Jump to content
I Forge Iron

Black Frog

Members
  • Posts

    1,623
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by Black Frog

  1. You  have a "BLACKJACK" branded Hay-Budden anvil.  It was stamped for the J.E. Pilcher hardware company in St. Louis.

    Unfortunately more than half of the anvil's hardened faceplate appears to have broken off. 

    The serial number on the front foot looks to be possibly a 5-digit number, maybe starting with a "3"....  if so, that would be the 1897 ballpark according to Anvils In America.

    Here's a better version of your stamp:

    PILCHER.jpg

  2. 2 hours ago, MC Hammer said:

    One thing is for sure, all Bokers have PW like feet.  Find an anvil with PW feet and a Trenton trade mark stamped on it and you have yourself an early Boker Trenton anvil.

    ....some of that statement is not true.  The very early Columbus, Ohio Trentons had flats on the feet and forged bases, very similar to the German Trentons. 

    This was before they switched to the first style of cast base.

  3. I believe the circular "SOLID WROUGHT" as well as the flats on the feet were an attempt to imitate some features of world's best selling anvil at the time- Peter Wright.  Some German Trentons had the "PATENT" stamp on them too, just like PW.

    I have seen a few oddly-oriented vertical stamps of GERMANY between the feet on some early German Trentons as well.  

    Not sure there is a good indication for organizing them into which came first, I've recorded some with SOLID WROUGHT in two lines also with the GERMANY stamp.  I've seen at least three different styles of the SOLID WROUGHT two-line stamp too.  There's "GERMANY" and "MADE IN GERMANY" stamps on early Trentons.

    There are several different version of the German Trenton logo stamp I've recorded.  And I've also see some very different proportions and forging styles of German Trentons.  Makes me wonder if there was more than one shop forging them.....

    Since the German Trentons did not have any serial numbers, pretty tough at the moment to figure which came first, and also why I've been concentrating on organizing the Columbus Trentons (and A&H's) by logo style.  Serial numbers makes for a convenient way to look back through their history and all the different logo styles they used during production.

  4. The Boker anvils have some general similarities, but are still noticeably different than PW's.  The proportions and forging style are not the same.

    Many of the Boker's are marked with the "GERMANY" stamp.  This would no be the case if PW was making them.

    This SDK shown is the same as the early German Trentons.  Just a different stamp on it.

×
×
  • Create New...