Jerry Simpson will display his turned wood pieces at this weekend’s Bethany beach Artisans’ Festival.

Jerry Simpson will display his turned wood pieces at this weekend’s Bethany beach Artisans’ Festival.

Jerry Simpson started working with wood “back in the ’70s,” eventually making small items, such as barrettes, for his young daughters, he said in a recent interview.

Then life — parenthood and a busy career as an investigator for the Federal Bureau of Investigation — intervened, Simpson said.

“I didn’t do a lot of woodworking until I retired,” he said.

Now specializing in lathe work, Simpson crafts a variety of types of wood into everything from ice cream scoops to large bowls. He said he has made many charcuterie boards since the platters of meats, cheeses and other foods became popular in recent years.

“The latest thing is butter boards,” he said.

Simpson will be one of dozens of artisans whose works are featured at the Bethany Beach Artisans’ Festival, scheduled for Saturday. Oct. 8, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. The annual festival, now in its 14th year, will be held at the Bethany Beach Volunteer Fire Company’s fire hall at the intersection of Coastal Highway and Hollywood Street, just south of Garfield Parkway.

The fair is sponsored by the Bethany Beach Volunteer Fire Company Auxiliary and features more than 40 artisans this year, collectively skilled in a variety of mediums, from yarn and fabric to seashells and wood. Proceeds from the vendors’ fees help fund fire company projects throughout the year.

Simpson, who lives in Bethany Beach most of the year, said this year will be his second as vendor at the Artisans’ Festival. A member of three wood-turning clubs, he said he enjoys the artistic challenges he gets from using the lathe.

“The nice thing about wood turning is you can try to be a little artistic and change the flow. With traditional woodworking, those things have to be very precise,” he said. “I don’t care for that kind of stuff.”

One of Simpson’s favorite things about his woodworking, he said, is the ability to use different woods — some exotic and some not. Sometimes, friends offer him parts of trees they’ve cut down, such as a recently acquired oak tree.

“I have a lot of wood curing on the side of my house,” he said.

Sometimes, he said, he splurges on more exotic woods.

“Africa has a lot of interesting woods,” including purple heart, red heart and yellow heart, in which the woods are naturally those colors, rather than having to be stained to attain different hues.

Simpson said his absolute favorite wood is cocobolo, which is found in South America and which he described as “brown with orange streaks. I use it very sparingly,” he said, mostly in turned work such as ice cream scoops and wine-bottle stoppers.

Having moved to Bethany Beach in 2018, Simpson said, “It’s a great town,” and that he is pleased to be able to give back to the community through the Artisans’ Festival, which is the only such event he participates in. “It’s a good cause,” he said.

Kerin majored in journalism at Ohio University and has worked as an editor and reporter for monthly, daily and weekly publications in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Delaware since 1983. A native of Baltimore, Md., she has lived in Ocean View since 1996.

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The Coastal Point is a local newspaper published each Friday and distributed in the Bethany Beach, South Bethany, Fenwick Island, Ocean View, Millville, Dagsboro, Frankford, Selbyville, Millsboro, Long Neck and Georgetown, Delaware areas.