My friend, Kelly Mehler
Generosity, kindness, and furniture making.
A memorial service for Kelly Mehler (1947-2025) is this Saturday, October 11, (2pm) at Union Church in Berea, Kentucky. All are welcome.
Kelly Mehler passed away earlier this week. Kelly was a fixture in Berea, KY, and known nationally within the woodworking community through his school (The Kelly Mehler School of Woodworking), his table saw book, and numerous magazine contributions.
I’m grateful to have known Kelly, and to have counted him as a friend. Most people felt that way around Kelly. Generosity and kindness radiated from him.
Our family met the Mehler’s early in our time in Berea. Kelly invited us over to their home, and the Mehler’s pointed us towards other young families and woodworkers within Berea. Teri took an immense interest in our kids and family.
Then Kelly invited me to his shop/school for a visit. It’s now Pine Croft. This was before Pine Croft was an idea.
The shop was immaculate. The machines were in perfect order. There was no dust (how does a shop have no dust?!?…Kelly kept it in pristine condition). The machine room was downstairs - mostly Felder machines, as Kelly would describe himself as a “machine” woodworker (he had strong hand skills as well…though he downplayed those whenever we talked woodworking).
The benchroom was the upstairs. About a dozen benches of different styles. This was the handwork teaching space, with windows wrapping the building. Kelly taught plenty of classes, and he invited guest instructors to the space as well. The bench room is up in the trees, surrounded by woods and the foothills of Appalachia, with a bubbling creek running behind the shop. It’s about perfect.
The sound of birds was a constant at the shop. Kelly and Teri would watch and chronicle them during their migratory visits through Berea. Birds, creek, woods. It was a woodworking sanctuary for visitors.
During my years in Berea, the college purchased the property and restarted the woodworking school (now named The Woodworking School at Pine Croft). I was to run it, following Kelly in his space.
I was excited, honored, and intimidated. Kelly built the space to his liking, which made it such a welcoming and unique shop. Many of the students who took classes came to Berea because of Kelly (and Teri). The Mehler’s generosity drew in others.
How do I know this? The students told me.
My nerves were appropriate but ultimately unfounded. Kelly supported me at every turn. He put in kind words with his former students. He showed me how to best operate all the equipment, and how the shop best functioned. We built a few pieces of furniture together, in the space, so that I could go through the paces. And then he taught one of the first classes at Pine Croft, which was filled with longtime friends and returning students, to help get the school going again.
Fast forward a few years. Our family had returned to Maine. I was running Pine Croft from a distance (dumb, operating the school from Maine, but necessary to keep things going during those early years of Pine Croft).
I would bunch a handful of classes together on the schedule, then I’d return to Berea for a 3 or 4 weeks stretch to run the shop. Always upon returning to Berea, as pulled off Big Hill Road and traveled down the long lane towards the woodworking school, I would find that Kelly and Teri were already there, waiting for me to arrive. They’d be pulling weeds, picking up sticks, freshening the flower beds, and opening the windows to let the breeze through. They were there to lend a hand without being asked.
Kelly would then offer a day’s help. He wanted to assist with the class preparations. So we’d mill and clean and work together in the days before classes started. He’d usually ask for some machine work, and I’d share with him the plan. Then Kelly would head out, purchase the supplies, and get to work. Inevitably, as he helped, I would learn from him.
This was all volunteer work, done out of kindness.
He’d help with everything. Time to clean and vacuum out the dust collector? Kelly’s there with his dust mask and glasses. The switch on the bandsaw is acting spotty? Kelly’s there to take a look. Where can we find thick basswood at late notice? Kelly’s driving me to his spot in Lexington.
This is how he treated people, and how he shared himself.
The big smile and welcoming presence were packaged with an immense amount of woodworking talent. He didn’t lead with it…he inquired about you, about your work, about your health. But if you looked over his shoulder, or glanced at his bench, you’d see something beautiful.
If my memory is correct, Kelly started in a furniture shop in Cincinnati (after a stretch at selling cars). From Cincy, he went to Berea College and worked within their furniture program for a year. Kelly had talent, so the shop staff gave him a key and he came in to work as much as he liked. Then he opened his first shop, in a barn, in Mount Vernon (a few miles south of Berea). With no heat, it was a rough go. Things were tight. But he continued on.
Soon after, his shop moved into Berea and Kelly operated a shop/showroom on Berea’s main street (where the library currently stands). Showroom out front, shop in the back. Then, maybe 20 years ago, Kelly built his shop in the trees.
His work was exquisite. He filled their house with it and shared it with others.
(Kelly operated before all images found their way onto the web. Pictures of his work reside within a physical portfolio, and possibly on his dormant website. I wish I had a few images of his furniture to share here.)
Kelly did not abide poor work. If something could be made better, he expected it to be better. Those high standards showed themselves in his work and while he taught others. And woe to anyone who tried to hide poor work. Kelly would find it, and encourage the maker (often me) to do better. No shortcuts. No half-efforts. There was only one way to work, and that was to the best of one’s ability.
While I ran Pine Croft, there was only a single time that I remember Kelly finding an issue with a choice of mine. He surely bit his tongue at other times. The issue: I put a soap dispenser with Yoda’s face on it in the shop bathroom. Big Yoda face and green hand soap. I’d found the line…the point where he needed to speak up. He politely, and directly, informed me that the soap dispenser needed to be switched out before the guests arrived.
I think of Kelly often as I work. His method of cutting dovetails stays with me. Each time I pick up the saw, I hear Kelly’s words:
“Hold the saw like you are holding a baby bird. Gentle, yet firm.”
We have lost a treasure in Kelly both as a woodworker and especially as a human being! The world is smaller now without him…❤️🩹
I took a number of classes at Kelly’s shop. Some with him, and some with other instructors.
It was always a premium experience.
He was the best kind of human. Rob P