Woodworker Aaron Marshall took my Dutch Tool Chest class at The Woodwright’s School this week and added a slot in the shelf to hold his English Square, which is featured on the cover of “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest.”
The slot is a cool idea. And several other woodworkers I know have added slots in the back of the shelf to hold longer tools such as backsaws and framing squares.
I cannot recall any vintage Dutch tool chests with this feature, but it’s quite smart.
— Christopher Schwarz
If you’d like to see what I built during the class – a rolling campaign-style unit that goes below the Dutch chest – check out my blog entries here and here at Popular Woodworking Magazine.
While teaching at Roy Underhill’s The Woodwright’s School this week, one of the students brought in some unusual antique winding sticks and laid them on my workbench.
I laughed a bit at first. Then I said, “Hmmm.” Then I said, “Dang!”
The winding sticks came from Mark Firley, the lead staff blogger of the international The Furniture Record blog. See also the German site, Die Möbel Rekord.
What is fascinating about these winding sticks, which were found in an antiques store in Mount Pleasant, S.C., is how incredibly well they work.
Many winding sticks feature some small bit of inlay on one of the sticks. This inlaid stick, when placed behind the other stick, makes it easier to see how twisted a board is. I like the inlay.
These unusual sticks, however, had instead two half-moon holes on one of the sticks. At the top of each hole there was a little strip of wood that was beveled.
At first, the whole thing looked like it was roughed in from Roughsville. Then I started using them. When the user has a backlight behind him or her, the small bevels appear as darker than the rest of the stick. They are in shadow and act like inlay (without the inlay).
When something is waaaaay twisted or you have light in front of you, then the half-moons take over. You can see the amount of light admitted by each half-moon. If there is more light in the right half-moon, then that corner is low.
Pure fricking genius.
The sticks were made from mahogany and were workmanlike but not fancy at all.
When I get home on Monday, the first order of business (after kissing my wife) is to make some of these. Stay tuned.
It’s quite difficult to determine a species of wood from a 16th-century engraving of it.
So we don’t know for certain what sort of wood would be used to make early squares, rules and levels. One clue comes from W.L. Goodman, who wrote a two-part history of marking and measuring tools for The Woodworker magazine in 1964.
Here’s what he wrote:
“Mediaeval building accounts often refer to the purchase of old wine casks, usually made of Baltic oak or wainscot, for the carpenters to make their straight-edges, rules, and squares from this well-seasoned hardwood.”
Goodman also briefly discusses the Melencolia-type squares in the article and said they were for “setting out.”
So if you want to build some old squares, drink up!
British woodworker Richard Arnold recently discovered an abandoned hand-tool joiner’s shop located only a few miles from his workshop.
Arnold says it looks like the shop was abandoned just before the second world war and looks as if it had never been mechanized. The pit saws were still hanging undisturbed on the walls.
Even more extraordinary are the pine or fir workbenches left in the shop. Each is about 30” tall and looks like it was built right out of Peter Nicholson’s treatise on joinery.
Two of the benches sport planing stops and leg vises with a traditional parallel guide. Yet neither appears to have a garter, as far as I can tell from the photos. Both benches have massive legs plus bearers that pierce the front and rear aprons and support the tops.
Perhaps most remarkable is that Arnold said the benchtops were only about 5/8” thick.
Arnold said there is a third workbench, not pictured, that appears to be an even earlier piece of work and didn’t have any vises attached to it. He promised that he would go back for a closer look and would report back.
— Christopher Schwarz
P.S. Arnold is the generous soul who dug up the original “Doormaking and Window-Making” booklets that we reprinted late last year.
June 15 is the day when I take stock of everything that has happened in the last 12 months and think about what is coming in the next 12 or 120.
It’s an important date because on June 15, 2011, I left Popular Woodworking Magazine and began to work full time for Lost Art Press, which John Hoffman and I started in 2007. There’s a navel-gazing aspect to this personal exercise, and I won’t bore you with those sorts of details.
Instead, I’ll bore you with a short list of the projects on the horizon. These are projects where we have signed a contract. They will happen. But I cannot say when. So when you ask me: “When will that be out?” My answer will be: “I don’t know.”
1. “The Woodworker Magazine: 1936-1966. The Charles Hayward Era.” We have contracted with the owners of The Woodworker magazine to reprint hundreds of articles on handwork they published between 1936 and 1967, almost all of them by Charles Hayward. This project began the day we started Lost Art Press and, if all goes to plan, it will be out in time for Christmas. John Hoffman, Ty Black, Megan Fitzpatrick, Phil Hirz and I have poured hundreds of hours into this project during the last six years to collect, organize, digitize and edit this information for publication.
2. “Woodworking in Estonia.” We have signed a contract with Ants Viires to produce a new English translation of his important and rare book. The translation is underway. The earlier English translation was not authorized by Viires; it was poorly done and has horrible photos. Our version will be like all our books: worth owning.
3. “Turning Fundamentals” by Alan Lacer. When I began turning about a decade ago, I looked for a book that covered everything in a deep way: tools, sharpening, spindle and faceplate turning. I couldn’t find one that made me happy. Alan is currently writing this book. It will be a monster.
4. “The Traditional Shop” by Richard Maguire. This is another book I wanted when setting up shop. It will be a complete overview of how to set up your shop for handwork. It will dive deep into benches, sawbenches, appliances, storage, lighting and arranging things. I cannot think of anyone better to write this book.
5. “Practical Design” by Jeffrey Miller. This book will outline Miller’s process for designing furniture, from its concept to the finished piece. Jeff will be discussing the book and his approach on his blog in the coming months.
There are other books in the fetal stages, including books on American campaign furniture, Danish modern furniture, “Furniture of Necessity” and 17th-century joiner’s work. And there are projects that are much closer to publication: Roubo on furniture, H.O. Studley, Andrew Lunn’s book on saws, Peter Galbert’s chair book, Roy Underhill’s novel and “The Naked Woodworker” with Mike Siemsen to name a few.
After reading the above list, I think I should stop writing this blog entry and get back to editing. There is work to be done.
