Below notes and gifts from Jorie Kennedy, who I met when she was apprenticing at the North American School of Natural Building, last year (2011). You don't need a book to make an oven. Best is a friend who's built one, but for friends she hasn't met yet, Jorie put her oven love into this "hot-n-dirty oven lovin guide." Here are the notes she sent about it: "My beautiful friend Lizzy (Rieke) and I (Jorie Kennedy) wrote this zine on how to make your own basic cob (earthen) oven. "We dream of offering natural building, carpentry, and metal working skills to communities that . . .
Roberto Monge’s Oven Story
Roberto Monge’s father – Alfredo Del Transito Monge Menjivar – grew up dirt poor in a jungle village in El Salvador, one of 8 surviving children in a family of 14. By good luck and hard work, he earned a law degree, found paying work, got married and started a family. I didn’t know him, but according to his son Roberto, the elder Monge felt indebted to his campesino roots; when he had to choose between a military dictatorship or a revolutionary people’s movement, he chose the latter, later assuming the position of Attorney General of the Poor in the revolutionary . . .
Increasing wood-stove efficiency
about 300 pounds of masonry makes a small space comfortable for 10-24 hours on very little fuel. It's also easy to burn clean — you never damp it down, so it burns hot and fast, , and minutes after ignition, there's no visible smoke from the stack. Increasing wood-stove efficiency can be as simple as adding just a layer of bricks on top of the stove: more mass stores more heat — as will a low brick wall next to the stove (it can be 1, 2, or 3-sided). However, you can also effectively upgrade your old (or new!) woodstove by re-directing the hot gases from your stove fire thru masonry . . .