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The Woodwright's Shop
1981 · TV series · 27 min episodes · 37 seasons
The Woodwright's Shop is a traditional woodworking show hosted by Roy Underhill on the Public Broadcasting Service in the United States. It is one of the longest running "how to" shows on PBS. Since its debut in 1979, the show has aired over 400 episodes. The first two seasons were broadcast only on public TV in North Carolina; the season numbering was restarted when the show went national in 1981. It is still filmed at the UNC-TV studios in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina.
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Have you never seen a barn raising by the Amish?[0] Have you never seen an episode of The Woodwright's Shop[1]? There are plenty of woodcraft workers that do not use electricity to build their wood projects. If you put aside the requirement that electricity is not allowed, then there are even more skilled wood craftsmen. Try The New Yankee Workshop[2]
[0]https://duckduckgo.com/?q=amish+barn+rasing&t=h_&iax=images&ia=images [1]https://www.pbs.org/woodwrightsshop/ [2]https://www.newyankee.com/
I'm hoping with a little bit of curiosity on your part, you might be able to eliminate some of your ignorance on this topic.
On that note, channels like AvE and Real Engineering come from two different ends of the spectrum in terms of production quality but have a similar feel in terms of how much I learn per minute of content.
There are also channels like the Sampson Boat Company that take a project that would've just ended up turning an old boat into scrap after a while into one of my favorite carpentry/woodworking things to watch, better even than old episodes of the Woodwright's shop or This Old House.
I've been doing a lot of reading about craftsmanship and making things lately, and developing software for about 15 years now. I've found the following books and links to be really well-written and deeply considered covering craftsmanship, skilled work, modern and historical ideas and explorations of the topic, and generally an interesting listen/read:
Cræft, by Alexander Langlands - This is probably the least relevant to building software, but was the first book I read on the topic. It mostly deals with discussions of the history of making things like stone walls, waddle walls, roof thatching, and the like. It's a fun read that I like to put on while I'm working in the yard.
The Craftsman, by Richard Sennett - I just finished this book, and found it to be a fantastically interesting discussion of the idea of craftsmen, craftsmanship, doing skilled work, problem solving and the relationship to problem finding/discovery (this resonated with me as a software developer in a big way) and various facets of all of the above. The author discusses the development of the linux kernel as a reference for madern skilled craftsmanship, which was a pleasant surprise.
My next read is The Nature and Art of Workmanship, by David Pye. It's been referenced by a few other sources that I've watched or read, so I'm very much looking forward to it.
I also really enjoyed an episode of The Woodwright's Shop called "The Spirit of Woodworking", where Roy Underhill discusses (in a somewhat goofy/silly way) concepts like ego, presence of mind, mindfulness, tool usage and jigs, etc.. It really resonated with me, in particular when he discusses ego and how that can relate to what you're doing when building things, as I've found the removal of ego and shifting of perspective to be a huge part of growing as an "experienced" maker of things myself. I can't find the direct link to the video, but it's about half way down the list on this season: https://www.pbs.org/woodwrightsshop/watch-on-line/watch-season-episodes/2006-2007-episodes/
Back when I was a kid there was an episode of "The Woodwright's Shop", where he talked about creating a wood box with no seams containing a coin.
The trick was to drill several holes in a tree that you'll eventually cut down, and fill them with coins. Wait five or ten years for the tree to grow wood around them, then cut the tree down and carve out the boxes from the outside, leaving a hole to view the coin.
Roy Underhill covered this in an episode of the "Woodwright's Shop." It's a PBS program in the US.
http://www.pbs.org/woodwrightsshop/home/