Yup. I should have remembered deS. See, it's another example of my brain turning to mush because I didn't memorize the Illiad when I had a chance!
I assume you've seen [link|http://www.pbs.org/wws/|The Woodwright's Shop] on PBS? The guy there, Roy Underhill, builds lots and lots of stuff by hand or with machines he's made. Amazing stuff, but it's exhausting to watch him work. I saw one show where he was building a shed from timbers in the woods. By himself. It was painful to watch him straining... But it's a good show.
While losing manufacturing is a very worrying trend in many respects, one very good thing about America being such a huge country and so technologically advanced is that it would be very difficult for things to get to such a state that we'd have to start over. Too many people have Honda generators now... :-)
Cheers,
Scott.