The fortuitous discovery of a battered old lathe in the basement of a firehouse by a curious teenage baseball player is the starting point for one of the latest Chicago maker stories.

Russell Herberg, known as Buddy, spotted the motorless machine back in 2009, nosing around the basement of his dad’s Chicago firehouse. Dad and some firefighter pals fixed it up and taught him the basics of turning and shaping wood, and the teenager started to tinker.

Click here to read the rest of this story, published in the Chicago Tribune March 31, 2015