“My envy is all too frequently aroused by those marvelously equipped cabinet benches that the hardware store displays at its center of interest in a holiday window. Folding doors are thrown back, bristling with tools of every conceivable kind; the top lid is raised to display supplemental racks of more tools; drawers and cupboards hold neat arrays of supplies….
“The cabinet workbench is a blood brother of the plaid golf bag; there is no inherent reason why its owner should not do great things with the contents, yet he rarely does.”
— Henry H. Saylor, “Tinkering With Tools” Little, Brown, and Co. (1924)
I love that.
That’s outstanding writing.
Well written.
I’ve never heard of that book. Is it any good?
The first edition is interesting. Well-written. Nothing new or shocking, but a good book.
Do you have a link to the full page ad? I am curious to see what they consider a “marvelously equipped cabinet” back then. Also, you see some shops in magazines equipped with a lot of high end tools and wonder if the owner ever uses them for real work. It is truly a waste to equip a shop and never use it to make furniture or art pieces.
Here is the full page:
http://lostartpress.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/gnome_full_hs600p294.jpg
That’s what my workbench looks like when I [deliberately] don’t want to get anything done. Out of the box, the setup says’ ‘Overload!’. The in-your-face reminder that your work can be very involved and ‘steppy’ can be overwhelming. I’m worn out just looking at everything.
Looking at the full-page ad and doing a little quick math – that’s a heck of a lot of tools for $80! Sigh, the good ol’ days.
A friend of mine has one of those… I think they were made by HAMMACHER SCHLEMMER & COMPANY. A really neat “gentleman’s” work bench that works nicely in the parlor with saw dust accumulating on the Persian rug.
That set up has to weigh about 1100 lbs, But I do like the tail vise, it looks stout enough to crack walnuts.