a project superintendent,
Williams is the final hurdle that a
mistake or bad idea must dodge
before it can become a perma
nent gremlin in some newly con
structed building. Whatever the
designers, drafters, architects,
carpenters, laborers, subcontrac
tors, and building materials sup
pliers let get by them, must face
his regimen of last minute in
spections, gut hunches, and
Noe puls skills to
quality control checks. There are
veiy few gremlins in Williams’
buildings.
"Nobody is taking pride in
their work these days,” Williams
says while taking a long look
across the site. "That’s some
thing 1 don’t believe in — skimp
ing on anything,” he says. Wil
liams points toward the upper
most steel girders his men are
bolting in place. Just the day be
fore he says, he had realized that
the project’s existing blueprints
called for a girder configuration
that would cause problems when
the roof was laid. Williams’ crew
was working from the freshly
altered plans the next day.
Two things critical for his suc
cess as a superintendent are his
many years of experience and
what Walker terms as Williams’
ability “to see” oncoming prob
lems. Williams is the first to
admit that his real job is basically
to walk among the freshly
poured concrete slabs, newly
joined steel girders, and recently
hammered wooden studs look
ing for anything that seems
wrong. He credits his love of
being outdoors and his interest
in watching how complicated
things get put together as the tw'o
main reasons that he chose to
spend a lifetime in construction
work. This enthusiasm has even
work on cabinet
bridged the generations in^Rt-
Williams’ family as his son also
works for Walker Construction
as a carpenter.
One thing which does not have
Williams feeling very enthusias
tic these days is what he per
ceives as a decline in the numbei
of people interested in really
mastering the carpenter’s craft.
"There don’t seem to be any
young fellows taking it up at all,’
he says. What makes this situa
tion even worse, Williams says, is
that the designs for commercial
buildings and custom homes art-
getting more complicated, there
by placing a greater demand for
skill on those who build them. “A
real shortage of craftsman w'ork-
ers is becoming apparent,” he
says.
But it is hard to keep Williams'
attention away from the project
at hand, the health care building,
for too long. To Williams, who
continually roams through the
parked trucks and stacked mate
rials looking at things, it’s all
business as usual: everything
must be perfect.
Eckard is also at work on the
site, forming a key, reinforced
concrete wall which will serve as
a m^or support in the structure.
There’s even always the chance
that Noe may be called to the site
during its later stages.
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