What do we call ourselves?

There is a story that Colonel Harlan Sanders of KFC fame stated it best. One time he had to testify in a courtroom. The lawyer asked him what the title colonel meant. Sanders without missing a beat stated that it means the same thing as an attorney. Not a damn thing.
 
My background is (mill) electrician. I have worked as apprentice electrician as far back as 1974. But an apprenticeship had no thought of "marine" electrician or motors. So I had to basically start over. That excludes the military time, from 1968 or as a general "fixer" even further back. That wasn't a paying job, just a helping hand sort. I worked as a "Master" in Florida, grand fathered in. Essentially, I'm nothing. Practically, I'm an "old school" electrician. Oh, and a modeler, but that isn't official or paying. Just helping out when I'm needed.

As an "old school" electrician, I use machine tools just like I would use a screwdriver or wrench. Not just a drill press, but a lathe, milling machine, etc. And again, side work as a modeler. I use the term from the British Royal Navy of Master Artificer (Electrical). The term is not well known Stateside, except in legal dictionaries. And it probably has changed meaning in the last 70 years or so. I live a great deal in the past. . . But my understanding of the word is one who works on anything that has a wire on it. Doing whatever is necessary to "make it go" again. If it is necessary to make a piece, I make a piece. If it is necessary to land a wire, I land a wire. Is there even a proper word for what I do? I don't know, but when asked, I reply "Artificer". It usually gets me puzzled looks, with an occasional nod from English or Irish friends.

I have never been impressed with the term "Master" anything. That term is usually used or generated by the people that don't really know what it takes to accomplish anything. They just shuffle papers until the ink is worn off. And have no idea what I do. What I do is easiest described as "make it go again". A "master model railroader" is someone who has completed the appropriate projects, an apprenticeship, and is checked off in certain areas. I consider myself a master when friends come to me for help and my advice is followed. Not a master anything, just a fellow that knows what to do in a given situation.

About the only thing I "make" is mistakes and piles of wire scraps and chips. I just make the machines go again. Whatever it takes. Is that enough?

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I am a Journeyman Tool & Die Maker. I retired from this position (in employ of the country's largest manufacturer of Natural Gas Compressors) in 2000. I fumbled around not knowing what to do with myself until about 2014 when my son bought a "factory" to make balsa airplane propellers and assigned me the job of actual manufacture. The "factory" included an Ames turret lathe, we added PM mill (PM25) and lathe (PM1030). Since then I've been happier than a pig in mud.
 
I get called a smurf dang Prussian blue for scraping. CAS AKA certified A$$Hole. wannabe machinist (have to wait 3 years before I can go to tec school) I always get yelled out for dragging chips in the house but who doesn't have chips in the hair running inside to find the tweezers because you got a blue chip up your nose and you can smell it buring.
 
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