Tri-State Woodturners schedules May meeting with Steve Pritchard demo

Tri-State Woodturners gave members a clear May target: the Saturday, May 16 meeting with Steve Pritchard listed as demonstrator from 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. at Woodcraft of Chattanooga, 5824 Brainerd Road in Chattanooga. For turners deciding where to spend a club afternoon, that calendar entry was the month’s strongest draw because it promised a live demonstration, direct instruction and the kind of close-up viewing that makes a meeting worth the drive.

The club’s event calendar worked as a planning tool, with a month grid and filters for classes, committee meetings, holidays, monthly meetings, training and webinars. That setup made the May meeting easy to find and placed it alongside the rest of the club’s schedule, which matters in a woodturning community where learning often happens through repeated attendance rather than a single stand-alone program.

Tri-State Woodturners describes itself as a local chapter of the American Association of Woodturners, and its membership stretches from novice turners to skilled professionals, including people who make all or part of their living at the lathe. The club also places strong emphasis on personal and environmental safety, and it says its purpose is to foster the art and craft of woodturning through sharing techniques, safe woodworking practices and proper tool and equipment use.

That teaching model showed up in the meeting format itself. Tri-State says demonstrators are frequently club members, the room is set up with a lathe at the front, and a camera system sends close-up views to two large televisions. After the demonstration, the meeting moves into questions and answers, which keeps the focus on practical technique rather than passive watching. Steve Pritchard’s name on the May calendar fit that pattern and gave members a familiar face for a meeting built around hands-on learning.

The club’s leadership page lists Jerry Schnelzer as president, Doug Spohn as vice-president, John Fortmiller as treasurer, Jeff Brockett as secretary, webmaster and membership director, and Jim Dvorak and Charles Jennings as directors. Tri-State’s meeting video archive also shows Pritchard as the demonstrator for an August 2025 meeting and John Lucas as the demonstrator at the January 17, 2026 meeting, underscoring a steady stream of documented monthly instruction. For members looking at May’s schedule, the draw was simple: a predictable club rhythm, a known demonstrator, and a meeting structure designed to turn one afternoon into useful shop knowledge.