Dan De Luz, who re-invented himself through woodworking in the 1960s and became a mentor to scores of Hawaii artists, died Sunday night in Hilo Medical Center. He was 77.

"Anybody who ever has ever done woodworking in Hawaii has made an effort to meet him," said one of De Luz’s many proteges, Jay Warner. "He’s that mythic man on the mountain top that people made a pilgrimage to meet. He was that wise man with an encyclopedic knowledge of every type of wood, but he was also just a real gregarious guy you had no problem striking up a conversation with."

Warner started his own woodworking career in 1981, making picture frames and jewelry boxes out of De Luz’s former shop in Hilo.

De Luz would put in 16-hour days, often because he spent so much time teaching tourists about Hawaiian woods or sharing his skills with promising woodworkers, Warner said.

"He was my best friend — and also the best friend to lots of people," Warner said.

Warner’s son, Seth, grew up watching De Luz, who often worked with a parakeet on his shoulder.

"Dan would be covered in wood shavings and the parakeet would be covered in wood shavings, too," Seth Warner remembered.

De Luz was born in Paauilo on the Hamakua Coast, grew up in Hilo and moved to Honolulu to sell cars and try his hand in the roofing business.

After an accident, De Luz returned to Hilo in the 1960s "to regroup," Warner said.

"Through trial and error, he remade himself making bowls," Warner said. "He had a natural knack for it and a work ethic that was just extreme."

Tim and Tiffany Shafto, president of the Hawaii Wood Guild, were making jewelry boxes in Mountain View four or five years ago when De Luz gave Tim his first lesson in how to turn a bowl.

The Shaftos now devote their business to bowls.

"It was Dan’s willingness to share everything he knew," Tiffany Shafto said. "You could feel his passion. He was at it before it was cool. He made tools out of truck springs and he even made his own lathe."

In her book, "Contemporary Hawaii Woodworkers," Shafto devoted four pages to De Luz.

"We call him the patriarch of our community," she said.

On Monday, Big Island woodworkers gathered to talk story about De Luz at his Mountain View shop and gallery — Dan De Luz Woods — where he and his wife, Marylou, also ran a cafe until late last year.

"With Mr. De Luz, there’s no bad stuff to talk about," said fellow woodworker Ed Solomon, who just retired from his own nearby woodworking business. "Whenever anybody needed a little bit of help, he’d go the extra mile to help them. If somebody needed some sandpaper, he would give it to them. If they had a broken saw blade, he would weld it for them. There was never, ‘You owe me.’ It was always from the heart and he was always smiling."

De Luz made fine bowls of koa, mango, milo, silver oak and even from woods that customers brought from as far away as Alaska, Solomon said.

An 8-inch koa bowl at De Luz’ shop could go for $595. But customers also spent tens of thousands of dollars on De Luz’s collections of bowls made from different woods in a variety of shapes and styles within the same collection, Solomon said.

"People wanted his collections like they would want a certain artist’s paintings," Solomon said. "He’s a legend. The man is a legend."

De Luz is survived by his wife, Marylou, of Kurtistown; son Dan of Mountain View; daughter Renee Godoy of Hilo; stepsons Ronald Williams of Maui, William Brown of Hilo and James Grimes of Hilo; and stepdaughter Leilani Marriott of Torrance, Calif.

Visitation will be held at 5 p.m. Jan. 26 at Dodo Mortuary on Wainaku Street in Hilo. Services are scheduled from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.