Katherine “Soft Wax” Schwarz has just put up for sale in her etsy store a fresh load of Soft Wax 2.0 – our favorite (and non-toxic!) finish.
As we know, you can’t sell anything on the interwebs without a cute animal photo, so here’s Bean, the three-legged shop cat, wishing he was inside where the treats are (gotta pay for those treats somehow, Bean!).
Notes on the finish: This is the finish I use on the trays of all my tools chests, and that Chris uses on his many chairs. Katherine cooks it up here in the machine room using a waterless process. She then packages it in a tough glass jar with a metal screw-top lid. She applies her hand-designed label to each lid, boxes up the jars and ships them in a durable cardboard mailer. The money she makes from wax helps her make ends meet at college. Instructions for the wax are below.
Instructions for Soft Wax 2.0 Soft Wax 2.0 is a safe finish for bare wood that is incredibly easy to apply and imparts a beautiful low luster to the wood.
The finish is made by cooking raw, organic linseed oil (from the flax plant) and combining it with cosmetics-grade beeswax and a small amount of a citrus-based solvent. The result is that this finish can be applied without special safety equipment, such as a respirator. The only safety caution is to dry the rags out flat you used to apply before throwing them away. (All linseed oil generates heat as it cures, and there is a small but real chance of the rags catching fire if they are bunched up while wet.)
Soft Wax 2.0 is an ideal finish for pieces that will be touched a lot, such as chairs, turned objects and spoons. The finish does not build a film, so the wood feels like wood – not plastic. Because of this, the wax does not provide a strong barrier against water or alcohol. If you use it on countertops or a kitchen table, you will need to touch it up every once in a while. Simply add a little more Soft Wax to a deteriorated finish and the repair is done – no stripping or additional chemicals needed.
Soft Wax 2.0 is not intended to be used over a film finish (such as lacquer, shellac or varnish). It is best used on bare wood. However, you can apply it over a porous finish, such as milk paint.
APPLICATION INSTRUCTIONS (VERY IMPORTANT): Applying Soft Wax 2.0 is so easy if you follow the simple instructions. On bare wood, apply a thin coat of soft wax using a rag, applicator pad, 3M gray pad or steel wool. Allow the finish to soak in about 15 minutes. Then, with a clean rag or towel, wipe the entire surface until it feels dry. Do not leave any excess finish on the surface. If you do leave some behind, the wood will get gummy and sticky.
The finish will be dry enough to use in a couple hours. After a couple weeks, the oil will be fully cured. After that, you can add a second coat (or not). A second coat will add more sheen and a little more protection to the wood.
Soft Wax 2.0 is made in small batches in Kentucky. Each glass jar contains 8 oz. of soft wax, enough for at least two chairs.
Today we started work on the workbench for the Cincinnati Museum Center’s new permanent exhibit, “Made in Cincinnati.” Our workbench is supposed to represent what woodworker Henry Boyd (1802-1886) might have used at his furniture business.
I decided to design a British-style joiner’s bench for the exhibit. It was tempting to build a German-style workbench, but Cincinnati’s German population was just beginning to blossom when Boyd was a young man. (In 1830, only 5 percent of the city’s population had German blood.)
So a British bench seemed more likely, based on the population at the time and the fact that this simple bench style was ubiquitous in 19th-century America. Also, Cincinnati was still a new city when Boyd was alive, so a bench that could be made quickly without a lot of material (or machinery, which entered Cincinnati in a big way circa 1850) made sense.
I know the bench above looks small. That’s because the floor space allotted to the workbench exhibit is only 20” x 60”. So I had to design the bench to fit the space and make it look realistic.
We’re building this bench with yellow pine, which was widely available in Cincinnati in the 19th century – it’s in all our old houses. We are building the bench using hide glue and cut nails – plus a linseed oil finish. In addition to the planing stop and holdfast holes, I’ll add a face vise powered by a wooden screw.
After we finish the bench, the museum’s staff will antique the piece so it looks shop-worn.
You can download my SketchUp drawing of the bench here. It requires five 10′-long 2x12s.
If you’d like to help us build Boyd’s bench, get in your car next Saturday (March 26) and join us at our Open Day in Covington, Ky. We’ll have the storefront open to the public from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., selling Lost Art Press books, Crucible tools and apparel. We’ll also assemble Boyd’s bench in the storefront. We welcome any and all gawkers and helpers.
P.S. Donating my time and money to this important exhibit is possible only because we hired Megan Fitzpatrick on full time. Without her help carrying our editorial load, I would have had to pass on this opportunity. And the reason we could hire Megan is because of your support. I’m not asking you to buy more stuff. I’m just saying thanks and letting you know that your support makes a difference.
One of the many lovely chairs I’ve encountered on my searches. This one is from Antiques Atlas.
One of the frustrating aspects of editing a woodworking magazine was how little unplowed ground was left to explore. Well, let me put it another way: there was little ground that we were permitted to explore.
Most woodworking magazines stick to a steady diet of the following furniture styles: Vaguely Shaker, Somewhat Arts & Crafts, Kinda Colonial, Maybe Modern and If It’s Got Nails it Must be Country. Why do magazines stick to those styles? Because every survey of magazine readers indicates those are the styles that readers love. Put another way: Why do readers love these styles? Because they are the ones shown in the woodworking press.
Several of us beat our heads against the wall every month at editorial meetings to get people to try something different. From day one I advocated for campaign furniture. David Thiel pushed for Mid-Century Modern, and John the Intern was always on about “Some Kind of Chair.”
Sometimes the overlords threw us a bone, but mostly it was: “Come up with some kind of Shaker case piece for the next issue. And not too intimidating.”
The problem was, of course, that the Shaker style has been explored by every woodworking magazine, book publisher and online personality. The best Shaker pieces have been published a thousand times. The good ones have been published several hundred times. And now we are down to Shaker Toothpicks, Birdcalls and Corn Scrapers, a Comparative Study.
My secret love was (surprise) Welsh stick chairs, but I didn’t dare suggest we explore that topic in the magazine. I did manage to get a couple articles about chairmaking published in the early 2000s, but those seemed like strokes of luck or sheer will.
Today I get to write about what I want, and if no one buys it then it’s my financial problem. So lately I’ve been writing a lot about stick chairs. Why? It’s not like my enthusiasm for them has increased lately. I’ve been stupid in love with the form for more than 20 years. Instead, the reason I have put them front and center in my work is because this is an opportunity for all of us.
This chair deserves some exploration. Another great chair found on Antiques Atlas.
Stick chairs from many cultures are waiting to be discovered. I have been building these chairs for two decades and have barely scratched the surface of what is out there. Honestly, there are hundreds of stick chair forms yet to be explored. I threw out a few dozen examples in the “Sticktionary” chapter of “The Stick Chair Book,” but there are many more that are waiting for you to study and build.
There are pieces out there that absolutely pause my heart for a couple beats because they are so beautiful. Why aren’t those examples published here or in my book? Dealers and museums are stingy with photos of these chairs. I have collected hundreds (maybe thousands) of photos during the last 20 years, but I don’t have the rights to publish them. I have signed Non-disclosure Agreements (NDAs) in order to gain access to collections of these chairs. I have swapped private photos (hush hush, chair porn) with chairmakers and collectors around the world.
I want to invite you into this world. Here’s how it works. Haunt the websites of antique dealers who specialize in vernacular furniture. Collect their images and descriptions because sometimes these photos aren’t public for long. Then observe who follows these dealers (it’s easy to do this on social media). Follow them. And so on. It’s no different than looking at the bibliography in a book then investigating the bibliographies of those books.
It might sound like hard work, but it’s not. And here’s why: These chairs are everywhere once you start looking. Literally everywhere. They turn up at auction nearly every day, but they don’t merit academic study or an exhibit at a museum. (Because they aren’t Shaker, Stickley or commissioned by some industrialist.)
You can quickly become an expert. Find a form that you love. Explore the hell out of it, breaking new ground with every new piece that you build. You can easily surpass me.
Stick chairs aren’t the only undiscovered country in furniture. But they are the one I love. Find your own favorite furniture form and make other people love the crap out of it.
Today is for all the woodworking math nerds. You know who you are. In 9th grade you cried when you found out Geometry and Shop Class were scheduled at the same time and you had to choose one or the other. You chose Geometry. Stashed somewhere in the back of your closet or in your underwear drawer is the dovetailed box you made to hold your first slide rule, your Texas Instrument SR-50 and your Casio C-80.
Let’s look at some pies from the woodworking world.
From 1st Dibs.
A nice example of a pie-crust tripod table. It is from the Georgian period and dated 1780-1789. The wood is mahogany. The foliate carving above the “knees” does not overwhelm the legs. The feet are hand-carved claw and ball, although the ball looks more like an egg.
The table top is one piece of wood with a hand-carved pie-crust edge that has aged very well. This particular design is considered a classic. If you encounter one of these tables in an antique shop or elsewhere in the wild check to see if the pie-crust is applied molding.
Top: A section of Plate 329 Roubo, bottom: the “bird cage” base.
Many of these small tripod tables have a sliding flip top to make these tables easier to store. You can see in Roubo’s example (on the right), that the bird cage sits between two rails. There is also a stop that limits how far the top can slide between the rails.
From 1st Dibs.
This Regency-period pie-crust table is dated circa 1820 and is made of mahogany. The top is smaller than the Georgian example, does not flip and it has a tripartite shelf.
The pie crust is much plainer than the Georgian table, but is very much in harmony with the table’s overall shape and design.
The description of the table indicates these are saber legs with hoofed feet that sit on brass casters. I disagree with the description of these feet as being hoofed. That is an even-toed ungulate if there ever was. However, ungulate might be off-putting to a prospective buyer.
One of three nesting tables. From 1st Dibs.
This is described as a pie-crust table. Pies are not square, this is clearly a tart. It does have a nice book-matched top which brings us to the next pie piece.
Table by Warren Snow of Snow Woodworks, Marshall, Virginia.
Warren Snow has a good description of the pie-matched table: ”Sequential wood cuts, from the same board, are then paired and arranged to create the table top surface.” For this table the pie ”slices” are made of American cherry and the edge is Macassar ebony. Pie-matching can reveal stunning grain patterns. On many examples, and as can be seen in this table, the center portion has an inlay that adds interest to the table top.
From Bonhams.
This is a Jupe’s Patent Extending Dining Table with two sets of pie-shaped leaves. Robert Jupe patented the design in 1835 and it is made of mahogany. It is the Big Daddy of pie tables. The table diameter is 65 inches, with the intermediate leaves the diameter is 83.5 inches, with the large set of leaves the diameter is 95.5 inches. As it is Pi Day you can figure out the circumferences.
The table top is turned to open it up into a Sarlacc-like maul and the leaves inserted (May 4th might be a better day for this table).
The table with leaves inserted.
According to the Bonham’s description these Jupe tables have sold for £120,000-£130,000, but those with more ornate bases have sold for much more.
Lastly, a good old American classic that probably originated in Europe. It the only piece of furniture that was routinely in the company of pies: the pie safe.
From 1st Dibs.
Pie safes (garde-manger in parts of Louisiana) kept pies and other foodstuffs safe from insects and vermin. This one is made of pine and is a very typical design with two doors and three shelves inside. The doors and sides have metal ventilation panels that have a pierced or punched designs. Fine metal screening or cloth might be used instead of metal panels.
I was planning a Pi Day post two years ago which happened to fall within a few days of the official announcement that we were in a pandemic. I had to make a quick trip out of town before hunkering down and consequently forgot about it. Last year I was deep into a research project. So, today have some pie and wear your old calculator watch, because tomorrow…tomorrow is March 15, the Ides of March and you should hide under your bed.
Henry Boyd, collection of the Cincinnati History Museum.
Publisher’s note: I first learned about Henry Boyd in “The Furniture Makers of Cincinnati: 1790 to 1849” (1976) by Jane E. Sikes. The short entry on Boyd was fascinating, but I found little else that had been published about his life or his woodworking. In the early 2000s, I encountered one of Boyd’s amazing beds at The Golden Lamb in Lebanon, Ohio, and became determined to learn more about him. Two years ago, I hired Suzanne Ellison to dig deep into public archives (her specialty) to put together a dossier on Boyd’s life. As many of you know, Suzanne does not engage in half-measures. After months of research, she produced a fascinating account of Boyd’s life that became the seed for a book on Boyd. Soon, we will introduce you to the author and the book (we have a signed contract with the author, but she asked for some time to work out some things on her end before we introduce her). This blog entry is a short introduction to Boyd’s life; more is to come. — Christopher Schwarz
When Henry Boyd died in March of 1886 at age 84 he had survived slavery, overcome enormous odds to start not one, but two businesses and persevered through tremendous societal changes. The story of his life as it has been printed in Cincinnati newspapers, often for Black History Month, was at best bare bones, at its worst just not true. Yet, his history has been waiting and is easily found in archives held in Cincinnati and in the Ohio History Collection. His history – his story – reveals a man of intelligence, determination and courage.
Boyd was born in Carlisle, Kentucky, the son of two worlds: his father was white and originally from Scotland; his mother was black, an enslaved person originally from Virginia. Boyd seems to have determined early on to buy his freedom. In his late teens he was hired out to work at the Kanawha saltworks in Virginia (now West Virginia) located about 150-160 miles from Carlisle. When slave owners had too many enslaved persons, one option was to send them to work at other farms or businesses. In this way the owner could continue to profit from their labor. For the enslaved person, it meant a year-long separation from family and possible exposure to dangerous conditions and harsher treatment. If there was an advantage to being hired out to the saltworks, it was that the enslaved person was allowed to work extra hours (overwork) to earn money they could keep. While in Kanawha, Boyd’s world expanded. He worked alongside enslaved persons from other states and interacted with free black men working the riverboats moving barrels of salt to Porkopolis (Cincinnati).
One of the overwork jobs that Boyd did at Kanawha was tending to the kettles in the salt furnace. The illustration is an example from the saltworks in Saltville, Virginia, as depicted in Harper’s Weekly, January 1865 (archive.org).
After several years, Boyd returned to Carlisle and was apprenticed to a carpenter (there are examples in the historical record of enslaved children of white owners given opportunities to learn a trade). During his apprenticeship Boyd would have had an opportunity to do overwork and earn money for himself. We don’t know exactly when his apprenticeship ended, exactly when he bought his freedom, or once free if he stayed in Kentucky for a while to earn more money. Fortunately for Boyd, Kentucky did not prohibit enslaved persons from learning to read and write, nor require them to leave the state within a set period after earning their freedom. We do know that once free, Boyd would have had to carry his official freedom papers with him at all times.
Boyd arrived in Cincinnati sometime during 1825 or 1826. Finding work along the busy docks of the Ohio River was fairly easy, but finding work as a black carpenter, no matter how skilled, was not. Although Cincinnati was a non-slave northern city, it had strong southern sympathies and business concerns. Eventually, with the help of a white man he was able to start working as a house carpenter. A newspaper biography published in 1877 relates the story of how Boyd met his future mother-in-law and how he came to live at 15 New Street. On his way to Cincinnati he was introduced to a woman whose widowed daughter lived in Cincinnati. She wanted to provide Boyd with a letter of introduction, but was illiterate. Boyd wrote the letter for her and on visiting New Street met Keziah, his future wife, and Sarah Jane, his future step-daughter. The 1850 census shows Emma Laws, his mother-in-law, was then living with them. One chance meeting on his journey to live as a free man resulted in a family firmly tied together. When Keziah died (estimated in 1862) they had been married 36 years. At the time of Boyd’s death he was still living in the same house on New Street with his daughter Maria and her family. He was buried next to Keziah in a cemetery plot owned by Sarah Jane.
Within eight years of arriving in his new city Boyd had his own business building houses and was employing five or six men, both black and white. In addition to having his own family and permanent residence, he had earned enough to purchase the freedom of two siblings.
Boyd was also planning and tinkering. He solved the most common problem of rope-suspension bedsteads (collapse) by devising a stabilizing screw-fastening system that tied the horizontal rails and vertical posts into a strong frame. With the help of George Porter, a Massachusetts-born cabinetmaker, he had the fastening system patented in 1833. At the time, black inventors were legally able to obtain patents, however, there were obstacles that made the preparation and submission of patent materials prohibitive. Six years later, in 1839, Henry opened his bedstead manufactory at the northeast corner of Broadway and Eighth Street.
An 1840 Boyd Bedstead, Smithsonian Collections.
Boyd advertised his bedsteads in city newspapers and business directories. Prominent business owners bought and endorsed his bedsteads. The 1850 Federal Profits of Industry Census shows the woods he used for bedsteads were poplar, walnut, mahogany, sycamore and cherry; more than 1,540 bedsteads were made annually for a production value of approximately $41,000. He employed an average of 20 men and, although the census doesn’t detail this, we know he employed both black and white men. Boyd’s bedsteads were popular in the South and and were transported by boat down the Ohio River to the Mississippi River, a cost-efficient transportation method for Cincinnati businesses.
From “Cincinnati in 1841: Early Annals and Future Prospects” by Charles Cist, Cincinnati Public Library.
The growth of Cincinnati and other “Western” cities attracted the attention of visitors, including abolitionists, from the East Coast and Europe. Henry Boyd and other successful black business owners were visited by the likes of Martin R. Delaney, Frederick Douglass and William Cooper Nell, and their successes were reported in abolitionist newspapers including Douglass’ The North Star and William Lloyd Garrison’s TheLiberator.
Sanborn Fire Map (1887) showing the location of Boyd’s home on New Street and the location of his former factory at Broadway and Eighth (Library of Congress).
Before the mid-1850s we know Boyd had expanded his operations into three or four additional buildings close to his original factory, and had more than doubled his work force. In addition to bedsteads he was advertising other types of furniture. He was also struggling to keep up with competition from larger furniture makers whose annual production values were more than triple his. One competitor, Clawson & Mudge, exclusively made bedsteads and offered 95 varieties. We also have documentation from an 1857 credit evaluation that indicates there was a level of turmoil in the workforce. By 1860, Boyd was not able to pay his leases and closed his factory. The leasehold agreements he had on the factory building and other holdings were advertised in sheriff’s sales.
The oft-published reason for Boyd closing his business was that his factory had been burned out three times and after the last fire he could not obtain insurance. The basis for this story is a newspaper article from the late 1870s. There is no documentation of Boyd’s factory being burned out either in the records of the Cincinnati Fire Department or in city newspapers. (Furniture factories in the 19th century were disasters waiting to happen with open fires, volatile liquids and plenty of wood shavings. There are plenty of records of other furniture factories burning down, including those of Clawson & Mudge.)
Boyd continued to operate a small furniture business for a couple more years, and in the late 1860s was employed by the city as a station-house keeper at one of the police stations.
Although he is best known for manufacturing bedsteads with a fastening system he devised and had patented, Boyd accomplished and contributed more to his adopted city.
When cholera arrived in Cincinnati in the autumn of 1832, the leading medical authority, Dr. Daniel Drake, was convinced the disease was caused by a type of aerial insect that was ”poisonous, invisible…of the same or similar habits with the gnat.” Boyd, on the other hand, thought cholera was in the water supply and communicated his idea to Charles Hammond, editor of one of the city newspapers. Hammond published Henry’s suggestion.
We don’t know if many people took up Boyd’s suggestion to boil drinking water. We do know Boyd survived cholera outbreaks in 1832, 1849, 1866 and one late in the 1870s. Twenty-two years after Boyd’s idea was published, a definitive study in London determined cholera was spread in the water supply.
While enslaved, Boyd was allowed to learn to read and write and learn a trade and was well aware of the advantages gained through education. In Cincinnati he supported and was involved in the initial efforts to open schools for black children. We don’t have full details on all of his family, but do know in 1849, when young women were not often allowed a higher education, his daughter Maria, age 16, was sent to Oberlin Collegiate Institute and completed three years of study. The Mechanics Institute prohibited enrollment of young black men wishing to learn a trade. We know of at least one instance where Henry apprenticed a young black man to learn how to be a turner.
Boyd had a home and business, paid taxes, obtained a patent and filed a lawsuit for non-payment for a house he built. Before 1857, he was citizen – of sorts, because he could not vote. After the 1857 Dred Scott decision, he was no longer considered a citizen. It was not until 1868, when the Fourteenth Amendment was passed, that he regained his citizenship. The Fifteenth Amendment passed on March 30, 1870, giving him the right to vote; three days later, on the evening of April 2, Boyd participated in the ward-level meetings of the Republican Party of Cincinnati. He was elected the initial chairman for the 13th Ward. In the autumn of that same year, at age 68, he voted for the first time in the state-wide election for the U.S. House of Representatives. The following year he joined the Grant Club to work for the re-election of Ulysses S. Grant.
Boyd had a humanitarian commitment that was not known until late in the 19th century. He was an active member of the Underground Railroad, contributing funds and helping to coordinate the movement of escaped enslaved persons to safety. He worked with other members, including Kitty Dorum, William Watson, Calvin Fairbanks and Levi Coffin. He knew Theodore Weld, a Lane (Seminary) Rebel, considered to be one of the architects of the abolitionist movements. Huntington Lyman, another Lane Rebel, revealed in correspondence with Wilbur Siebert (author of books on the Underground Railroad in Ohio) that Boyd had a hiding place in his house for escaped enslaved persons. Boyd’s involvement in helping escaped slaves seems to have begun within a few years of arriving in Cincinnati; they continued despite increased dangers brought about by the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act, and lasted until the end of the Civil War, a span of more than 30 years.
Transcription of an 1898 letter from Huntington Lyman to Wilbur Siebert outlining what he knew about the Underground Railway in Cincinnati. Siebert sent out hundreds of letters to “construct” the Railway trying to establish “stations” and “conductors.” In reality, the network of people and locations was not rigidly structured with members falling into a hierarchy. Siebert Archive in the Ohio History Connection.
There aren’t a huge number of chronicles of 19th-century black men whose lives included buying their way out of slavery, long-term involvement in freeing others from slavery, invention and entrepreneurship, enduring four race riots in 12 years, and involvement in the early struggle for the civil rights of equal education and the right to vote. Boyd’s story adds dimension to the history of Cincinnati in particular, and to American history as a whole.
Using historical documents and contemporaneous accounts we can reconstruct much of what Boyd did in his life and we can extrapolate ideas that were important to him. He was, however, always living in two worlds. At his birth, his white father owned him and his mother was enslaved; he received an education likely denied to others. He could start a successful business, prosper and be well-regarded, but his public life was proscribed by state Black Laws and threats of violence. He had a law-abiding public life countered by a dangerous hidden life of illegal acts to help escaped slaves. We can try to imagine how he felt to truly be a citizen and cast his first vote, but we can’t even get close. About his suffering while enslaved, or once he was free, we will never know.
