Today is Thanksgiving Day, 2014. It is also my 59th birthday. As the administrator of this site as well as the owner and creator of the CanJoe Company, I have much to celebrate and much to be thankful for. I began the CanJoe Company over twenty years ago, in the year 1994. Previous blog posts on this site tell the story of how I got started, and why. Without repeating all the details, as one can find those details in the previous posts, I was a close and personal friend of Herschel R. Brown who originally designed and created the very first in the world one-stringed musical instruments that he called the “Can Joe”. Herschel gave to me, and I still own, one of his very first ever made instruments. Soon after, he and I began working together to market and distribute them. Herschel always used only pine wood that he recovered from his construction jobs to make his simple, but well made instruments. He did not stain, edge, or add any finish to the raw pine wood that he used to make his. He mass produced the simple pine wood finger boards that he sold to a wood working supply catalog as kits. I quickly found a different niche of buyers who wanted something better, something more personal, and who chose to invest in a higher level of products than the simple, less than finished version that Herschel offered. Folks that I met would ask if I could make theirs with specific cans, special woods, or with much greater detail than the simple pine wood versions. I grew up in the mountains of East Tennessee and my grandmother managed the Blue Ridge Parkway Craft Center in Blowing Rock, NC for 27 years, beginning in the year that I was born. She was an expert on the high end hand crafted items created by the finest craftsmen of the Southern Highlands Craft Guild. I grew up learning from the works of these fine craftsmen that detail and quality matter, a lot! When I began making my versions of “canjoe” instruments, with and by Herschel’s full support and assistance in getting started, my goal was to create them at the highest level of craftsmanship and accuracy as possible. I also had two other goals that came from life’s circumstances that I was experiencing at the very beginning of my starting the CanJoe Company. That beginning was at the time when my wife, Sissy, was dying from cancer and before she departed this world I promised her that I’d someday reach two other specific goals with the instruments, besides creating them into fine art. One of those goals was that I’d someday play the Grand Ole Opry on a canjoe, and on November 4, 2006, I made that goal realized. I debuted the Opry on the stage of the Ryman Auditorium to a sold out crowd and earned three rousing ovations during, and a standing ovation at the end of that performance. So, that goal was finally met. I also had promised to Sissy that I’d put smiles on faces that deserved to smile, and after my debut on the Opry, I began an exclusive tour of children’s hospitals, called the Tour of Smiles, where for seven consecutive years, I toured, entertained, and gave thousands of my beautifully hand finished instruments to very sick kids with chronic illnesses, like cancer, as for what I called “smile therapy”. Thus, I’ve achieved that other very worthy goal, as well.
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It’s obvious that I have much to be thankful for. As I, too, am quickly reaching the age of being a senior citizen, I also realize that my time on this earth is becoming shorter with each year, each day, but hopefully many more that will allow me to continue offering my craft, my art, for those who appreciate owning these cool, fun to play, genuine instruments. I will continue to make my instruments at the highest level of craftsmanship possible. I will not ever compromise, lower my standards of workmanship or quality of product in order to “compete” with those who have more recently jumped in to take advantage of a growing market that I have spent twenty years creating, with their conceived versions of cheaply made inferior products, either. What I personally hand make and others now attempt are not as “apples to apples” by anyone else offering, and more than often, are not even close … no brag, just fact. I make no apologies for any statement made here, either. I create my instruments for those who require and desire to own the absolute very best, the highest of quality possible of ‘canjoe’ instrument made, and who choose to deal with a 20 year well established business that has a sterling world wide recognized and respected reputation. The CanJoe Company of Blountville, TN is the only maker and provider in existence of the truly genuine, original, master crafted one-stringed musical thing, trade branded as the ‘Canjoe’. For all inquiries, orders, or options, please call 423-323-0174, or cell 423-612-4320. Orders for Christmas should be made as soon as possible in order to assure delivery on time. ~ John L. VanArsdall (aka CanJoe*John), Proprietor
