I was at a customer's location the other day and got stuck waiting on a part to arrive. So to kill time, I went over and struck up a conversation with their junior machinist. This company is not a machine shop, but they do make a lot of their own parts, so they have their own machine shop inside, staffed with 2 machinists. They have a Hurco CNC, a Mazak CNC, a Moriseki 16" manual lathe, a Leblond 16" lathe, and a Lagun FT mill. The junior guy says he didn't go to school for machining, but he's been studying under the older guy for about a year and a half. I mentioned that I have a lathe at home and that I was practicing threading. He started asking me how to do it! He said he wants to learn how, but the older guy doesn't know how to do it either, so can't teach him. The older guy (who was not available for comment) has supposedly been a machinist for 15 years or more, but works exclusively with the CNCs and never touches the manual machines. There used to be another machinist who knew how to use the manual machines, but these days they are pretty much just for show. Is that weird? I just assumed that all trade machinists learned how to thread on a lathe right after they graduated from sweeping the shop.