28 ADIRONDACK LIFE September + October 2019I
’m never called by my real name. As far as the gov-
ernment knows it’s Wendell. I was born on a real
windy night in Thurman, and I’ve been Windy ever
since,” says 75-year-old Windy Baker, who lives in
Indian Lake at the top of North River Hill in a house he built
from scratch. There’s a big garden along the road, a board-
and-bat ten shed crow ned w it h a t urban vent ilator t hat spins
in the breeze, a workshop with lumber stacked on most flat
surfaces, a sawmill adjacent to the chicken run and piles of
pine logs waiting to be processed. Adirondack chairs are on
the porch and along the path to the outbuildings.
Windy, nimble despite a cane and a hitch in his giddy-up
from hip surgery, explains, “If you live here you have to have
more than one job. My father always said not only do you
need to learn to read and write you need to learn to work.Windy Baker
Forest to furniture with an
Indian Lake institution
BY ELIZABETH FOLWELL
Windy Baker in his
workshop, where
he has made hun-
dreds of Adirondack
chairs, including this
giant one off Route
28 in Indian Lake.PROFILE
I’ve always had sawmills, been timber-
ing, done tons and tons of fireplaces
from Granville to Whitehall to Ticond-
eroga to Newcomb.”
Windy and his wife, Cindy, have
five children; he’s built homes for each
of them. “I told them they could have
whatever they wanted from my mill, log
or timber frame. I wanted them to have
homes not mortgaged to the hilt.”
In his own place Windy made the Ph
ot
ographsbyCarrie^ Mar
ie^Burr