South Bend. Yowza!

The South Bend lathe toolpost sets went at prices beyond my wildest dreams. The reason for the frenzy? Well... as Rosie's pal Rust sees it, there are quite a few folks out there who own South Bend lathes and, due to the sad fact that there are pretty much no more machine factories out there in our wide United States, parts and pieces and accessories like these toolposts are hard to come by.

This is kind of alarming to Rosie, as she envisions a country full of small independent machine shops who have to scan the internet and junk dealers for parts. Shades of Atlas Shrugged? She hopes not.

And while she finds this thought unsettling, she appreciates the fact that she can supply even a little bit of the tooling and parts and accessories that folks who have so conscientiously and conservation-mindedly kept their vintage machines in good order and running. This may indeed be the saving grace for the future, particularly if the US economy keeps bleeding out.

That's why Rosie always smiles when she sees another small company that is preserving some of the industrial manufacturing heritage that was built up during WWII... companies like Versamil, Inc., that have kept in production many older machines.

Keep up the good work!

(oh, and if her South Bend customers simply wanted those toolpost sets for their collection, that's terrific too)

A thought for the day (also courtesy of Rust):
When we consider things from the past as being better - made better, more sturdy, of higher quality and workmanship - than most things seem to be made today, is not because things from the past were actually made better. Consider how much of what was made in the past has rotted in landfills... and how much of what is left is the creme de la creme. Kind of changes a person's perception, huh?

Having a wonderful autumn weekend in Oklahoma... with wishes of the same to all!

--"Rosie"