A Road Far from Harvard

Learn by Making (7.1)

Table of Contents

Some years ago, I had a kitchen chandelier that multiple electricians could not figure out how to hang. There was a piece missing and the manufacturer would not replace the part. Enter Tim Bland, a deep soul electrician who took one look at the fixture and went out to his truck to grab his box of old parts. “What are you going to do?” I asked. He replied that he had no idea yet, but that he’d play around a bit and devise a solution. Sure enough, Tim hung the light and it stayed securely in place for the eight years we lived in that house. On another occasion, Tim told me, “When I am working in walls I don’t bother looking. I can see with my fingers.” He loves his work, especially when new challenges arise. Tim’s approach is successful, careful, and surpasses that of many more traditional electricians. That’s why he’s in high demand in his community in Westchester County, New York.

Tim is one of the youngest of nine children. His brothers and sisters all went to top-tier colleges: Yale, Harvard, the University of California, Berkeley, and Stanford. Tim, on the other hand, dropped out after less than two years of community college. As a kid, he was the only one of the clan who “fought school” and didn’t particularly excel in academic subjects. Yet he has always been the guy his family seeks out when they have a problem to solve. “Timmy can figure it out,” was a constant refrain in the Bland household. His family recognized the problem solving strengths of the kid who spent hours building forts in the backyard and taking apart mechanical lock sets in the 115-year-old family home. In middle school and high school, Tim was encouraged by his teachers in wood shop, metal shop, and plastics. Teachers saw and supported his potential to learn by making. While other kids were doing beginner projects, Tim was allowed to create more advanced products and serve as a teaching assistant.