Lost Art Press

Category: Historical Images

The Wood-Butcher

Posted on by fitz

saw_bench

Wood-butcher (tradesmen): workmen who have not thoroughly learned their business as carpenters or joiners.

Counting carpenters and wood-butchers together, it is estimated that about 20,000 men make their living in London as carpenters and joiners. Of these nearly 5300 are of the wood-butcher, or inexpert workmen class, and therefore do not belong to the trade societies. —New York Herald.

Albert Barrère & Charles Godfrey Leland

A Dictionary of Slang, Jargon & Cant: Embracing English, American, and Anglo-Indian Slang, Pidgin English, Tinker’s Jargon and Other Irregular Phraseology – Volume 1 – 1890

—Jeff Burks

Ye Olde Unisaw

Posted on by Lost Art Press

Fotothek_df_tg_0003845_Mechanik_^_Säge_^_Holz

The lumber trade began with a small shipment of hand-sawn clapboards sent from the James River settlement to England in 1607. The water-powered sawmill was introduced – in the autumn of 1611 – near the site of Richmond. The expertise was Dutch or German and was reinforced before 1624 by additional groups of sawyers from those countries, as well as a few Poles. William Byrd of Westover imported saws and sawmill parts from Europe and boasted that his mills could rip two thousand board feet in five hours.

— “This Well-Wooded Land” by Thomas R. Cox, Robert S. Maxwell, Phillip Drennon Thomas and Joseph J. Malone (University of Nebraska Press) 1985.

Workbenches in the Danish Tradition

Posted on by fitz

danish_workbench_1767
Joiner working at his bench (høvlebænk) 1767.

The above image was reprinted in a 4 volume set of Danish craft history books:
Håndværkets Kulturhistorie – Copenhagen 1982-1984.


The book titles in English are:
Vol. 1: Craft Coming to Denmark. The time before 1550.
By Grethe Jacobsen.
Vol. 2: Craft in Progress. The period from 1550 to 1700.
By Ole Degn and Inger Dübeck.
Vol. 3: The Craftsmanship and State Power. The period from 1700 to 1862.
By Vagn Dybdahl and Inger Dübeck.
Vol. 4: The Race with the Industry Period from 1862 to 1980.
By Henrik Fode, Jonas Miller and Bjarne Hastrup

The period source for this image has eluded me. All references point back to the reprint, which I don’t intend to purchase. If anybody owns this set of books, I’d like to know if the authors included background notes for this illustration.

While I was searching for the source to the above image I came across this interesting photograph of a workshop appliance located at Sønderborg Slot in Denmark. It is described as a Fugbænk, which I believe translates as [joint(ing) bench]. The description implies that the bench could also be used for plowing.

jointbench

–Jeff Burks

Man as a Measurer

Posted on by fitz

rules_01

The ability to measure accurately, and thus obtain a definite and positive knowledge, instead of a general and indefinite knowledge of form, relation, distance, and the other phenomena of the existing condition of things in which we are placed, constitutes the difference between scientific knowledge and ordinary knowledge. By some philologists our term man is traced to a derivation from the Aryan root-word ma, to measure. Whether this derivation is true or not, certain it is that the most accurate and comprehensive definition of man, as classified at the head of the organic evolution of intelligence upon this planet, is that of a measurer, and, as symbols of his true domination of the world, a rule and a pair of scales would be much fitter and more expressive of his glory than a crown and a sceptre.

The use of the rule is so absolutely necessary in almost every mechanical or artistic pursuit, that the consumption is, of course, very great, and the manufacture is consequently a very important one. Rules are generally made of boxwood or of ivory, and are mounted and tipped with brass or silver. Boxwood is most extensively used, both on account of its being more plentiful than ivory, and also because it is less liable to expand and contract by variations of the temperature. This last consideration is the most important, since the accuracy of the rule depends upon the constancy with which it marks the fixed standard for lineal measurement.
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On Ornamental Woods

Posted on by fitz

trestle_sawing

Veneers used to be cut by the hand-saw; at present, the circular saw is, I believe, universally employed in England for this purpose, with the advantage, not only of cheapness and expedition, but of a smaller waste of wood in sawdust, and for greater accuracy and precision in the thickness of the veneer — a quality essentially requisite to produce good work in the finished article.

In a large veneer-mill which I had an opportunity, through the kindness of one of our members, of visiting, there are five circular saws. Each consists of a strong, stiff, circular frame-work, of the shape of a plano-convex lens, or rather a low hollow cone, tapering gradually to the edge, from which projects a ring of soft steel a few inches broad, pierced with many holes. The saw is a plate, or rather a flat ring, of well-tempered steel, about twelve inches broad, pierced with as many holes as the former ring, and firmly secured to it by means of screws: a band over the axis of the saw communicates motion to it, by connecting it with the first mover, which is a steam engine.
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