A thin layer of sawdust coats the well-worn power tools, wood scraps and partially finished projects that are randomly spread around the Little House wood shop.

91-year-old instructor Richard Springer runs an electric saw through two blocks of wood. These will be used to help a student replace the rotted handles of her wheel barrel. 

For more than two decades Springer has been showing up habitually at Little House to teach carpentry and wood working every Monday from 9 a.m. - noon. 

Standing tall and agile, with surprisingly smooth hands for a life-long wood worker, Springer patiently guides his students every week, and has no plans of retiring any time soon from his job as a Peninsula Volunteer. 

Barb Wallis, 70, is one of his students who says that while she appreciates many things about Springer's teaching skills, the thing that stands out in her mind is his humility.

"He makes you want to do it, but doesn't make you feel foolish," Wallis said.  She shows off her work-in-progress from Springer’s class -- a collapsible ‘clam’ chair patterned after the one she used to have and is grateful for Springer’s talents and teaching skills.

"Ric has all 10 fingers!” Wallis she added. 

While known on the Peninsula as Menlo Park’s senior center, Little House welcomes members of all ages to participate in a variety of classes. New this summer – and starting today is a “boot camp” exercise class, along with yoga, arts and crafts, ceramics and a lot more.

Springer built his family’s 2,500-square-foot home in 1962 on a five-acre parcel in Woodside, where he still lives. He learned the skills of cabinetmaking and carpentry while growing up in Germany and Switzerland. He also built a cabin from scratch up in Tahoe.

Signs of his craftsmanship and repair work fill the Little House complex. 

What keeps Springer busy besides helping students with their woodworking projects?  Helping his four children with carpentry work needed around their own homes, all located in San Mateo County.  When he gets time off from his avocation, Springer, who still drives, heads over to the Main Street Coffee Roasting Company for lunch.  The Redwood City establishment is owned and managed by his two daughters.

Springer emigrated to the U.S. in 1941 during World War II after moving from Switzerland to France where he joined the French army.  In 1940 he escaped from Paris just as the German militia stormed the city and occupied the country.

“The German soldiers marched into Paris on one end and I left on a train from the other end,” Springer said.

Springer’s carpentry skills served him well as the army’s unofficial barracks handyman both in France and when he was dispatched to North Africa where he remained until being discharged, then coming to N.Y. in 1941.

After moving to the Bay Area and settling in Woodside, Springer tried to run his own cabinetry shop building doors, kitchen cabinets and custom furniture, but couldn’t produce enough work on his own to support his family.

“You can’t make a living with just your own two hands,” Springer said. 

So he took a job as construction supervisor for San Mateo County where he worked until 1985.  Up until five years ago Springer traveled all over the world with his wife, from China, Japan, the Philippines and Taiwan to Peru, Equator, Costa Rica and Guatemala, to Spain and Morocco, among other places, and fulfilled his other passion, photography. 

Reflecting on how he spends his time when not teaching, Springer muses, “I wonder.”