More Toys From ‘The Little Toy Maker’ Of Sandy Hook

By Shannon Hicks

Jim Makowicki has been making wooden toys for years in the workshop of his home in Sandy Hook, and for a few years he has been offering free programs at community centers such as C.H. Booth Library in Newtown and Newtown Senior Center. His programs are entertaining, well-attended, and educational.

Those who have enjoyed Mr Makowicki’s programs in the past, along with anyone who enjoys making and/or playing with wooden toys, might want to keep an eye out for the new programs Mr Makowicki will be presenting in upcoming months now that the Sandy Hook toy maker has a new book.

Released in October by Taunton Press, Marvelous Transforming Toys (224 pages, 218 illustrations, 191 color photos, $24.95 softcover) is the follow-up to Mr Makowicki’s first book, Making Heirloom Toys. Both books present complete instructions by the toy maker on making special wooden toys, yet each follows its own theme.

Where Heirloom Toys presented readers with ideas for making toys that were put together completely by an adult and then played with by children, Transforming Toys offers a collection of pieces created by adults and then assembled by children. One of the earliest chapters, “Boats,” offers a system of pieces which allows a child to make variations on five basic seafaring vessels: a tugboat, a cabin cruiser, a motorboat, Noah’s Ark, and a houseboat.

The title of the new book tells the basic story, and the pages fill in the blanks. Transforming Toys focuses on what Mr Makowicki, who has long referred to himself as “The Little Toymaker,” calls system-based toys.

“Although system toys like Tinker Toys, Lincoln Logs, and Lego have been around for years,” Mr Makowicki points out in his Introduction, “mine are different in that each system part is an identifiable component of the finished system.”

The first chapter is called “Techniques and Materials” and in it Mr Makowicki devotes his discussion to what needs to be found in anyone’s workshop and the approach they should consider — safety first — when working on any project. Components of each system, he explains, will be made so that they can be fitted together in a variety of ways to create each system’s theme. Pieces include friction-fittings, nut and bold assemblies, stacking dowels, locking rods, and lugged nesting pieces.

Quality is encouraged, especially through the use of selected hardwoods. Finishing with top grade materials, says Mr Makowicki, “not only enhances the wood’s natural beauty but also provides protective surfaces.”

Safety is also covered in depth, and it has always been a major concern of Mr Makowicki. He avoids using what he sees as dangerous hardware for children’s toys such as hooks, and he rounds all of the edges and corners. He also uses non-toxic finishes on the toys because, says the father of three and grandfather of another three, “younger children are in the habit of putting playthings in their mouths.”

Chapters move from the simplest theme — “Boats” — and increase in challenge with each new system introduced. Chapters, and systems, continue with “Trucks,” “Houses,” “Planes,” “Vehicles,” and “Ships.” The boat system was the first one devised by Mr Makowicki, and therefore is the simplest in both design and assembly procedure.

Photographer Judi Rutz spent several days with Jim Makowicki at his workshop in order to take photos of the toys seen in Marvelous Transforming Toys. Ms Rutz’s images present the toys both completed and in their building process.

Like his first book, Mr Makowicki’s second release is chockablock with diagrams and illustrations, parts lists and step-by-step instructions. There is even an entire page devoted to resources, where readers can purchase the same toy parts, woodworking supplies, and finishes used in the toy maker’s own workshop.

Mr Makowicki comes from a family of 13 children. He was the only one really interested in woodworking, he told The Newtown Bee in 1997, so he built his own workshop.

As his skills and designs evolved, what had begun as a family-oriented hobby began to attract outside attention, Mr Makowicki mentions in the Introduction to Marvelous Transforming Toys. He began presenting workshops at locations throughout Fairfield County and his toys were being commissioned for people beyond family and close friends.

Then three of his toys were picked up by a manufacturer for a limited edition production run. One of those three toys was an earlier version of the “Houses” system detailed in Chapter Four.

That early toy brought more than commissions and attention to Mr Makowicki’s talent, however. The “Houses” system won a Parents’ Choice Award, presented by Parents Choice, a magazine devoted to the promotion of toys with high educational value. Mr Makowicki was presented the Parents’ Choice Award for High Educational Value to honor his system’s “tremendous potential for engaging a child’s creative imagination.”

Mr Makowicki spent two years working on Making Heirloom Toys, the 1996 release also published by Taunton Press of Newtown. That book was a collection of 22 of the toy maker’s transportation toys, educational toys, and a few games, complete with toy building techniques, safety guidelines, and complete instructions for each toy.

He was excited upon the release of the book, and thought almost immediately about a second book. Letters the toy maker received from readers after Heirloom Toys was published were not only appreciated by Mr Makowicki, but also part of the encouragement to do the second book, the author writes in the early pages of Marvelous Transforming Toys.