Michael Fitzpatrick

As if it was yesterday, I remember carrying my new toolbox down the aisle at Kenworth Trucks of Seattle. Scotty, the crusty drill press operator, stepped away from his machine and planted himself right in front of me. Without a welcome, he raised his bushy eyebrows, poked two fingers into my chest, and said “You see all these men here?” He waited. At eighteen, I recall only nodding, unable to speak. He went on, “Each one of us will show you everything we know if you pay attention. We’ll give you lifetimes of experience, but know this, lad, it comes with an obligation. Someday you’ll pass it on.”

Hello, I’m Mike Fitzpatrick, your machining instructor in print. Since you’ve honored me by studying my book, I thought it might be a confidence builder to tell a little about why I’m qualified to pay forward to you what Scotty and countless other fine craftsmen taught me.

I began that apprenticeship on the first Monday after high school graduation, in 1964. A year or so later, I was given the life-altering opportunity to be their first employee to run the first Numerical Control (NC) machine brought to the Seattle area, other than the ones at the Boeing Aircraft Company. Nothing like the computerized machines you’re about to learn, that NC machine was a turret head drill press, run by paper tapes. Not far from a music box in its technology, it was primitive compared to the machines in your training lab. Still, it was enough to hook me for life. So, with a year of applications and interviews, I transferred to Boeing, where I completed my machining certificate. There I learned to run programmed machines that had basements, and ladders to get up to the cutter head!

Passing the tough final with a 100% score, I qualified to take the even tougher test to become a tool and die apprentice. I made it and finished my training in 1971. That totaled 12,000 hours of rigorous on-the-job training under a whole army of skilled people. It also came with many hours of technical classes. Since then I’ve either been a machinist/tool maker or taught others for my entire adult life. For the last 25 years I’ve taught manufacturing in technical schools, private industry, a high-school skills center, a junior high school, and in two foreign countries.

Today I can stand in front of anyone and say with pride, “I’m a journeyman tool and die maker and a master of my trade.” Nearing the end of my journey, Scotty’s imprint calls me to pass it forward. But don’t forget, what we instructors and machinists give you comes with the same obligation.

One trait we clearly see you’ll need far more than we did is adaptability. Beyond imparting skills and competencies, this book has a mission: to start its readers down the long, ever-accelerating technology path. Clearly, the machinist of the future is one who can see and adapt to a changing future. When you do pass the baton forward, the trade won’t be anything like that found in this book. But I’m confident it will be passed, because machinists have a long history of adaptation.