Knicely Done: The Sawmill Kid

Danny Nye's passion for customizing wood was evident when he was just old enough to drive.

"When he was 16, he took my 16 inch Poulon chainsaw and drilled two holes in it and made a slabbing rail," explained his father Dale in an interview with WOWT 6 News. "Then he went out to my log rack and started milling logs with it. He was building bird houses, and thats kind of how this whole thing started."

The whole thing that Dale was referring to is Danny's sawmill operation on his small acreage in Bellevue.

"We started real small when I was 17 and then I kind of built a bigger one," he said. "And finally I had enough money to buy one, you know it was a good one."

Walk through Danny's shop and you'll see that he's been busy. Slabs of different types of wood are stacked eight deep all along the walls and ready for someone with creative ideas.

"That's the beauty of wood," he said. "Every piece is different and it can become whatever you want it to be. One person comes in and says 'that could be a cool table' and someone else says 'I've got a different idea.' It could be coat racks, shelves, or counter tops. You can build anything with wood."

Danny's work is much more efficient these days. He earned enough money to buy a skid loader at an auction and he can move the heavy logs into place on the sawmill with ease. "It's saving my back," said the 29-year old.

He hasn't had to advertise Dan's Custom Sawmill because word of mouth has supplied plenty of business. And people who have old trees that have to come down also contact him. Just before we visited his sawmill, Danny and his father had traveled to pick up a load of logs from the City of Gretna.

"We're open to any project if it's wood related," he said. "We'll find you something."

Knicely Done