BRATTLEBORO-R.E. Dunklee & Sons Machine Shop hummed on Flat Street for 100 years before closing in 2023. It was an irreplaceable Brattleboro institution.
Machining is the process that transforms raw materials — often but not exclusively metal — into a final product using tools like lathes, milling machines, or drill presses. Of course, machining endures and it evolves. But as new technology replaces old tools and techniques, the art of it all might seem a little less apparent to fans of handsomely designed and eminently efficient machines of the past, such as those seen at the American Precision Museum in Windsor .
In a new short film by filmmakers Alan Dater and Lisa Merton of Marlboro Productions, Dunklee’s place in machining history has been captured and immortalized.
Small Places Close to Home , the latest Dater/Merton production, is part of a collection that spans a range of subjects from Kenya’s visionary Wangarĩ Maathai to artist Wolf Kahn. The film will screen for the public on Sunday, Nov. 1, at the Latchis Theatre in Brattleboro.
It looks at life inside Lester Dunklee’s Machine Shop, “just before this century-old machine shop closed its doors for good,” a media release explains. It is “shot in direct cinema style: there are no interviews or voice overs; the camera observes and captures telling moments,” the filmmakers say.
“In the past, things were rarely thrown away; they were repaired at shops like Dunklee’s. Small Places Close to Home is a portrait of the end of an era. It is also a portrait of a community [and] a look at a vibrant place in a small town where you can catch up with friends, exchange opinions, offer and get advice, and have discussions with Lester Dunklee on just about any subject.
“There are fewer and fewer places now that draw us together,” the filmmakers write. “This film reminds us that rich and diverse communities thrive in small places close to home.”
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When asked what he thought of Dater and Merton’s documentary, Dunklee said quietly, “I liked it, yes. I thought it was pretty well done.”
Does it tell an accurate story? “I would say so, yes. They did a pretty good job of getting the idea of what was going on there and what I was all about and everything else.”
When asked what he missed about the shop, he’s quick to say, “I don’t miss having to lift up the steel and drag it out to be cut up and everything. But I miss the people that come around.”
The Commons spoke recently with Dater and Merton.
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Annie Landenberger: What was the genesis of the film?
Alan Dater: I’m a filmmaker but also a cameraman, and I’ve always been interested in the light in Dunklee’s shop. It’s [a great] place to film because it’s very dark and gloomy in some places. But when the sun shines, it comes through these windows [over] 100 years old. They’re covered with this grime, which, when it hits a face, it looks like a Vermeer or something. It’s just very soft and beautiful light.
So I’ve always loved that part of that shop. And of course, I know what the scene [was] there, what it [was] like.
All these people meet and look for bearings and bolts and get things fixed, but it [was] also a place for people to get together and talk to one another and commune.
A.L.: A beautiful thing to make a film of.
Lisa Merton: [Lester] closed the shop in December 2023 [when he was 75]. Because it was 100 years since it had opened, and he was just getting sick of walking around on the cement floor. So it was three years ago that we filmed there, in September 2023, when he had decided he was going to close.
A.L.: Why then?
A.D.: I’d asked Lester if I could make a film of activity in the shop probably 10 years ago. And he didn’t really want anything to do with it. He thought it would be intrusive. So I let it go.
Then, when he was getting ready to close, I asked him again. He said, “Yeah, OK, fine.”
He didn’t really know what it would be like to have me and Lisa there filming. And once he realized that it was very easy and that we didn’t interfere, we didn’t direct, he began to appreciate what we were doing.
L.M.: We went over and visited him pretty recently to tell him that we wanted to show it at the Latchis. And he said, “Yeah, OK, that’s OK.”
A.L.: So, will there be a Q&A afterwards?
L.M.: Well, it’s really a celebration of the Dunklee family, who have been on Flat Street — Lester, his father, and his grandfather before him. So that shop has served people and the community for a century.
And it’s a huge loss for many reasons. I mean, farmers went there, auto mechanics went there, artists went there. Anybody who needed something made or needed something fixed.
We knew a guy up here in Westminster West. His name was Dewey Newcomb, and when I first moved into this house in Westminster West in 1965, he spent a lot of time here with us. And what did he say, Alan, to you one time about Lester Dunklee’s father?
A.D.: He said, “Oh, yeah, that old man Dunklee, he can make just about anything, fix anything. I guess if you give him the right tools, he’d probably even make a human being.”
Old Vermont humor.
A.L.: The range of subjects that you guys cover is pretty broad, but where is your comfort? Is this film in the love-to-do category?
A.D.: Well, you know, we’ve done films all over the world. But it’s the local story that I think is important. It’s just interesting. It’s a cameraman’s dream. There were a lot of characters who came in there.
The film doesn’t have narration. There’re no interviews. It’s like a day in the life, except it’s extended over three weeks. First it’s Lester just working, then it’s made up of maybe a dozen individuals coming in and interacting.
L.M.: They all come in with something to fix or something to make. And then it goes on from there.
A.L.: So Lester Dunklee is an old-fashioned machinist, then, yes? So in doing this homage to him, are you also looking at a dying art?
L.M.: It’s looking at a dying art. The reason we call it S mall P laces C lose to H ome is because that’s exactly what it is. And that’s actually a line from [Eleanor Roosevelt’s 1958 speech on universal human rights].
But it is a disappearing skill. It’s a disappearing kind of place.
You can go and hang out there and get what you need done by somebody who is really dexterous and smart and experienced and will figure out some way to do it.
And if Lester can’t, he’ll say, “I can’t.” But mostly he’ll figure out a way to do it.
A.D.: People are used to just throwing things away these days. But a Vermont tradition, a farm tradition, is that you fix everything. And that’s part of why people [went] to that shop — to get something fixed.
And the other aspect of it is that we’re all separated by our own little cubicles, sort of looking at the internet and communicating in every way except in person. But that place [was] in person. You went in there to see people and learn what’s going on in the community.
It was the same as Stanley [Lynde]’s motorcycle shop across the street. A lot of people would go there. It was part of the community’s soul.
A.L.: We’re in this time of built-in obsolescence: You can’t even find a cobbler to resole a leather shoe. And there’s a sadness around that, because I imagine that similar patter happened in the cobbler shop.
L.M.: Were you here when the cobbler was still there where Mocha Joe’s is?
A.L.: I’m sorry I missed it.
L.M.: He was such a great guy. He would just take anything in there, and he would fix it — a belt or your boot or your shoe.
A.L.: It’s poignant what you’ve done.
L.M.: It’s bittersweet. I don’t know how many people [would] go there to get acetylene for their torches.
And people came in just to get advice. They didn’t necessarily pay him.
“How would I do this?” “Well, you would do it this way.” An artist, she’s making a sculpture that’s going to have faces on it and hands. “And, well, how would I make it stand up?”
So it’s a broad spectrum of people, and some of them are highly educated. And some of them aren’t.
A.D.: Lester Dunklee likes to help people. He’s very patient. He’s a great listener: He listens and then he comes up with this brilliant solution. He’s modest, and he’s humble.
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A Sunday, Nov. 1 celebration of the Dunklee family takes place at 4 p.m. at the Latchis Theatre, 50 Main St., Brattleboro. After an introduction and the film screening, there’ll be a discussion with the filmmakers before audience members will be invited to tell their own stories that have sprung from Lester Dunklee’s shop.
Admission is by donation ( $10 is suggested, but no one will be turned away ) . Proceeds benefit Latchis Arts. For more information, visit marlboroproductions.com and latchis.com .
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Editor ’ s note: Stories presented as interviews in this format are edited for clarity, readability, and space . Words not spoken by interview subjects appear in brackets, as do editorial clarifications .
Annie Landenberger is an arts writer and columnist for The Commons. She also is one half of the musical duo Bard Owl, with partner T. Breeze Verdant.
This Arts item by Annie Landenberger was written for The Commons.