Jon Arno

Jon Arno was a respected author and longtime contributor to Fine Woodworking who passed away on Dec. 1, 2004. Arno liked to call himself a wood technologist, and he relished sharing his incredible range of knowledge about trees and the products they provide. He was the author of books, magazine articles, and hundreds of posts to the Knots discussion forum, where he revealed an encyclopedic command of the subject.

His many articles on woods offered practical advice to the woodworker with an engaging mix of botany, history, and storytelling. His first article was published in Fine Woodworking #15 (March 1979), and he went on to pen nearly two dozen more. His last article, “The Mysteries and magic of Cherry,” appeared in Fine Woodworking #169.

Arno also wrote two books and contributed to a third. The Woodworkers Visual Handbook was published by Reader’s Digest in 1995, and Trees: An Explore Your World Handbook was published by Discovery Books in 2000. His contributions can be found in A Guide to Useful Woods of the World, Second Edition (Forest Products Society, 2001).