End Table

My father built this coffee table when I lived in Racine, Wisconsin.  My mother told me that I was less than one years old.  This makes the table over 50 years old.  When my father passed away, my older sister inherited the table and it has been in her living room ever since.

Recently, she asked me to refinish the table.  It had 40 years of wear and tear on the finish, however, it is made from walnut and the wood is in pretty good shape.

Table Top Witness Marks

I tried to completely disassemble the table, unfortunately the base is glued to the frame.  Why my father did this I don’t know.  Further, upon inspection of the construction, the center section of the  walnut top appears to be a wood laminated piece of plywood salvaged from some other piece of furniture.  There are stain marks on the underside that clearly show it had once belonged to another piece of furniture.

The picture shows lower shelf disassembled from the frame.  It has very interesting caning  and I am trying to decide what I am going to do with this.  Last night I tried to remove the caning.  It is too old and looks like my father used a lot glue.  The quality of the miter joints is not that good.  I will probably replace the wood frame rather than salvage it.  I have to decide if I am going to attempt to replace the caning or do something different.

I have stripped the finish and rough sanded most of the wood.  All surfaces are in good shape.  I expect to have the entire table fully finished sanded in a couple of weeks.  I am not sure what I am going to do with the cane shelf.