Stewart Coffin is an American
puzzle
A puzzle is a game, Problem solving, problem, or toy that tests a person's ingenuity or knowledge. In a puzzle, the solver is expected to put pieces together (Disentanglement puzzle, or take them apart) in a logical way, in order to arrive at th ...
maker. According to
Ars Technica
''Ars Technica'' is a website covering news and opinions in technology, science, politics, and society, created by Ken Fisher and Jon Stokes in 1998. It publishes news, reviews, and guides on issues such as computer hardware and software, sci ...
, he is considered to be one of the "best designers of
polyhedral interlocking puzzles in the world."
Biography
Coffin majored in
electrical engineering
Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems which use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...
in college
at the
University of Massachusetts at Amherst
The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst, UMass) is a public research university in Amherst, Massachusetts and the sole public land-grant university in Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Founded in 1863 as an agricultural college, it ...
where he graduated in 1953.
He worked at the
Lincoln Laboratory
The MIT Lincoln Laboratory, located in Lexington, Massachusetts, is a United States Department of Defense federally funded research and development center chartered to apply advanced technology to problems of national security. Research and dev ...
at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...
(MIT) building computers from 1953 through 1958.
In 1964, he left electronics to start building canoes and other boats. He and his family moved to a farm in
Lincoln, Massachusetts
Lincoln is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts. The population was 7,014 according to the 2020 United States Census, including residents of Hanscom Air Force Base that live within town limits. The town, located in the MetroWest region o ...
.
Coffin currently lives in Carlisle,
, where he moved to in 2021. He has three daughters, all of whom are very good at solving his puzzles.
Work
Coffin began creating puzzles in 1968, after quitting the design and manufacture of canoes and kayaks.
One of the puzzles he created, made of 12 hexagonal sticks and cast in epoxy, was brought to school by one of his three daughters.
This event led to Coffin meeting Thomas Atwater who was a
business agent for
inventors
An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a machine, product, or process for increasing efficiency or lowering cost. It may also be an entirely new concept. If an ...
of games and puzzles.
When
3M showed an interest in his work, he decided to quit making boats and concentrate on puzzles. Hectix, one of his designs, was patented in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
in 1973 and then manufactured by
3M. When they were manufactured, the design was so complex that factory workers were unable to assemble them.
The parts were shipped to his Lincoln residence where he, his daughters and neighborhood children all put them together, making 20,000 puzzles in two weeks.
Later, Coffin stopped patenting his puzzles because he did not feel he could make a living by designing products for
mass production
Mass production, also known as flow production or continuous production, is the production of substantial amounts of standardized products in a constant flow, including and especially on assembly lines. Together with job production and batch ...
.
Instead he turned to
woodworking
Woodworking is the skill of making items from wood, and includes cabinet making (cabinetry and furniture), wood carving, woodworking joints, joinery, carpentry, and woodturning.
History
Along with Rock (geology), stone, clay and animal parts, ...
and selling his puzzles as an
art
Art is a diverse range of human activity, and resulting product, that involves creative or imaginative talent expressive of technical proficiency, beauty, emotional power, or conceptual ideas.
There is no generally agreed definition of wha ...
or a
craft
A craft or trade is a pastime or an occupation that requires particular skills and knowledge of skilled work. In a historical sense, particularly the Middle Ages and earlier, the term is usually applied to people occupied in small scale prod ...
.
Coffin has designed more than 500 original puzzles, most of which are
polyhedral.
Some have been commercially produced, such as the Hectix.
Most of his designs are crafted in wood, some of which use exotic woods such as
cocobolo
Cocobolo is a tropical hardwood of Central American trees belonging to the genus ''Dalbergia''. Only the heartwood of cocobolo is used; it is usually orange or reddish-brown, often with darker irregular traces weaving through the wood. The heartw ...
,
bubinga
''Guibourtia'' is a flowering plant genus in the family Fabaceae, also known by the common names as Rhodesian copalwood, African Rosewood, Amazique, Bubinga, Kevazingo, and Ovangkol. Scientific Name being Guibourtia spp.
Description
''Guibourti ...
and
rosewood
Rosewood refers to any of a number of richly hued timbers, often brownish with darker veining, but found in many different hues.
True rosewoods
All genuine rosewoods belong to the genus ''Dalbergia''. The pre-eminent rosewood appreciated in ...
.
In creating his wooden puzzles, Coffin selects beautiful types of wood, cuts and glues the work and then adds his own finish to the piece. Coffin has had no formal training in puzzle making and designs his works intuitively.
Coffin's puzzles have several rules, including that each piece be dissimilar, have different
axes of symmetry
In mathematics, reflection symmetry, line symmetry, mirror symmetry, or mirror-image symmetry is symmetry with respect to a reflection. That is, a figure which does not change upon undergoing a reflection has reflectional symmetry.
In 2D ther ...
and only one solution.
He has freely shared his designs for reproduction, making his puzzles widely produced and sold internationally.
Coffin has called his work "AP-ART," "the sculptural art that comes apart" and he feels that the "ultimate object in puzzle design is amusement."
Curator, Amy Slocum, has highlighted the artistic effort that Coffin puts into his work when she exhibited several pieces at the
Katonah Museum of Art
The Katonah Museum of Art is a non-collecting institution geared towards visual arts, located in Katonah, New York, Katonah, New York (state), New York. It does not have a permanent collection, but holds temporary exhibitions.
The museum was foun ...
.
Jerry Slocum
Jerry Slocum is an American historian, collector and author specializing on the field of mechanical puzzles. He worked as an engineer at Hughes Aircraft prior to retiring and dedicating his life to puzzles.
His personal puzzle collection, numb ...
, the founder of the International Puzzle Party, has called Coffin's puzzles "beautiful three-dimensional sculptures."
In 2000, Coffin was the winner of the
Sam Loyd Award
Samuel Loyd (January 30, 1841 – April 10, 1911), was an American chess player, chess composer, puzzle author, and recreational mathematician. Loyd was born in Philadelphia but raised in New York City.
As a chess composer, he authored a numbe ...
.
Association Awards: Sam Loyd Award
Association for Games & Puzzles International In 2006, he won the Nob Yoshigahara
Nobuyuki Yoshigahara ( ''Yoshigahara Nobuyuki'', commonly known as "Nob"; May 27, 1936 – June 19, 2004) was perhaps Japan's most celebrated inventor, collector, solver, and communicator of puzzles.
Nob graduated from the Tokyo Institute of ...
Award for his lifetime contribution to creating mechanical puzzles.
In 2007, Coffin spoke at the American Association for the Advancement of Science
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is an American international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific respons ...
(AAAS) in Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
, where he discussed his puzzle making and demonstrated his puzzles.
Books
He is the author of several books and articles about puzzles, puzzle design and memoirs of his life:
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* AP-ART, A Compendium of Geometric Puzzles (2014)
Excerpts
The Universal Book of Mathematics
''The Universal Book of Mathematics: From Abracadabra to Zeno's Paradoxes'' (2004) is a bestselling book by British author David Darling (astronomer), David Darling.
Summary
The book is presented in a dictionary format. The book is divided into ...
provides the following information about him:
''A leading designer of mechanical puzzles. He is also the author of The Puzzling World of Polyhedral Dissections, one of the most significant works produced on this subject.''
References
External links
Stewart Coffin's Puzzles
A compendium of geometric puzzles
by Stewart Coffin
{{DEFAULTSORT:Coffin, Stewart
Puzzle designers
Living people
Year of birth missing (living people)
People from Andover, Massachusetts
Writers from Massachusetts
University of Massachusetts Amherst College of Engineering alumni
American woodworkers
MIT Lincoln Laboratory people