Dozens of lathes buzzed under the grind of chisels. Sawdust drifted into small piles on the floor. The scene wasn't a wood shop but the conference room at North Oaks Diagnostics Center in Hammond.
Artists in the medium of wood – some lifelong woodworkers, some relatively new wood turning hobbyists; some local, some from afar; one blind – toiled over their machines for hours, intent on crafting beautiful ink pens for soldiers stationed overseas. In all, 27 wood turners volunteered their time and equipment to create 294 pens at the 2024 Sgt. Joe Kelly Freedom Pen Foundation Annual Turn-A-Thon.
The pens will ship this week and soon be in the hands of those looking for a connection to home. "The biggest thing for the troops is staying in touch with their families. This gives them something they can use," said Bobby McCarley, a resident of Watson retired from the Air Force Reserve.
"The original idea was to turn 200,000 pens, and we've gone way past that." The effort has so far turned out around 275,000 pens. The Sgt.
Joe Kelly Freedom Pen Foundation, a nonprofit begun three years ago, is the spiritual successor to the Freedom Pens Project, started in 2004. "A bunch of us just got together and said, 'Let's make pens to send to the troops.' It started out on this internet forum, got people involved from all over the country," McCarley said.
The late Joe Kelly, a retired Army sergeant, fell in love with wood turning after learning about the Freedom Pens Project and meeting McCarley, who taught him how to turn. Kelly eventually took the reins of the project. He and his wife, Irmalene, turned 11,000 pens for soldiers before Sgt.
Kelly's death, not counting the ones he donated at home. "My dad just kind of took off with it and grew it all over south Louisiana and really nationwide," said Deanne McRae of Ponchatoula, one of Kelly's daughters. "I don't think they really had any idea how big this was going to get and how much it was going to take off.
" When Freedom Pens Project was in danger of closing, Ponchatoula wood turner Joe Vander Linden founded the new group, naming it in Kelly's memory. As president, Vander Linden coordinates volunteers for the turn-a-thon and contacts military chaplains seeking supplies through the San Antonio-based Soldier's Angels. He doesn't know exactly where the pens go, but cards bagged with them let their recipients know that someone handcrafted the gift with gratitude.
Many of those volunteers at the Hammond turn-a-thon are members of local group Bayou Woodturners, who meet at the North Oaks conference room every second Saturday. Members run the gamut of experience, from woodworker-by-trade Jude Lemoine of Metairie to Vander Linden who'd never touched a lathe before joining at the behest of his friend, Jim Creel of Hammond. "Everybody has their own techniques; everybody uses the tool that they like best," Vander Linden said.
"Some guys use scrapers, some guys use skews, some guys use spindle gouges – it doesn't matter, and you come out with the same thing." Also volunteering was Skipper Munson, a retired shop class teacher who runs an antique restoration business in Napoleonville with wife Joann and has turned close to 16,000 pens for the military. Munson lost his sight three years ago, but 50 years of wood turning has given him the ability to keep operating his lathe by feel, while Joann helps with his prep work.
"Skipper can turn out a pen in probably less than five minutes," McCarley said. The Munsons still turn out for the turn-a-thon too, making the trip from Napoleonville to Hammond. "I love to turn, period," Skipper said.
"This is right up my alley. I can do this, 'cause she's not on my back watching me," he added with a laugh to his wife, whose help he doesn't need with pen turning. "My daddy taught me how to turn.
We used screwdrivers and files; we didn't have any of these fancy tools. Of course, I've got racks of tools. We go in the shop every day.
" Two of Joe Kelly's daughters have inherited their father's passion as well as his tools. Deanne McRae and her sister Debbi Kelly recalled that after their parents' Denham Springs home flooded in August 2016 they stayed with McRae in Ponchatoula, setting up shop on her back porch where her husband, Shawn, learned wood turning from Sgt. Kelly.
Deanne uses her mom's lathe and wears her dad's smock when she turns. Shawn turns with his late father-in-law's lathe. Showcasing the variety of wood types suited for pen turning, Shawn presented a trio he'd sculpted at the turn-a-thon using cypress, cedar and, notably, crepe myrtle.
"I love the chatoyance in that one. That's that kind of iridescent-looking reflection you see depending on how you turn it," he said. "You can make pens out of any kind of material," McCarley said.
One he keeps with him is an acrylic pen he turned using the disassembled pieces of his late father's wristwatch, set to the time and date of his passing. He also turns pens from spent shell casings of 21-gun salutes at military funerals to give as keepsakes for families. A wood-turned pen like those at the turn-a-thon start as a 3/4-by-3/4-inch block of wood with a brass sleeve inside, which is inserted onto the lathe's mandrel alongside small pieces that serve as a size guide.
Then they're shaped, sanded, rubbed with a sanding paste and buffed. Packaged pen kits bought by the foundation contain all the small metal pieces and ink tubes used to assemble the finished product. The kits are one of the foundation's primary expenses, and the pens – produced with volunteers' time, effort and wood – aren't cheap to ship overseas.
Those interested in donating to the foundation may do so through Lenny Nederveld's Venmo at leonardned or through a PayPal invoice by texting Nederveld at 337-781-3050 or emailing him at [email protected] and providing name, email address, and donation amount. Wood turners interested in joining the foundation's mission are asked to email joe.
[email protected] or [email protected] .
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