KINDRED - Bruce Hendrickson still has the saw, utility knife, level and pliers from the tool chest his father gave him when he was 4 years old.

Dad also gave his little guy a can of bent nails and a soft, 4-foot-by-4-foot board. Straighten these nails, his dad said, and pound them into that board.

"I'm sure he just wanted to keep me busy, so I wouldn't get under mom's skin. I'm also sure I banged up my fingers pretty good, but he was just teaching me to use my hands," Hendrickson said.

Forty years later, Hendrickson is still busy with his tools. He owns Handi-Cabinets Etc. Inc., a business dedicated to making life easier for handicapped and elderly people.

His shop, started in 1995, is in the old Thompson Cafe, downtown on Kindred's Elm Street.

The former Kindred city councilman calls his town "the woodworking capital of North Dakota." Along with his business, this community of 600 southwest of Fargo also is home to the Braaten Cabinets plant, Ira Custom Cabinets Inc., Kindred Kabinets and Woodworking, Dale's Cabinets and some smaller shops.

"It's a mostly Norwegian community with a lot of craftsmen," Hendrickson said.

At West Fargo High School, he excelled in drafting and building trades programs. During the summers away from classes at Trinity Bible College in Ellendale, he worked construction for a master carpenter in Seattle.

"He was from Lebanon and knew Old World construction techniques. He taught me how to make things that last," Hendrickson said.

The first thing he noticed when he moved to Kindred was the high concentration of senior citizens. Hendrickson catered to their needs and began remodeling homes with an eye toward changes to make living easier.

He widened doorways, built wheelchair ramps, lowered countertops and fashioned easily-accessible fold-down kitchen cabinets.

"Nursing homes have their place, but I believe people should have the right to choose where they live," Hendrickson said. "My primary goal is helping people stay in their homes as long as they can."

Hendrickson works under contract to modify households for the disabled and elderly under Clay County's home- and community-based Medicaid services program.

"We don't have many vendors like Bruce," said Pat Boyer, a social services supervisor and program administrator. "He just really focuses on what the client needs to stay in their home."

Hendrickson helped Gail Tillotson change her north Fargo home to accommodate a wheelchair. Tillotson has multiple sclerosis and spends a lot of time in her chair.

Her kitchen table was raised, kitchen counters and cupboards were altered and the bathroom was changed to include a roll-into shower and a lower sink in which Tillotson can wash her own hair.

"He has just done an excellent job with all the work he has done for me," Tillotson said.

Hendrickson has expanded his services to include the installation of outdoor elevators, which can be used to raise wheelchairs and eliminate the need for long ramps.

"The thing about people with disabilities is that there are no two the same," he said. "They all have different needs and abilities. When you start working with them and make changes in their homes, you can see that glow of self-accomplishment come over them, and it makes you feel good."

When he's not helping improve homes and apartments, he's inventing. Hendrickson has created a foot-pedal and hand-levered chair that helps people move to and from the sitting position.

He received a $103,800 Small Business Innovation Research grant through the National Institute of Health for development of a lift to help people in their homes.

The device, actually a battery-operated, friction-drive, inclined-platform lift, could be installed in any staircase 36 inches or wider, he said.

"He has so many ideas. And he'll be successful because he's persistent," said Stephanie Blair of the University of North Dakota's Center for Innovation. "A lot of people tend to give up when they lose out on a grant. But he's not intimidated by the process."

Hendrickson also is working on a golf-cart harness contraption that could help stroke victims return to the course.

"I call it 'thoughtsmanship,'" Hendrickson said of all his ideas.

Hendrickson works into the night on another of his pet projects: the conversion of Gol Lutheran Church into a home and bed and breakfast. He recently bought the 5,600-square-foot church building and plans to make it home for his wife, young son and a child on the way.

Hendrickson is saving the tools given him as a child in case his children follow in his footsteps. He still has a picture of himself standing beside his first completed project: a milk stool constructed from peach crates.

"It wasn't anything pretty," he said. But it was sturdy, and he finished the job by painting it pink.

That drive to finish the project is still with him today. "If you start something, you finish it. I live by that rule," Hendrickson said.