A Parting Gift

"Moxy" (moxy)
05/16/2014 at 10:20 • Filed to: None

Firstly, apologies for the sappy-ness and if I bring down the mood in here at all. Not my intention. Have an F1 for the trouble:

So, the past year or so has really been rough for my family. My grandfather passed away last March, leaving my grandmother to carry on alone in the house they've owned since '53. He was 90 years old, served as a sonar man on a battleship in the Navy during WWII, and was one hell of a carpenter. I can remember him building me a bunch of wooden airplane models when i was a kid.

Shortly thereafter, we found out that my aunt was diagnosed colon cancer. She then passed away after only 4 short months of battling it, in January of this year. Now, my grandmother had lost both a husband of 60+ years and a daughter, within 6 months.

My family thought we'd put all of this terrible shit behind until my grandmother passed away this past March, only 2 weeks after the anniversary of my grandfathers death the year before.

So, why I'm writing:

I haven't had a chance to be on Oppo much because I've been helping my family sort through everything in my grandparents house as we prepare for an estate sale, but I had to share this:

As we dug through the wood shop that my grandfather had spent years building in his basement so he had somewhere to work on projects, we found tons of tools and un-built models. When I started cleaning out the bottom cabinets though, I found a giant box, way in the back with about an inch of dust on top, and got my mind blown when I opened it:

As far as I can tell, its a 1907 Rolls Royce Silver Ghost, made from scratch entirely out of pine (That's my iPhone next to it in the picture, for scale). Being the 'car guy' of the family, there was no dispute with my family about being able to keep it. A parting gift from my grandfather.

DISCUSSION (14)

$kaycog > Moxy
05/16/2014 at 10:23

That is beautiful! Your grandfather was very, very talented! I'm sorry to hear about your losses.

CalzoneGolem > Moxy
05/16/2014 at 10:24

That's gorgeous! Have you posted more of his work here before? I remember someone posting a few wooden models of cars before.

Moxy > $kaycog
05/16/2014 at 10:25

Thanks

Moxy > CalzoneGolem
05/16/2014 at 10:25

No, this is the first. But, we found a few other models after this one. I'm trying to see if I can get some pics of them too.

Roundbadge > Moxy
05/16/2014 at 10:26

That's a tremendous model...

...damned onions...

Chris_K_F drives an FR-Slow > Moxy
05/16/2014 at 10:26

That thing is gorgeous! I'm very sorry for all that your family has been through. I lost my grandfather about two years ago. He was a full-bird colonel in the Marines during WWII and was the Marine liaison in France for awhile and was in charge of most of the amphibious operations during the Pacific. After he retired he opened a clock repair shop and continued to have a clock shop in his basement for the rest of his life. Many of those clocks are all over my parents' house now, and they are all beautiful. What a great generation.

CalzoneGolem > Moxy
05/16/2014 at 10:28

I'm sure they'd be much appreciated here. He looks like he was one hell of a craftsman!

Moxy > Chris_K_F drives an FR-Slow
05/16/2014 at 10:35

Yeah no kidding. Some of the stuff we found was incredible.