Many years ago, my great grandfather founded J. C. Ayer & Company, which provided remedies to customers around the world. This new puzzle features one of the original advertisements from Ayer’s Cherry Pectoral. Below, alongside a picture of the puzzle, you will find one customer’s accolades from an issue of Ayer’s Almanac from 1868, which was translated into many languages and distributed world-wide. This puzzle is 7″ x 11″ and has 174 pieces.
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This is a story of a special puzzle that I recently made. My customer sent me two pictures of racing motorboats, one for the puzzle and one for the drop-out-lettering. We decided on an oval puzzle because a rectangular one would have too much unnecessary background. The final size was 10 x 15 inches. I used a design from an 11 x 14 puzzle so I had to modify the periphery. The picture above shows the design part-way made.
I wanted the name in the puzzle just as it is on the transom. I was glad that the picture was taken almost directly from astern so I could just trace the letters. The name was slanted to be parallel to the boat’s waterline. The letters were large enough so that the puzzle could be put together with or without them.
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Teaching inner city special ed kids has always been a challenge. They have short attention spans and would much rather be active than reading or listening. Studies have shown that spatial intelligence interacts positively with mathematics so, as an experiment, a 6th grade teacher introduced my puzzles to her special ed class.
Of course the kids loved them. What 6th grader wouldn’t? Here is something they can do with a clear but difficult goal, a put-together puzzle. Normally, making puzzles is no substitute for reading, writing & arithmatic but something must be said for active minds working hard and having fun. The most skilled and enthusiastic boy (below) is also good at math. Now the classes end each week with puzzle time Friday afternoon.
Over the years since I started making puzzles, 1986, I have made more flawed puzzles than I care to admit. If they were pillow cases, they would have been seconds. They are OK but not good enough to ask money for. I am glad an imaginative teacher found a good use for some of them.
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I have redesigned my smaller puzzles. Below left is the old 8×10 design with about 160 pieces and right is the new with about 250.
This new design is the first I am really happy with smaller than 11×14. Prices are the same so now you can get a good custom puzzle for $190 rather than the $320 that an 11×14 costs. Of course there wil be more than one design as time goes on and these designs will apply to the new 7×11 format as well. I will show some samples in future posts.
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A client asked me to make a difficult puzzle for his wife on their fifth anniversary. He comissioned a painting and asked me to make a 16 x 20 puzzle of it. Furthermore he asked that all edge pieces be taken away. For the hell of it I made two copies. His wife liked the puzzle and did it in about two weeks. The second copy is below. Luckily, a waterjet puzzle is not made by jigsaw. When it is finished, it comes off the machine cut, wet and together. I have never taken it apart. I don’t dare to.
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Up late at a wedding
Here is a puzzle of a picture that I took recently at a wedding in Marrakech. I don’t think much of it as a picture but as a puzzle, its impressionism and movement makes it interesting and perhaps difficult.
Years ago I read of a famous and hard puzzle named Little Red Riding Hood’s Hood. It was solid red, without a picture of any kind; difficult but oh so dull. For me an interesting picture is important.
I am going to take Marrakech home and put it together. I think it will be fun but I am not sure that it is good enough to be one of my standard puzzles.
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