Slightly off-topic but relevant to some of the posts: when did shop classes stop being offered in High School? During my five years (1967 to 1972) in Canadianicon high schools I took Woodwork, Metalwork, and Power mechanics classes. In the metalwork class we learned to use a brake, shear, and soldering irons to make items out of tin, sand casting to make tools, oxy-acetylene to weld and cut (no MIG or TIG), lathes to turn round stock down and many other skills. In Power mechanics class we learned to analyze problems with internal combustion engines and repair and rebuild them. All these skills held me in good stead as a starving college student who wanted to pay his own way through college and had little extra money. Somewhere along the line elitist educators felt such classes were irrelevant because a college education was the only way to go hence, today there is a profound shortage of machinists that can make something from scratch.