Thank You, Scott Bartky

While reading my friend Kate McKinnon's blog yesterday, I discovered that a gentleman by the name of Scott Bartky passed away last week. I never met Mr. Bartky and indeed, had never heard his name before, but it turns out that I have used something he invented quite often and for that, I must raise a glass to his memory and say "thank you, sir". Mr. Bartky was the inventor of the crimping plier, a tool that most of us beaders have in our basic arsenal. As I recall, it was one of the first pairs of pliers I ever bought and it is definitely something that all beginning beaders should own if they are stringing beads on wire.

You'll want to read Kate's post about this man and especially the 37 comments that are attached to it (click on the link on the right and scroll down to her January 6th posting entitled "Sail on, Scott")(for some reason, I can't link directly to that specific post but there's lots of interesting stuff to read as you scroll down so it's not a bad thing).

Kate describes both herself and Mr. Bartky this way - "both of us loathed greed and idiocy and celebrated open hearts and foolishness." The people who have added their stories to Kate's in the comments section include Mr. Bartky's wife Elisabeth, his son Alan, Mike Sherman from Soft Flex and Herman Kirkpatrick, who used to own Euro Tools and describes how popular the tool has been for Euro Tools, who licensed the tool from Mr. Bartky. The stories are all quite delightful to read and paint a picture of a man of honour and talent, who leaves behind a powerful legacy in the hearts of those who knew him, to which we should all aspire. I think his son Alan said it best, when he spoke of the most important lesson his father taught him: "The choices you make in life, what you create and how you interact with others always can be done in a way that as you say “makes you a better person” but also helps others."

Click here to see the Euro Tools page featuring the various sizes of crimping pliers available. http://www.eurotool.com/PDFs/catalogPDFs/BeadStringing.pdf. Upon inspection of the pair I own, it seems they are not made by Euro Tool, so I'll have to get myself a new pair one of these days to remember Mr. Bartky by. But remember him, I certainly shall, whenever I use any pair of crimping pliers from now on.