Scion of woodworkers is first woman chosen for centuries-old trade group Paul Revere founded

Standing at the lathe in the woodshop she shares with her dad, Christina Fuller presses a chisel against a spinning stick of teak. She’s shaping a spoke to just the right dimensions to fit in the steering wheel of a boat.

“This particular spoke is known as the king spoke, which is our family signature," Fuller said before fine-tuning the piece with a hand rasp.

Fuller, 26, said she can't remember a time when she wasn’t in the shop of her family's South Shore Boatworks in Carver. She descends from a line of pattern-makers — a nearly extinct woodworking trade that involves making molds for metal casting.

“From when I was a small child, I would come into the shop and just glue two pieces of wood together or just help my dad with something real quick, hammer something," she said. "It's just been my whole life doing this."

Bob Fuller said he couldn’t be prouder that his daughter is carrying on the family tradition. And now Christina is breaking new ground: She’s the first woman inducted into an organization founded by the Bostonian who went down in history for alerting colonists to the arrival of British soldiers.

More than two centuries ago, silversmith Paul Revere helped start a group to boost skilled craftsmen, the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association, which still exists today. But over all these years, the group has never welcomed a woman into its ranks — until now.

Chuck Sulkala, president of Mass Charitable Mechanic Association, said, “When you list Paul Revere as our founder, you have to kind of perk up your ears a little bit and say, 'Wow, we are the oldest continuous charitable organization in the country.' ”

The group was formed by master craftsmen to deal with the problem of “runaway apprentices,” who would jump ship before fulfilling the terms of their contracts. But the mission soon morphed into helping the families of artisans, and these days it’s about funding nonprofits that promote the trades.

Sulkala said the association wasn’t closed to female members; it just took 230 years to get here.

“Our members are invited by other members," he said. "And so it just never happened, and we said, you know, we really need to look at this."

He added it’s a big deal for the first woman to help carry the association into the next generation: “Absolutely. This is new lifeblood.”

Meanwhile, at the Fullers' South Shore Boatworks, the craftsmanship stretches back nearly a century. Fuller said his parents met in the Panama Canal Zone when it was controlled by the U.S. One grandfather ran a bronze foundry, and the other managed an apprenticeship program — their children were Bob's parents.

Fuller said the family's nautical wheel-making tradition began when his grandfather returned to Massachusetts in the 1960s: "I learned from my father and grandfather. I really haven't deviated much from how they built wheels.”

South Shore Boatworks claims it's the last shop in the U.S. making hand-built boat wheels. That’s largely because digital technology has taken over much of the woodworking industry, with parts designed on computers and produced on automated machines.

Bob Fuller points out that devices now even affect how people steer boats.

"With the electronics, you can basically program a computer screen and walk away and the boat's going to go where it wants to go," he said. "But that's not the sensation or the feel of actually steering your boat."

The company also offers custom furniture, classes in boat building and other services at the intersection of boats and woodworking.

Training is a key part of keeping traditional crafts alive. Christina Fuller completed an apprenticeship funded by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, studying every aspect of wheel-making with her dad, from lathe work to inlay to applying varnish.

One group the Mass Charitable Mechanics supports is the North Bennet Street School in Boston’s North End.

It’s the oldest trade school in the country, and it was founded in the 1880s by a woman: Pauline Agassiz Shaw, a philanthropist married to a wealthy investor. Today male students outnumber females by roughly two-to-one, according to its president, Sarah Turner.

"We sit right down the street from Paul Revere House," Turner said. "So I'm very sympathetic to long legacies. You have to put your back into it; it's hard to change them and open them up."

Turner said people like Christina Fuller will inspire more women to take up similar careers, working with their hands and keeping old trades alive.