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20 Years of "In the Interim"
Jim Dorsett wrote the "In The Interim" column, which he described as cross between a journal entry, a snapshot, and a letter to friends," in every issue of The Scale Cabinetmaker. It provided him with a place to discuss the goings-on with Dorsett Publicatitons, and later with the restoration of the Christiansburg Station. As Dorsett Publications begins yet another phase, we will be adding new interim columns, but for now the original "In the Interim" columns are reprinted below.
Volume 1
(1976-77)
(1977-1978)
(1979-1980)
(1980-1981)
(1981-1982)
(1982-1983)
(1983-1984)
(1984-1985)
(1985-1986)
(1986-1987)
(1987-1988)
(1988-1989)
(1989-1990)
(1990-1991)
(1991-1992)
(1992-1993)
(1993-1994)
(1994-1995)
(1995)
In the Interim, Volume 1, 1976-1977
TSC 1:1 (October, 1976)
With a somewhat more cautious optimism than that of the fellow who, having fallen from atop a sixty story building, shouts as he passes the 50th floor. "So far, so good!': we look back over the past six months with a mixture of satisfaction and amazement. What began as the subject of late-evening conversation in March has become, through many more late evenings, an idea with some substance attached: Vol. I, No. 1 of The Scale Cabinetmaker. We have discovered that threading the passagesof the publishing world labyrinth without suffering any terminal encounters with the Minotaur is no small trick.
Having been in miniatures long enough to know that any doubts were groundless. we still wondered whether there would be enough ideas to suntain the content of just one issue (let alone the many that might follow). As ideas piled up, that shadow was soon erased. Would there be any need for the journal? The strong encouragement of many old and new acquaintances in the hobby dispelled that fear. Caye MaeLaren, in her inimitable fashion, nu,ged us along . As did Jim Doyle. The idea received its first positive reaction fron a miniatures club in Norfolk, Va. from which club came Mitzi Van Horn to contribute one of our first articles. And so it has gone for six months.
In that initial period of life for TSC, Helen has busied herself with kits, carvings, and furniture plans and contruction articles; Kathy has built a room for an article and the cover, in addition to a feature intemiew; and Bill has concermed himself with the centerfold on measurement. 'And. between bouts with post and beam comtruction, photography and the dark-room, and the typewriter and blue pencils, I have done the myriad small things which lead an editor to imagine that he is being nibbled to death by gold fish.
Finally. I invite and encourage your responses to what we are doing (or neglecting to do). If The Scale Cahinetmaker enjoys a long life, as I hope it will, it will be because you have had a hand in our content.
TSC 1:2 (January, 1977)
IN THE INTERIM ........
There used to be a rule in the old Saturday Evening Post that no indecent or off-color material would be printed. However, at one point the rule was slightly bent when the Post ran Katherine Bush’s serial “Red Headed Woman.” The first installment ended with the heroine and her boss having dinner in the heroine’s apartment; the second began with breakfast at the same site. The Post was deluged with letters from indignant readers to which the editor, George Horace Lorimer, replied, “The post cannot he responsible for what the characters in its serials do between installments.”
Last October, as a series of production and printing problems forced the postponement of the publication date for three weeks, subscribers to TSC 1:1 were remarkably patient with us and gracious in their letters of inquiry. As we struggled “between installments” to overcome the difficulties, what Henry David Thoreau once wrote seemed to apply to us, that “the mass of men lead lives of quiet dispair.”
Between installments a number of things have been going on which threaten to increase your impatience before your copy of TSC 1:3 arrives in the mail (April 1977). The spring issue will carry a multipart feature on caning miniatures. Four caning projects have been under development since last October: a small, square stool for beginners, a Victorian side chair and a modern Chinese bed for the more experienced modeler, and an Empire couch for the advanced craftsman. Add to that list articles focused on lathes and woodturning, several kit modifications, chair stenciling, and the third part of the house project and I believe that TSC I:3 will be an issue that will have you doublechecking your mailbox.
.......J im Dorsett
TSC 1:3 (April, 1977)
On Museums and Miniatures...
Why display a photo of a museum room on the cover of a miniaturist's journal? To deceive or to misrepresent the content of the journal? No; rather it underscores the prime source of the content of scale modeling: the entire universe of memorable houses and their furnishings. In the first issue of TSC, I wrote that "the history of prototypes is the first form of scale modeling experienced by most miniaturists" and I contended that a growth in that awareness parallels the developments of skills in the craft. The ultimate expression of such dual growth occurs when the model is patterned directly from the prototype. The cover of this issue of TSC and the lead article by Bill Sevebeck illustrate the unbreakable bond between the historical object and the best miniature craftsmanship.
Crisscross Hall, or Christ's Cross, is one of ten period rooms displayed in a significant and remarkable museum, the Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts (MESDA). located on the restored site of the old Moravian settlement of Salem in Winston-Salem, N.C. The rooms span a period of one hundred and f i f t y years and range in their furnishings from Jacobean to Federal. Each room in MESDA is original, not a simulation: located by the Museum, disassembled, and carefully reconstructed in the Museum.
The Hall from Christ's Cross was the main living area in a cruciform shaped, brick house built in Kent County, Virginia about 1690 and is the earliest room displayed in the Museum. As is true throughout the Museum, the furnishings are all of southern origin. The earliest known southern piece is a court cupboard, c. 1640; other furnishings include a paneled back chair (c. 1680-1710). a wainscot chest (c. 1700), two Carver side chairs (c. 1700), and a walnut gateleg table (c. 1690).
Last fall, I asked Bill Sevebeck to visit MESDA for the purpose of selecting from among its holdings a piece for scale reproduction which would express the optimum in the scale cabinetmaker's craft. He selected the gateleg table from Crisscross Hall. I asked that his treatment of the construction should give no quarter to the lesser talents of the majority of us in the lobby; he responded with an article in which the closest tolerance is given serious consideration. I asked that he treat the piece of furniture as it now appears in Crisscross; he responded with a miniature in which 287 years of shrinkage, warp, and wear have been painstakingly replicated. If it is a piece which only the journeyman peers of Bill Sevebeck in miniature crafts will attempt, yet it offers the rest of us an opportunity to learn from as well as to enjoy the outcome of his work.
The Scale Cabinetmaker is indebted to the Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts and its Director, Frank L. Horton, for the splendid cooperation and encouragement given to us in preparing this issue. From offering extraordinary access to their collection to the provision of the cover photograph, we are in the Museum's debt. A visit there is a feast for the mind and spirit that no miniaturist should be denied.
James H. Dorsett, Editor
TSC 1:4 (July, 1977)
IN THE INTERIM.....
Sixteen months ago, when TSC was just an idea, we set some goals for ourselves. In summary, they were to publish a miniatures journal whose quality of content on the scale modeling of miniatures from prototype would earn public acceptance. To the extent that The Scale Cabinetmaker has enjoyed some measure of acceptance and trust, it is due in some part to the unanticipated generosity of others.
We have been welcomed openly and genuinely by the editors of sister publications in the miniatures hobby. Individuals, private and commercial, have been willing to risk their reputations on our performance by distributing our flyers to their friends,. customers, and clubs. We have been encouraged by enthusiastic letters from readers who liked what we have tried to do, and by the gentleness of letters from readers who wished for good reason to take us to task for our mistakes. We have discovered the willingness by artists and craftspeople in the hobby to share their skills with others. So, if we have moved at all toward the approximation of our goals in the past year, we have many to thank.
Editors live under the constant threat of accepting credit for the talents of others. I am no exception. The first volume of TSC would not exist were it not for the constant talents of some very special people: the high skill and technical know-how of Bill Sevebeck; the great enthusiasm and wide-ranging interests of Kathy Sevebeck (who. with this issue, assumes a new responsibility for needlework content in TSC); the drafting ability of Larry Keen, whose work has appeared in every issue. With this fourth issue, we welcome in addition the artistic touch of Bob Turner and the photo talent of Don Massie to the journal.
However, beyond the efforts of all of the rest of us. TSC would not exist without the prodigious and kaleidoscopic creativity and modeling skill of the Associate Editor, Helen Dorsett. Her stamp on our content speaks for itself over the past year: two secretary kit modifications, Wegner chair, slaw bed, Parsons tables, Victorian settee and factory chairs, roundabout chair, caned furniture. experiments with natural dyes and fabric block printing, techniques for cutting and carving Queen Anne and Victorian cabriole legs, modification of Seven kit kitchen pieces, furnishings for a Victorian parlor, photographic room settings, complete furnishings for the Whitman house. And these were only the things that have been published. The truth of the matter is that, if I have written a lot of copy in the first year of TSC, I have had a very great deal to write about.
..... Jim Dorsett
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