I have always appreciated fancy figured wood grips on my firearms, with the most amazing fiddle-back/tiger stripe maple wood blanks I found years ago at "Sutler's Row" at the N-SSA Nationals in Winchester, VA. The wood measured ten stripes to the inch!
A part-time dealer was selling blank stocks from an old tree cut down in western PA., and my father-in-law (to me he was "Dad" as my biologic Father had passed many years earlier) and I grabbed all that we could carry back to our car.
In the ensuing years, Dad cut the wood and built flintlock rifles for each of us, a buttstock for an original Maynard breech-loading carbine I shot in N-SSA competition, some black powder revolver grips, and a few pen bodies before the supply was depleted, but before Dad passed.
Rummaging around a storage room at a local lumber yard recently, I found a small block of 'fiddle-back' maple (6x4x2") and grabbed it. The graining literally jumped out at me when I got it outside in the sun.
My problem? Dad never taught me his woodworking skills.

Are there any blog members, and especially "sarge43", who might be able and interested in possibly creating some M1911 grips from the maple block. No fancy engraving; smooth grips would be great.
Reimbursement would be contingent on the amount of work required.

rustymusket