Trestlewood box

[Curt Fuller]

This box isn't very fancy, I'm not much of a box maker. But the wood has an interesting history. It's made from a scrap piece of wood from the old Southern Pacific railroad trestle that crosses the Great Salt Lake. The last remaining piece of the original trestle is now history with the completion of a concrete bridge over the Bear River passage through the lake. A company has salvaged the timbers from the old trestle http://www.trestlewood.com/about_tw/history/history.html but this was a scrap left along the causeway that I picked up while delivering concrete for the new bridge.
There are a lot of woods that have their own unique aroma when turning but nothing I've ever turned stinks quite like this stuff. If you've ever visited the Great Salt Lake it has it's own unique stink, but this wood has 100+ years of it all saved up. This piece is just sanded with no finish. It's 100+ year old douglas fir preserved only by the salt.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Curt....nice box! I like the simple design but I like the historical value even more!

[Andy Hoyt]

Curt - This looks familiar from maybe six months ago. Wow?

[Bernie Weishapl]

Curt that is a nice box. I like the simple design and finish. Great work.

[Raymond Overman]

I'm interested in anything with some railroad history Curt. My father's father worked with Atlantic Coastline. Thank you for sharing. Nice looking box.

[Barry Stratton]

Nice looking box with a great history. Doubly impressive that it was "found" wood.

You get waterfowl in that lake? Might be part of the smell.....

[John Hart]

Pretty neat Curt! Nice story. I had some large pieces of DF stashed in a corner in the basement of my house that I was going to try and turn but after cutting it once with the bandsaw, I decided that I couldn't stand the smell. Maybe it's just the nature of 100year old fir?

[Mark Cothren]

Nice box! Great history! Thanks for sharing.

Thanks for the pictures!

[Christopher K. Hartley]

Curt, Great Job! I assume the lid comes off and that being the case you did a great job of aligning your grain in the wood. It seems as there is no off alignment at all. I'm really impressed. I love the shape also. Isn't it cool when you can make something from something that has meaning behind it?

[Keith Burns]

Nice box Curt but, as has already been said, the history really makes it special. Thanks for sharing.

[Mike Ramsey]

What makes this box special besides the great job you did turning it
is of couse the history behind the wood! Very nice Curt!!

[Paul Douglass]

Wow! I'd put that one in a nice shadow box, with a little card with the history written on it and it would sit on my mantel (if I had one). Great box and great history.

[Ron Ainge]

Being born and raised in Utah </ST1:pI know that they replaced all of the wooden bridge structure on the rail ways going from <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:pUtah</ST1:p </st1:State>to <st1:State><ST1:pNevada</ST1:p</st1:State>. I was wondering when I would see some of it turned into something useful. Great Idea, nice project and keep the history alive.

[Rich Stewart]

Nice box and great story. They are going to be tearing down an old Tavern here soon. A tavern that I have sat in on many a saturday afternoon telling lies and watching big screen sports. I've been planning on trying to salvage some of the wood when they do tear it down and making some sort of trinket for the fellas. Probably gonna smell like cigarettes and beer. The Muskett tavern is close to 100 years old.

[Corey Hallagan]

Curt neat little box, I like it and the story as everyone else has already said. Very cool.

Rich, looking forward to seeing your project as well. You should be able to get some cool old wood out of there. Alot of oak in it? Someone is turning a coffee cut, you could turn a beer mug!!

Corey

[Ernie Nyvall]

That's a nice box Curt. Cool story too.

Ernie