Gorensky Glass | Working in the forest rejuvenates him

As he answered the phone, over the hum of the machines, I heard: “Now I’m in the mud, we’re clearing the road, we can roar like wild boars.” The mood was good. “But I’ll be home in a few hours, just come over,” he invited me to simultaneously tour his extensive chainsaw collection.

They meet at noon on a hot July day in the pleasant shade of trees near his home in Spodnybrnik. If you want to know what drives a person to start collecting chainsaws in the first place, through a conversation with Fran Martinjak, he will pull himself to prepare a stand – if not specifically for this type of saws, at least for something else, something like a collectible. Frank is a witty interlocutor: “For a while I wanted to collect vintage vehicles, but they were all too rusty and it wasn’t cheap to ‘shave’ them.” Then I thought I should collect old tractors. I also thought about collecting old women (laughs), but the mayor, who came to see my “motorcycles”, told me that I would have to pay for myself with the old ones, and the young ones would also ask me where I would take them, what I would buy them…” The wise thought continued. “So it was the wisest thing to start collecting chainsaws here,” he concluded. “15 years ago, I heard about someone collecting them in Cerkno. One of my “motorcycles” was missing a part, so I called him. He told me that he only collects them and doesn’t sell parts. I was tempted to collect them myself. And that’s how it all started. Most of it was given to me by neighbors who collected excess iron from their houses, and I had a lot of it myself. I had an excavator, and when I was digging at someone’s place I would ask them if they had an old unused chainsaw. I bought a lot of it, too,” Frank explains.

His shelves are sold out.

In the garage where he stores them, shelves are filled with them. “My shelves are full,” he smiles, pointing to a piece that will last at least a decade less. He says the saws have more symbolic value. “I got a lot of them for free, some of them I gave twenty euros for, and the Russian ones I gave a hundred euros for.” He remembers his time in the army. “I was with the soldiers in Niš, and they had this clunky Russian chainsaw. It had a 140-centimeter sword and a fuel tank on the other side. Two of them had to hold it to see.”

A clumsy person

Frank hides his age very well. “You know, I have a wonderful wife who takes good care of me. I had my knee replaced a few years ago and last time I was working in the forest with my brother-in-law he said: ‘You’re still fine, you haven’t missed anything.’ Today I was in the forest and there was a meter of mud, but when I work on the ‘farm’ I’m young. I worked in the construction industry for many years and sometimes I still like ‘mole burping’,” he explains in a witty way.

Husqvarna in Jonsered sta »dzeka«

One hundred and thirty chainsaws, all free of cobwebs (“I cleaned the dust off before you came,” Fran winks), look truly spectacular. The collector says they come from Germany, Sweden, the United States, China, Japan and Russia. He is most impressed by manufacturers from Scandinavian countries, “Husqvarna and Jonsered are ‘the boys’ among them, I have used about seven or eight myself. My favourite is the Jonseredova, which I ordered in Bosnia in 1978. In those days it was difficult to buy a “štilerca” (a chainsaw from the German manufacturer Stihl, op. a.), and an acquaintance told me that they sold a “jonseredka” in Sarajevo. I paid 430 marks and 180 Yugoslav dinars for it at the post office in Podnart. I was a little worried that nothing would come of this order, but I got everything, down to the last key and screw.” He tells me that the 46-year-old chainsaw still works like new.

Saws are getting smaller

Franz’s saws are apparently stacked in order from largest to smallest. “They used to weigh 16, 17 kilos each, and over the years they have become smaller and smaller,” he explains to me, and I have noticed this myself. “People are losing power,” he thinks. “When I was twenty, I used it (he points to the saw, which looks huge, and says it weighs 17 kilos, op.a.) to repair the road to Krvavec. My late brother and I demolished eighty “compartments” a day. But I admit that if I open it today, it’s already a bit heavy, it’s no longer in such a state.”