#bill coperthwaite

[steph-down-underer-blog]

If you need me, I’ll be living in a yurt.

[railroadbridge-blog]

6.2.14 (Bill Coperthwaite 1)

Here's a paragraph by Bill Coperthwaite, from the foreword to Country Woodcraft by Drew Langsner: 

"There is a great treasure of knowledge stored in the fok cultures of the world. And folk wisdom is, of course, mixed with folk ignorance--even as today our 'civilization' is made up of a mixture of ignorance and wisdom. If we are ever to attain the height and splendor of a society in which all people have the opportunity to grow and flower to their fullest, it will be due to our ability to sort the wisdom from the ignorance of all cultures in all times and to blend what we find into better ways of living." 

[skeletonsofloopy]

Those who guide us, who inspire us, having gone our way before, are now partners with us in building a better world. Any success we have is theirs as well as ours. To copy or imitate them should be only the beginning--the apprentice stage of life. It is fine to think, "What will a Shaker do? What would Scott Nearing have done? What would Gandhi have thought?" These are good exercises for the mind, a way of weighing ideas and contemplated actions, valuable so long as we do not follow anyone blindly. Only by standing on their shoulders can we build a better world, but we should use the wise as advisers, not masters.

William Coperthwaite, A Handmade Life: In Search of Simplicity

[skeletonsofloopy]

William Coperthwaite's yurt. (Photo Source)