MidSouth Woodturners turn pens for troops, raise donations at Art in the Loop

MidSouth Woodturners used a busy weekend at Art in the Loop to show how a club demo can do more than draw a crowd. Members turned pens on site, made tops for children, and kept donations flowing for Pens for Troops, turning a public craft display into direct support for service members.

The guild’s April 10 to 12 appearance in East Memphis was a return engagement at Art in the Loop, the free, three-day fine-craft festival on Ridgeway Loop Road between Briarcrest Avenue and Ridge Bend Road. The show, now in its ninth year and presented by ArtWorks Foundation with support from sponsors including WKNO TV, brought together artists working in metal, glass, wood, clay, fiber, jewelry, paintings, photography, and other media. Public hours ran Friday from 1 p.m. to 6 p.m., Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

MidSouth Woodturners said the club did not sell product directly at the event. Instead, it accepted donations for Pens for Troops, and guests who gave at least $25 received a pen made by one of the members. One attendee reportedly donated $60 for a pen, a strong sign that the crowd understood both the turning and the cause behind it. The club’s mix of live turning and simple giveaways, especially the tops for youth visitors, gave the booth an easy way to pull in newcomers without losing the appeal of the bigger demonstration.

The roster behind the booth was large enough to make the effort feel like a club project, not a solo show. Event coordinators Bob Wolfe and Sam Dawson were joined by Revo Reeves, Larry Sefton, JD Lord, Roland Lee, Everett Smith, David Jones, Ken Burnette, Rick Gillespie, Joseph Voda, and special guest Ray Tanner, a longtime member and author of Shop Talks in the club’s Turners Talk publication. MidSouth Woodturners, a local chapter of the American Association of Woodturners, meets on the fourth Saturday of each month.

The 2026 appearance extended a pattern the club had already established. MidSouth Woodturners said its 2024 Art in the Loop demonstration also accepted donations for Pens for Troops, with 11 members participating. On March 2, 2024, about 13 members turned in pens, eight members worked at the lathe, and they made 49 pens. The club says it has met several military recipients of those pens, and their appreciation has kept members making more.

That is the real value of the booth: it gave the public a clear view of what woodturning can do, then converted that interest into donations, finished pens, and a visible connection to a veteran support effort that reaches well beyond Memphis.