Patriotism in Wood

David Boyd works as a Registered Nurse, but it was an earlier job stocking shelves at Food Lion that proved pivotal on the family front. “I met Heather one day on the Jell-o aisle,” he recalls. He graduated from Eastern Montgomery High School, and she from Christiansburg High School. They talked a bit and exchanged telephone numbers in the grocery store. Their dating culminated in getting married in August of 2010. 

That same year he took his first job in healthcare as a Certified Nursing Assistant, which provided the pivotal point for him to want to advance his career. He attended Jefferson College of Health Sciences in Roanoke, which is now Radford University Carilion. He graduated in 2015 and began working as an R.N. at LewisGale Medical Center in Salem.

It was his late pawpaw (his mother’s father Robert Mundy) who played a pivotal role in his love of woodworking, now a hobby-turned-business which had been shelved for more than 10 years. “I loved being in his shop, cleaning the sawdust, learning how to use simple woodworking tools. He made end tables, picture frames and home décor items of wood. I made a little bird house that looked like a cabin,” Boyd relates. “That would have been my first real wood piece. I remember helping him assemble his new table saw, which I use now.” 

Last year, the woodworking bug stirred, and the 38-year-old father of three girls decided to build a workshop. “My new garage is a 30 x 40-foot building split in half for woodworking on one side and mechanical work on the other. I do all of my own mechanic work. Both my father and father-in-law were mechanics.”

He loves the process of transforming a plain piece of wood, step by step, to a finished product. One of his favorite pieces so far is an early tattered flag. “It was my first project like that, and I really enjoyed the finished look,” he offers. It sold quickly, and Boyd went on to craft many more flags, some flat, some wavy, some tattered and others stenciled with God Bless America or We The People. 

An American patriot to the core, one of Boyd’s biggest disappointments was not being accepted into the U.S. Marine Corps due to his asthma condition. Both his grandfathers, two uncles and a brother-in-law have served in the military. He still thinks of signing up with the Reserves, weighing the trade-offs with family life and a full-time job. Thus, his big attraction with handcrafting Old Glory in wood.

“I also do all the staining and painting myself, which has been a learning curve in itself,” he states. “Some of my current goals are getting my workshop set up more completely, creating new designs and pieces, and inviting my daughters to become involved in the building phases.” 

The Boyd family loves the natural beauty and outdoor recreation that living in the New River Valley offers. Craft fair appearances are new and exciting for everyone. Heather and the girls help load, unload, arrange things and sell. While Boyd does not have another craft fair appearance scheduled at the moment, some of his wood flags are for sale at True Value hardware store at First & Main in Blacksburg. 

 

Text by Joanne M. Anderson
Photos by Jon Fleming

 

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