51 Pound Box

The unexpected death of Eric Fuller, the larger than life tour de force behind the puzzle crafting brand Cubic Dissection, has left the many friends and fans who knew him in a state of shock and bewilderment. Stories of his legendary personality, antics and adventures have come flooding into the media airwaves as the “puzzle” world tries to cope with the loss. I will never forget, for example, hanging out with him and his two girlfriends at the International Puzzle Party, watching him zoom around on his One Wheel in the hotel lobby at one o’clock in the morning while we all tried to solve one more puzzle. For my part, I felt compelled to postpone my planned offering for this week and do something to honor his memory, even if at the last minute. I have been a huge fan of Eric’s work over the years, and own practically every puzzle box he ever made. I wasn’t surprised to realize that he is actually the second most often written about artist on my blog, and his “artist’s” page on my site is extensive. In recent years I have been in the habit of talking with artists about specific puzzle boxes I will feature, to hear their stories. I spoke to Eric many times, and always imagined I would hear the story of this puzzle box, too.

The 51 Pound box seemed somehow appropriate for this sad occasion. I was hoping to find something that could convey the weight and heaviness we are feeling. I’m sure any representation of Eric’s immaculate work would be enough, but I had this box, and always meant to write about it. It was one of his earlier creations, from around 2008, but made after he recognized that one of his signature brand identities would be his precision. Eric had an interesting life that started in Colorado. He moved around a lot in his youth, from San Diego, to Luxembourg, to the seaside town of Noordwijk in Holland where he attended the American School of the Hague and learned to speak fluent Dutch. He came back to the states at seventeen to finish high school in Dallas, Texas and then joined the marines. He was stationed in Okinawa with the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit, then transferred to the Marine Corps Air Station in Camp Pendleton. After serving his country he worked in IT, got a business degree and around the same time started collecting puzzles. That quickly led to making puzzles, simple burrs using a hand saw and chisel on his kitchen table. He traded with other collectors, and fell in love with woodworking. He moved to a small house with a one car garage just so he could have a workshop with power tools. He recalled that the first puzzle he made for sale around 2003 was his deviously perfect Pack Six, which still stumps me. A little over a year into making and selling puzzles, Eric produced something remarkable, his “mame” box, a tiny Japanese style puzzle box which defied the conventional wisdom of what was possible with such designs and paid homage to the great master of the art, Yoshio Okiyama, whose masterpiece was a one-hundred twenty two move himitsu-bako. Eric’s tiny box hid thirty moves, a record for this size box which has not been broken, achieved by making the internal steps each 25/1,000th of an inch wide. He realized that his calling card would be his precision.

The 51 Pound Box is a mystery to me, and an anomaly among Eric’s many puzzle boxes. His boxes almost never have any decorations or embellishments, and rely instead on the natural beauty of the wood, and the combinations of clever hidden mechanisms, precisely disguised movements, and exasperating misdirections that he was so famous for incorporating. The 51 Pound Box, conversely, is visually striking, and includes both wood inlay and a brass accent. It is also not very difficult to solve, but uses a clever hidden mechanism and can be considered a “sequential discovery” design. I searched my emails and found a few words from the past that Eric shared when I asked him about it. “You solved the box correctly; that one was one of my earlier ones and was more about the woodworking and mechanism than being difficult. I milked the mechanism out of aluminum bar stock myself. I don’t have drawings of that any more because back then I used to draw everything on graph paper and it’s buried somewhere. That aside, I don’t generally share my drawings ever. I put a lot of work into these designs and do reserve the actual plans for myself. Hope you’re weathering the storm ok!” This was during Hurricane Harvey, and one quarter of Houston was flooding at the time.

Eric left a rare message inside the 51 Pound Box as well, for the lucky solver to discover. In addition to a congratulations, it included the address to a secret web page, which contained “pictures of the internal mechanisms, information about the design inspiration as well as scanned copies of my shop notes and design drawings.” The username and password to let you in were “pound” and “dnuop”. I felt crushed when I tried to navigate to that web page as I wrote this tribute, hoping to catch glimpses of what has been lost now, only to find the page no longer exists. But then I saw what Eric had written me back during the storm, “Oh yeah, geez, never did get that page up I don’t think. Man that was a long time ago”. What a tease he was.

Let’s raise our glasses to Eric Fuller, the original Raleigh Renegade. There are plenty of drinks you might select when thinking about him. Eric liked an Old Fashioned, for example, and might be found enjoying one at Landmark or Slims in Durham. I had a whole set of Old Fashioned variations planned to pair up with Eric’s “Button Box” series, but he only got around to making the first version, which happens to be an incredible puzzle box. He enjoyed a glass of red wine, and you might have joined him for one of those at Raleigh wine. I’m thinking about him tonight with something poignant, bracing, and bittersweet, a reminder of each precious, irreplaceable day.

James Beard award winning bartender Toby Maloney created the “Eeyore’s Requiem”, his infamous “deep dark Negroni”, at Chicago’s Violet Hour. The drink amps up the bitter components of an already bitter drink considerably, increasing the Campari by 50%, and adding the broodingly dark amaro Cynar, plus the devastatingly bitter Fernet-Branca. I’m paying homage to Eric Fuller’s Dutch roots in this version, using distinctively malty Genever in place of the typical gin. Genever makes its presence known in this drink, but plays well with the other bold flavors to create something unique and memorable. Eric, here’s to you.

E’s Requiem

1 ½ oz Campari

1 oz Cocchi Americano

½ oz Bols Genever

¼ oz Cynar

¼ oz Fernet-Branca

2 dashes orange bitters

Stir ingredients with ice and strain into a favorite glass. No garnish.