He’d come home from his job as an engineer with Victaulic and over a few days took down several trees. While doing that, 3 other neighbors stopped to ask for similar help. Too much to do on his own Eric enlisted the free help of his wife Rachel, a music teacher at Pleasant Valley Middle School. It was during this time of little weekend jobs that Wicked Beaver was named, and while it grew with a wood chipper, skidster, and sawmill, it remained a small side business until 2019. In 2018 Eric accepted a different position with Victaulic moving Rachel and their daughter to Wilmington, NC. Not too far from Wilmington Eric and Rachel went for a tour of ShopBot in Durham, NC and Eric was sold. A few weeks later Eric and Rachel were unloading the ShopBot Desktop Max into their garage, and while Eric was at Victalic every day Rachel began watching tutorials and learning the software to use the ShopBot and prepare for the training workshop offered by ShopBot. So after 13 years of teaching Rachel became lead designer of the craft side of Wicked Beaver while Eric continued the sawmill and tree climbing/trimming of the business.
