Like New Again

An abandoned chair lay by a dumpster in the alley. Abused, broken and regarded as junk, it waited the arrival of the Clarendon city trash truck.

But then Wayne Tubbs entered the scene. After looking the chair over, he picked it up and carried it back to his workshop, where it became one of the many pieces of old furniture he reconstructs to look brand new.

“That was about six years ago, and we still have that chair today in our upstairs bathroom,” said Patsy Tubbs, Wayne’s wife. “He’s redone a lot of the furniture in our household, and for many other people as well. I call him the Chairman of Clarendon.”

Wayne said that his inspiration to begin fixing furniture came from his grandfather.

“I used to help my grandpa, Earl Berry, in Carrizozo, New Mexico, fix stuff in the late 40s and early 50s,” Wayne said. “Back then they didn’t have any money, so they had to make just about everything they had. He did all kinds of work as a blacksmith and carpenter, and he even made windmill towers out of wood. He was a jack of all trades.”

Wayne started repairing and refinishing furniture for people in 1996, after he retired from his position as superintendent over El Paso Natural Gas Company.

“I’ve been working with furniture all my life, but it became a hobby after I retired,” Wayne said.
“We were living in Roswell, New Mexico, at the time, and there was a lady there who had a warehouse full of antiques. She wanted her stuff fixed, so I started working for her, mainly on rebuilding chairs and tables, until I moved to Clarendon in 2003.”

His work did not stop there though. Since he moved to Clarendon, Wayne has rarely had an empty workshop or any idle time.

“I’ve done work on a roll-top desk, tables and chairs for the Saints Roost Museum; redone doors for the Clarendon Schools; rebuilt stairs and made stair railing for the First United Methodist Church; did quite a bit of work for Poor Boys Antique Shop; built the box that held Kevin Johnston’s spurs that were presented to George W. Bush; and I make picture frames for Patsy’s paintings,” Wayne said. “I also do a lot of work for many other local customers.”

One of his local customers is Virginia Patten. 

“Wayne refinished a slant top desk that’s in my office, and it was a piece of junk,” she said. “It was my grandparents’ desk from the late 1800s, and my parents used it at The Grocery Store. He saw it and said he could fix it, and now it’s one beautiful piece of furniture. As a trademark, he even left one of my father’s cigarette burns on it. It’s worth millions to me. If my house were on fire, I would get that desk out.”

He has also done numerous pieces for Fredie Jo Moreman.

“Wayne is an artist in his trade,” Moreman said. “He is very thorough and detailed in his work. There’s not many people anymore who can do woodwork like him. I’ve been pleased with everything he’s done for me.”

To ensure that the furniture looks as good or better than its original condition, Wayne refinishes and repairs the old fashioned way, which he said is “still the best.”

“I use a lot of tools that people used years and years ago, in fact I still use some of my grandfather’s tools,” Wayne said. “I make a lot of my own tools as well. Most of the old furniture I do by hand without the use of power tools or strippers with harsh acid.” 

Wayne and Patsy figure that he has worked on thousands of pieces of furniture throughout the years.

“When people bring furniture to me that’s in pieces, I see it like a puzzle and I enjoy reconstructing it,” he said

Wayne’s workshop continues to be full of old furniture awaiting an extreme makeover as more customers bring in “junk,” but pick up works of art.

“I love seeing the furniture before and after he gets done working on it because it’s always such a drastic change,” Patsy said. “He continues to amaze me and each of his customers with his endless talents in woodworking.”