Mark Dickey
I’m a retired architect with an idea I think many people will relate to.
If downsizing meant giving up your workshop or creative space, you know how much more than square footage was lost. The tools may still exist — but the environment that made them meaningful often disappears.
Ray’s ShopSpace was created to restore that experience.
The Legacy Behind the Name
Ray Hatala wasn’t just an uncle — he was a force of nature in a workshop.
He served as plant engineer for Anthony & Company, armed with nothing more than a high school education and an extraordinary mechanical mind. Ray was a designer, fabricator, and problem-solver who could build anything that would fit through the door — and if it didn’t fit, he’d build it in pieces.
His basement workshop became a second home.
It was cramped, dense, and overflowing with tools and raw materials. So much so that a six-foot-two visitor had to duck just to move around. But inside that packed space lived capability without limits.
If you could imagine it, Ray could make it.
The Telescope Adapter Story
At age fifteen, I became deeply interested in astronomy and wanted to photograph the night sky through my telescope. The problem: no adapter existed to connect a Nikon camera to the focusing tube — something easy to buy today, but unheard of back then.
One afternoon, my father and I dropped by Ray’s place unannounced — the way people did in those days.
Ray disappeared into the workshop and returned with a three-inch aluminum barrel he had cast himself from scrap parts. Over the next two hours, he and my father stood at a nine-inch metal lathe and machined a flawless custom adapter.
This wasn’t a simple threaded ring — Nikon used a precision bayonet mount, requiring exact tolerances.
Fifty-eight years later, I still have that adapter.
It worked perfectly — and still does.
From Basement Shop to Community Space
Ray’s ShopSpace was born from that spirit.
Over six years, what started as a personal tool collection grew into a functioning workshop — and then into something bigger: a social and creative lifeline for others like Ray.
Too many seniors give up their shops when they downsize — and with them, a piece of their identity. Without that creative outlet, isolation creeps in quickly.
Ray’s ShopSpace exists to prevent that.
It’s not just about tools — it’s about purpose, community, and staying on the right side of the grass by continuing to build, repair, and create.
The Mission Today
Today, Ray’s legacy lives on in every bench, tool rack, and project that comes through the door.
Ray’s ShopSpace is a place where:
• Knowledge gets shared
• Skills get passed down
• Friendships get built
• Projects get finished
And where the next generation of makers can experience the same spark that once lived in a crowded basement workshop.