I received word last night that Norman Stevens died yesterday after a short bout with pneumonia.  Norman’s love and support for carved spoons began decades ago and continued right on through the current surge of interest in spoon carving.

Norman Stevens.  Thanks to Norm Sartorius for both photos.

Norman joined us at Greenwood Fest 2017 to share some of the spoons from his collection, a collection that he continued to build upon, reaching his goal of 400 spoons not even a month ago.  Norman meticulously catalogued each spoon in his collection and valued the craftsmanship of each of the carvers to whom he reached out over many years.

In this post from 2016, I wrote about how Norman’s affection for wooden spoons began and how he had made arrangements to bequeath his collection to the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts.

Norman continued to quietly support and encourage handcrafts in many ways, including his recent donation of many personal treasures to the September 2018 fundraising auction organized by North House Folk School to benefit the Wille Sundqvist and Bill Coperthwaite Slöjd Fellowship Fund.  Norm went on to work with North House this fall in order to make copies of Dan Dustin’s book Spoon Tales available.

So, here’s to a man whose passion and kindness touched so many others.  I and many others are grateful.