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Coffee Table Conversion
by Tom Holloway
 This past spring
my brother gave me an old stand-up clerk's desk, the type used
on top of an existing counter, with drawers for cash and
supplies and a sloping top. It was unusable as furniture,
and hardly a priceless antique, but had lots of well patinated
oak lumber. He had acquired it some years ago in Walla
Walla, WA, and it has spent the past several years in his
storage shed in central Nevada (Smith Valley).
Medallions: Were they Cast or
Stamped by Philip
W. Baker
Three patents have been found that relate to the manufacture of
saw medallions. The earliest patent is by Washbourne dated Dec
31, 1867. A Dec. 21, 1869 patent by Daniel T. Munger followed.
C. Glover’s patent of Dec. 27, 1887 was the third.
It
should be noted that the three patents referred to the bolts
used to fasten the handle of a saw to the blade were called saw
screws with the medallion being called a label screw. The
threaded portion of the saw screw is called shank.
Another Stunning Drill... by
Christopher Schwarz
For those of us who buy old
tools, one of the fantasies involves time travel. Wouldn't it be
cool to walk into a hardware store in the late 19th century and
buy a new Stanley Bed Rock plane off the shelf? Or how about an
entire set of chisels from James Swan?
Until we build a time machine,
we're just going to have to be satisfied with the work of Wiktor
Kuc, who rebuilds hand drills to better-than-new glory.
More on Chisels
by Bob Smalser
Some
time ago I did an article on minimalist rehabilitation of old
chisels for the benefit of tight-budget newcomers in need of
high-quality tools. Those newbies have undoubtedly progressed some
since then, so today we’ll rehab even more old chisels using more
advanced techniques on the lathe.
Another 30-dollar lot of
eBay treasures in need of a hug. Some
of the Lie Nielsen’s of their day are in there… Witherby, Gillespie,
Swan, Peck Stowe and Wilcox, Buck, Greenlee, Barton…
Letter
from Paul S.
Oh Gracious Galoots,
I weren't payin'
proper attention as I was perusing the offerings in my Digested
Old Tools. Somebody was shakin' their head ruefully at the
finest plane ever offered this side of the Great War!
Being follicly challenged I am unable to shake my head ruefully
and might not if I could. It sounds slightly obscene and
besides if I shake my head - ruefully or not - about the only
thing that happens is the sawdust and woodshavings which are
stuck to yesterday's lunch in my flavor saver and my beard reach
critical mass and sometimes ruefully, maybe it's ruefully after
I think of it, and they go flyin' through the ether and land on
my belly. They stay there for a long time unless I get a
reason to move.
That brings me
back to that dainty-fied, gender-appropriately-whipped,
ultra-disgusting, cheap guitar finish looking plane which d&*n
near made me choke and drop that classically fried piece of
chicken/chook onto my keyboard!
 Last time I saw
a $650 "for sale" sign on a tool it took 4 of us to load it on
the truck and there was beer money left over to boot. I'm
sittin' here gaggin' and frothin' until I realized that it
wasn't just an ordinary plane. It was a French somethin'
or another. There was this pretty French word , let's see,
I think it was PetitPoutlailier - that's close - and no disrespect
to the French language. But, once I figured it was a
PetitPoul... that I had obviously misunderstood the ad. My
French is a little rusty, but I believe that translates as a
short French person will deliver this tool by train to your
location. With the weakened state of the dollar French
people just don't go around deliverin' this stuff for nothin'.
But, then you
gotta tip them $15. It don't matter much if'n that's Canuck,
Real French or the Almighty Dollar.
I was sorta put
out that there was only one of these planer tools to be had.
Mostly for the entertainment value, what I really wanted to see
just how many people really could be had! I suspect this
would be like shootin' fish in a barrel in some circles.
The picture-takin' sorta reminded me of the last Robert Redford
movie that he made, it was all swathed in this soft golden glow
so you couldn't see his Liver Spots, but it all kinda reminded
you of Fall in a spent Cornfield. You get so busy bein'
tuned into the golden light and the possibility of a celestial
visitation that you forget that you came to see the main
character!
All I know is
that I ain't ever gonna be the same after this. I'm a
sorry excuse for a Quaker and they might "read me out" of
Meeting if they figured I'd really leave, but where I was goin'
with this is that I haven't fired a gun in 4 decades, but I got
a bunch of blunderbusses around here - high brass paper 10 gauge
shells. I am going to sit in the basement tonight - armed
- and guard those PetitPoutlaliers that I always thought was
your basic run-of-the-mill Stanley planes, until I can get to
the bank and rent me a bunch of strong boxes and put these
things away for posterity and the fruit of my looms, my adult
kids.
Paul in Normal
July, 2008
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