Eighty-six-year-old Chester Jones can be found most days surrounded by woodworking equipment in an unheated workshop behind the Twin City Mission.
He toils with saws, drills and welders to build wooden three-wheeled vehicles that look like a mix between a bicycle, a wagon and a wheelchair. He, the other 20 or so members of his men's group from First United Methodist Church in Bryan and a few volunteers hope to build 44 of the chairs at the shop by the end of January -- and change the lives of 44 people across the world in the process.
The vehicles are called personal energy transporters -- or PETs -- and they are designed to work as off-road wheelchairs for people in developing countries. They are distributed by the nonprofit organization PET International, which has workshops across the country.
"It is for people who have lost the use of their legs through polio or land mines or whatever happened to them," said Mike Beal, another church member who works in the woodshop in his spare time. "They will change someone's life."
The local project was started by the Methodist men's group as a way to do good while doing something they enjoy.
"It gave our group of men a hands-on mission without having to drive or fly to another place in the world," said the Rev. Matt Idom, senior pastor at the church and one of the men who works on the chairs.
The workers said they don't know who their chairs will go to, but they have seen videos of people who have received them in the past.
One recipient's birth was stunted. He wanted to become a doctor, and the chair he received helped him continue his education.
Another video showed a man with no legs who couldn't afford any kind of wheelchair. He dragged himself on the ground with a pair of wooden blocks.
"They will go from crawling around in the dirt to a certain amount of independence and self-respect because they are up on something and can move themselves from point A to point B," Beal said.
The chairs are made of solid wood with a steel chassis and are propelled by hand cranks. They have large cargo areas so their users can carry crutches, bags or other supplies and have solid rubber tires that can't go flat and are capable of going up stairs.
They are shipped in boxes, but instead of packing them with foam peanuts, the boxes are stuffed with clothing, water bottles, soft toys and other items that the recipients can use.
Each chair costs about $240 to build. The group hopes to make about 22 a month, meaning they need to raise about $5,500 a month to cover supplies, utilities and other expenses.
The group began working with PET International in August after Jones read about it in a Methodist magazine. He and a few friends traveled to a shop in Luling that makes the vehicles and brought pattern samples of wooden parts back to Bryan so they could do work in Jones' woodshop.
When they delivered the parts, the owner of the shop, an 82-year-old man with Parkinson's disease, told them he was getting too sick to keep working and offered to give them about $50,000 worth of equipment for free if they took over. The Twin City Mission allowed the group to use a shed on its property, an electrical company wired the shed for free and a moving company moved the equipment to Bryan for no charge. After buying some more supplies at a deep discount from local stores, the group began building.
So far, they've constructed about eight of the vehicles. Once they have built 44, which is the most they can fit into their trailer, they will drive them to a warehouse in San Antonio and the vehicles will be distributed across the world. People in more than 70 countries -- including Iraq, Afghanistan, Jamaica, Sierra Leone and Cuba -- have received the vehicles.
The men are also in need of volunteers. A group of welders from Texas A&M has put in hours on the project. A local doctor has regularly helped with welding and a professor from a small Iowa university drove down and spent a few days working in the shop.
Jones said volunteers or donors can contact First United Methodist Church in Bryan at 779-1324.
"It's the kind of thing that men, women and children can do right here locally to support people all over the world," Beal said.
Additional information:
* PET International: www.petinternational.org
* First United Methodist Church: www.fumcbryan.org
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