Tailgate: Jackie Rogers, Artist
Meet the artist who created the drawings for Fine Homebuilding's "Great Moments in Building History
FH: Do you remember your first “Great Moments” illustration?
JR: No, but it’s in FHB #17 if you want to look it up. I do remember that it was in black and white. I was fresh out of college.
FH: What building knowledge did you have when you started illustrating “Great Moments”?
JR: Absolutely nothing, but while illustrating “Great Moments,” I bought my first house, an 1835 side-hall colonial on the brink of destruction.
FH: What’s the most difficult thing about illustrating a “Great Moment”?
JR: That’s easy. You can’t illustrate the punch line of the story. Of course, there have been many “Great Moments” where I couldn’t come up with anything good other than the punch line, in which case I was forgiven by the art director, Bob Goodfellow, especially if he couldn’t come up with anything better. One time while I was waiting to have my car fixed, I had an “aha” moment at the Kia dealership, and from then on, Bob would say, “That’s not a very good idea. You better go back to the Kia dealership.” Then I’d call and say, “I had a Kia moment!”
FH: What illustrations have been your favorites? Are there any that come to mind?
JR: They would be the ones where we had a lot of fun with the design, because it wasn’t just about illustrating the story in an interesting way. I think one of my favorites was a recent story of a missing wheelbarrow, where the whole page was illustrated and we played with the shadow on the wall. That was a Kia moment.
FH: What building knowledge have you picked up over all these years?
JR: I learned that I should never Sheetrock my dog under the stairwell. Mostly, I’ve learned what not to do, although it didn’t help because I did plenty of things wrong.
FH: So doing “Great Moments” has taught you important lessons about how not to build?
JR: No, because I’m sure that everything I build, I will build wrong because I always do, and then I will learn how to do it right—unless I give up and call somebody.
FH: Are you as handy with power tools as you are with drawing tools?
JR: No, but I have gotten better since I am a homeowner without a husband who I can get to do things for me. I have to be a little more fearless about that stuff. I do own a chopsaw. I own a compressor. I own a tablesaw. My next step is to learn how to use a router. I really fantasize about using routers.
I think all builders should teach their daughters how to do basic carpentry. Every little girl should learn how to build something out of wood. Maybe someday they’re going to have to fix some rot or replace a molding or whatever, and they should know how to do that.
FH: Have you ever had a “Great Moment” of your own?
JR: Yes. I had a frozen pipe, and to get to it, I had to go through a crawlspace about 2-1/2 ft. wide—maybe more like 2 ft. because it was so tight. I was on my stomach, and I was pushing with my toes because in front of me, I was pushing a fan and a mini electric heater, which I know is a really bad idea, but I didn’t leave the basement once it was on. While I was pushing the fan and the heater up ahead of me, I noticed that as my body was dragging on the dirt floor of the crawlspace, my pants were slowly inching down. Every time I pushed with my toes, my sweatpants slid farther down, and I couldn’t move my arms around to fix them.
Meanwhile, with my pants down at my knees, I saw this really disgusting carcass of a giant spider covered in white mold. I screamed and started crying. I waited until I calmed down, and then I got everything in the right place to deal with the frozen pipe.
Then I had to push with the palms of my hands to get myself out, which, by the way, did not put my pants back on. When I got back to the place where I had crawled in, I discovered that the chair that I had climbed on to get to the crawlspace had fallen over, so I had to slide down. I scraped my stomach because it was all rock. I was crying, and I was full of dust and dirt.
It wasn’t fun at the time, but I had a good time telling the story afterward. I had to do the whole thing again the next winter. That winter, though, I put a mobile phone in my pocket. I went in prepared so that if I got stuck, I could at least call somebody to get me out. And I wore pants with a belt.
Photo: Bret Wills, Drawing: Jackie Rogers
