Erik Johnson of Treehouse Woods

Article Category: Skilled Labor

It’s said you can tell a lot about a person by the car they drive. If that’s the case, then surely the woodie owner rides in the most revealing and loquacious of biographers.

The woodie is undeniably fetching, yet it exudes the kind of understated and approachable attractiveness you find in the girl next door, the one you’ve had your eye on since first grade. It whispers the sort of comfortable affluence earned by dint of hard work and deep appreciation for days off rather than the inherited, windfallen wealth other vintage roadsters seem to shout as they pass. Even when parked, with no driver in sight, it tells you that its owner is down-to-earth, laid-back, and respectful of history, more at ease on the simpler, scenic roads of life than on the crowded freeways of modernity. Not that he’ll completely avoid them though, because they’re often the fastest way to the beach — and the woodie owner is at heart a surfer. His car is as indispensable as his board, and the road that takes him to the wave just as worthy of riding.

I’m sure if you listen closely, you can hear the five models woodie builder Erik Johnson owns singing a chorus of praise to their guardian and caretaker, but it’s hard to make out beneath the din made by thousands of his other children — spread out from Florida to Hawaii — who have plenty to say about their beloved father. It’s in Treehouse Woods, Johnson’s cluttered Cocoa Beach woodworking shop-cum-garage, that many of the country’s woodies saw the first light of day or were nursed back to health, thanks to his abiding love for this quintessentially American car.

As Johnson sees it, woodies symbolize “lost youth, freedom and fun.” He saw his first specimens while surfing in the New England of his own youth and never forgot the impact they made on him, nor the emotions they still conjure. “Nowadays,” Johnson says, “a lot of baby boomers have grown up thinking back on the carefree summers of their childhood. And now that their own kids have grown up and gone off to college, they need a toy of their own.” While most customers are doctors, lawyers, and businessmen, Johnson is quick to dispel any notion that woodies are simply exclusive collectibles for the well-heeled. “Woodie lovers come from all backgrounds, really. Everyone can appreciate and relate to them.”

It’s democratic qualities like these that attract woodie enthusiasts to their charges, vehicles that were originally built less for their aesthetic appeal than for their economy and practicality. The first prototypes appeared in 1910 and were known as “depot hacks,” favored for their spaciousness and the efficiency with which they shuttled encumbered travelers back and forth between hotels and train stations, hence the origin of their other name, “station wagons.” In the ’20s, more refined versions were being fashioned as chauffeured conveyances for Henry Ford’s illustrious cronies, men like Edison and DuPont, who reveled in the rare, bird’s-eye maple panels that adorned them. Subsequent decades saw them serving as America’s early SUV, with nearly every major car manufacturer in the country producing models with panels hewn from cheaper more prevalent woods like birch, ash, mahogany and common maple.

Woodies began their decline during the ’50s and ’60s when manufacturers realized pure steel bodies were less costly and labor-intensive to produce. Owners found them to be labor-intensive, too; without proper care, most succumbed quickly to the elements and were abandoned roadside or left to moulder in scrapyards. Surfers, then enjoying their heyday and just on the cusp of an excited diaspora, found them to be cheap workhorses, ideal for carrying boards and friends and duly expressive of their resourceful, individualistic attitudes. Today, woodies are usually associated with the California lifestyle, Funicello and Avalon films, and, of course, the Beach Boys.

But the ones that first spoke to Johnson were seen on the East Coast where he learned to surf. He made his first trip to Cocoa Beach from Massachusetts in 1969 before serving in Vietnam and returned to settle here in 1974, drawn by the Southeast Asian-like climate and lifestyle to which he’d grown accustomed. It was while living across from the ocean at 6th Street South that the self-taught Johnson began collecting driftwood and making furniture for his woefully bare second-floor apartment. “People were coming over and taking notice of some of these pieces and asked me to start building things for them,” he remembers. “I worked on my porch with this great view out over the trees, and that’s how I came up with the name, ‘Treehouse Woods.’”

Woodies came back into Johnson’s life serendipitously in 1975, when a friend told him about two rusting 1940 models he’d seen for sale in Orlando for $7,000. “Of course, I didn’t have the money for them then and I was trying to start a wood shop,” he tells me, “but it stayed in the back of my mind. A few years later they were still there, and I couldn’t pass them up again. I got both for $3,000.” Johnson’s woodworking and carpentry skills came in handy at this stage, as did earlier experience building hot rods in high school. “I had to teach myself how to repair them, but I restored those first two and bought some more. Now it’s a passion that’s just gotten way out of control,” he laughs.

Now nearly 30 years at his shop on Brevard Avenue, Johnson combines a variety of impressive skills with that passion to refurbish, restore and build custom and vintage woodies from scratch. Few shops in the country specialize in this type of work; even fewer do it as well as Johnson. When he can’t find parts — everything down to brackets and miniscule hinges — he makes them himself, often working from molds he had the foresight and ingenuity to fashion over the years. Though Ford wagons from 1935-1951 are closest to his heart, Johnson is also adept at repairing and creating models of all makes and years from chassis and molds he’s made of frames. Apart from planing, sanding and shaping wood into doors, tailgates, window moldings and roofs, he also does the varnishing, interior work, wiring, and engine repairs, all painstaking processes that involve a fantastic eye for detail.

Often working on several projects at a time, Johnson still finds time to do the unique woodworking that first brought him success. “We are refusing to participate in this recession,” he says matter-of-factly. “The country needs to learn to get up in the morning and go to work.” To that end, Johnson is devoting more time to doing custom woodwork, from made-to-specification furniture to fit odd spots in customers’ homes to repairing broken pieces that might otherwise be thrown out. His portfolio reveals a wide variety of creations: boat interiors, architectural flourishes and ornaments, cabinets, bookcases, entertainment centers, full kitchens, bed frames and sofas.

Still though, you get the feeling that what really gets Johnson up in the morning is that passion woodies first kindled in him all those years ago, one that’s as warm and organic as the very substance they’re made from. “It never fails to amuse me that when a person sees a woodie, the first thing they do is smile.”

“I feel like I’m helping make the world a better place,” he says, with just the sort of selfless cheer you’d expect from a proud woodie owner.

Treehouse Woods is located at 112 N. Brevard Ave. in Cocoa Beach. Call 783-6781, or visit www.woodiewood.com

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