When I was a child, my father cut all our wood by hand. A neighbor, standing by watching him one day asked, “Why don’t you get a chainsaw? Just think how much more wood you could cut in a day, the extra time you would have to spend with your family, and you could even read your Bible more.” The day did come when my father got a chainsaw, and he did cut many times more wood than before. As he reflected on the conversation he’d had with the neighbor of his youth, he noted that for all the wood he was able to cut with relative ease, he somehow spent less time than ever with his family and certainly didn’t find occasion to read his Bible more.

As you enter the workshop, small groups of people are gathered in clusters around the room. Under bright lights, they are quietly discussing raker depth, saw set, degree of angle tooth profiles, metal hardness. Welcome to the West Coast Saw Filers Gathering, held at the Cispus Learning Center. Cispus is located on the west slope of the Cascade mountains, eight miles south of Randal, Oregon. Well-known expert saw filers Don Sanderson and John Sterling put together what they are hoping will become an annual saw filers event.