About

The Maker
Granite Falls Manufacturing, established June 2005, is the trading name under which Chuck Tilbury makes and sells his whistles, under the watchful eye (and patient ears!) of his wife. By day, Chuck works as a systems software engineer (which, along with hardware development, he has been involved in for over 20 years). By night, he is the mad whistle maker. At first he was making whistles mostly as a hobby, but enjoyed it so much that he wanted to do it full-time. Chuck's goals are to make very good whistles that are comparable in quality to high-end whisltes, like Overton or Copeland whistles. However, he also aims to sell them for much less. Why? Because he strongly believes that everyone should have access to a really good whistle.

The Workshop
The GFM workshop is located in Granite Falls, in Washington state, approximately one hour North of Seattle. It is a small town of roughly 10,000. However, there are lots of outdoor activities here. It is very close to hundreds of thousands of acres of National and State forests. As with most of Western Washington, there is no shortage of low mountains or waterfalls... Hence the names "Cascade Mountains" and "Granite Falls." The leafy and green images used in the header of the website are all from photographs Chuck has taken of the surrounding area.