A Splintered History of Wood

Extraordinary woods. Fifty-thousand-year-old wood lives and breathes again ; In quest of the world's most expensive board foot ; Oak, the breakfast of civilizations ; The wood freak show ; Bamboo : the grass that thinks it's a wood ; Rescuing redwood the hard way ; Logging the industrial forest ; Wood : how it got here, how trees make it -- The wacky world of woodworkers. A chainsaw artist a cut above the rest ; My seven awkward minutes with the world's greatest wood carver ; Woodworking blind : just like everyone else ; How much wood would a wood collector collect? ; Nakashima : the Pavarotti of woodworking still sings ; My almost-perfect interview with woodworker, Jimmy Carter -- The tools that work the wood. As the lathe turns : making golf tees with the master ; Tool junky heaven ; The tablesaw that couldn't cut a hot dog in half ; Belt sander racing : a saga of true grit, speed, and victory (sorta) -- Wood in the world of music. Stradivarius violins : the sweetest sound you've never heard ; The making of Sweet Baby James's guitar ; Drums : and the beat goes on and on and on-- ; The Steinway : 12,000 pieces of indestructible music ; The National Music Museum : six hundred zithers, B.B. King, and one-ton drums -- Wood in the world of sports. Baseball bats : a David and Goliath affair ; Golf : persimmon scores a hole-in-one ; Tossing telephone poles and other curious sports ; The art of the pool cue ; Tennis : the racket about wood racquets ; Lumber Jacks and Lumber Jills -- Wood as shelter. Living in trees : from Papua, New Guinea to Washington State ; The history of housing from log cabin to, well, log cabin ; Everything you never wanted to know about construction lumber ; A dirty rotting shame ; Winchester House : the thirty-six year remodeling project -- Wood in day-to-day life. When wood was everything and everything was wood ; The Lindbergh Kidnapping, the Ted Bundy Tree, and forensic wood ; Pens and pencils : getting to the point ; A barrelful of coopers, kegs, and tradition ; True relics of the Cross ; Fifty billion toothpicks can't be wrong -- Wood, weapons, and war. Ten great moments in catapult history ; A tale of two warships : one unsinkable, one unsailable ; The twang of the bow ; White pines and war ; Pine roots versus atomic bombs -- Wood by land, air, and sea. The Spruce Goose made of birch ; Go fly a person : kites for work and play ; Trains : riding the wooden rails ; In search of the Lost Ark ; The song of the gondolier -- Wood in unusual uses and peculiar places. Venice : the city perched on wood ; Wood pipe takes a bow ; Building a staircase to heaven ; Academy Award nominees for outstanding performance by a wooden structure ; Roller coasters : Mobius strips of screaming wood -- Trees : answers, gifts, and ducks in the wind.