Like a lot of people his age, Tim McCreight smiles when he looks back on his college years in the late 1960s and early ’70s. His reasons, however, might be different than most.
“If I know nothing else, I know I am not a good student,” McCreight said in a recent interview at his home on Sebascodegan Island.
A man of considerable accomplishment on a global scale, McCreight should never run out of things to talk about. He’s been a metalsmith, jewelry maker, craftsman, artist, author, publisher and teacher. He is currently president of the Harpswell Heritage Land Trust Board of Trustees.
But McCreight might rather talk about the “pothole parties” he and his Harpswell neighbors throw to repair their section of Gun Point Road after storms. Or about how he had such scattered interests as an undergraduate at The College of Wooster in Ohio that he almost didn’t have enough credits in any one area to earn a degree. Or about how a stubborn student might resist his suggestions and turn out to be right, doing things their own way. “And that’s a lovely thing when that happens,” he said.
He might be genetically incapable of the proverbial humblebrag. One of his former students, Abby Johnston, picked up on that a long time ago and decided to take action.
Johnston, a sound therapist and metalsmith who lives in Biddeford, is the author of “Marks of a Maker,” an unconventional biography and a tribute to McCreight’s influence on craftspeople from Maine to West Africa, Japan, Europe, Canada and then some.
“He is one of the most humble people you’ll ever meet,” Johnston said in a recent interview. “I would say he is not just a local treasure or a state treasure. He is a national treasure.”
“Marks of a Maker” is not a traditional biography. Released in October by Johnston’s Wild Che Press, the book begins with a chapter titled “How to engage with this book,” explaining that its 184 pages are not linear, but organized by theme.
“Marks of a Maker” contains essays from McCreight’s students and peers in the world of metalsmithing and jewelry making, a moving tribute from McCreight’s son, and dozens of photos of work by artists in McCreight’s world.
It is difficult to pinpoint a signature accomplishment of McCreight’s life, but the Toolbox Initiative, a nonprofit he created with Montreal-based jeweler and teacher Matthieu Cheminée, might come close.
The program distributes tools and supplies to jewelers of limited means, primarily in West Africa. Cheminée has devoted much of his life to preserving traditional jewelry techniques.
“Dozens of artisan jewelers in cities of West Africa have lives forever transformed by the work of Tim and Matthieu,” Johnston wrote in “Marks of a Maker.” “But they were able to deepen their impact by bringing along other North American jewelers to be ambassadors, and perhaps more importantly, caddies for a growing collection of donated tools for distribution.”
McCreight’s signature book, one of many handbooks and textbooks he has authored, is “The Complete Metalsmith,” first published in 1982. In 2004, McCreight’s own Brynmorgen Press released a major revision with student and professional editions.
McCreight’s impact on artisans in Maine began decades ago. From 1987-2005, he was a professor at the Portland School of Art, later named the Maine College of Art and Design. Johnston met him there by accident.
“Thinking I was going to create my own illustration major … somehow I wound up in the metalsmithing studio and never left,” Johnston wrote in “Marks of a Maker.”
In 2003, McCreight hired Johnston to work at Brynmorgen Press as an editorial assistant. They worked together for five years.
In 2018, Johnston asked McCreight for permission to write a book about him. Johnston had previously published a critically acclaimed biography about Portland artist Lissa Hunter.
McCreight declined. Johnston didn’t argue, but asked again a few months later, encouraged by McCreight’s wife. McCreight said no again. But eventually he came around.
For all his travels, connections, and adventures of the mind and spirit, McCreight lives very much in the present. He said he wants to keep learning.
Turns out he might be capable of a humblebrag after all. “I’ve taught all over the world,” he said. “But I’ve never taken a jewelry class.”
“Marks of a Maker” is available for purchase at marksofamaker.com and available for loan at the Orr’s Island Library.
