October 21, 20178 yr Stopped by Lehmans Hardware today & while there visited the Kidron Community Historical Society museum. I'd been there before researching furniture but this trip I noticed a blacksmith section. Snapped some pics & thought I'd share. *** I'd never seen cannonball tongs before !
October 21, 20178 yr Thanks. It's always good to see that kind of work. Eric Sloane, the author/artist, had a residence in Santa Fe, and I would've visited him if only I had known.
October 23, 20178 yr Cannon balls against ships were often heated red and a pad of damp clay rammed in before the ball, Having a wooden ship with *everything* tarred, a red hot cannon ball could do a lot more damage than just making a hole! IIRC the Castillo de San Marcos in San Augustine FL still had shot ovens on display.
October 23, 20178 yr Author Never knew that. We received a little history while I was in Subic Bay Philippines attending Advanced Naval Gunfire school for Forward Observers. Are these for that purpose, do you think , or for part of the casting process? I mean these are / were made in Ohio.
October 23, 20178 yr May just have been for moving them from point A to point B without having to bend over.
October 23, 20178 yr I'd have to research them again I saw that display about 45 years ago... On museums with blacksmithing sections; my wife just gave me a copy of "Guide to Britain's Working Past" which is a listing of small (and LARGE) museums, exhibits, collections, mine, mills, trains, steam engines, furnaces, oast houses, quarries, canals, etc and so on. Very handy if you want to plan a trip and see some of the extant historical examples of the technology. (Ironbridge gorge and Darby's furnace remains are on the list!) Sadly sigh inducing if a trip is probably not in your future...little things like "The cold rolling mill powered by a horizontal steam engine is impressive; but even that cannot compare with the hot rolling mill and the immense Foden Vertical Compound Engine" I was reading in the 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue" (It's on the web!) and ran into: SMUG. A nick name for a blacksmith; also neat and spruce. To knock off; to conclude: phrase borrowed from the blacksmith. SPLIT IRON. The nick-name for a smith.
October 23, 20178 yr 20 minutes ago, ThomasPowers said: I'd have to research them again I saw that display about 45 years ago... The hot shot furnace at Castillo de San Marcos was (I believe) part of the battery built in 1842-1844. Here's an interesting overview of the process and its equipment (no pictures, unfortunately): http://friendsoffortmacon.org/hot-shot-furnace/ Also this, which has pictures of both the furnace at Castillo de San Marcos and the ruined furnace at Fort Morgan in Alabama: https://www.nps.gov/parkhistory/online_books/regional_review/vol2-2d.htm
October 23, 20178 yr Thanks for the pics Grumpy! Very informative. You have given me a few ideas for our museum and certainly some help in identifying stuff. The charts of tools, anvils, nailers, etc are very well done. I wonder if they were created by that museum or if they are commercially available. My museum has two 'sites' - the blacksmith shop which is set up as a display of tools, forge, bellows etc and the farrier's shop where I do my demos (because there is more space for onlookers). So although we don't have things clinically set out and labelled in glass cabinets, your pictures have been a great help. Thanks.
October 23, 20178 yr Author If you wish to contact them about the prints , here's their information. © 2009-2017 Kidron Community Historical Society • P.O. Box 234 Kidron, OH 44636-0234 • Phone: 330-857-9111
October 23, 20178 yr The prints look like pages from the works of Eric Sloane; I'd suggest you get a copy of his books and talk with the owner of the copyright if you want to use them for display.
October 23, 20178 yr Thanks for posting. Definitely neat looking items. I really like that claw hammer, interesting that they put langets on it.
October 23, 20178 yr Harber Village museum had a pickaxe with langets and no eye and it was described as "dating before the eye was developed for tools" Of course some stone tools had eyes in the neolithic... really made me doubt the rest of the museums descriptions...
October 23, 20178 yr I have one almost exact to the cannonball carrier just with out the teeth bent out as much. I was told they were nail tongs, like for grabbing batches out of a barrel. I will try to get a picture when I get home tonight.
October 23, 20178 yr We used to have a very good (old time dating back to the late 1800s) hardware store that used nail tongs to get the nails out of the barrels and put them into the scale pan for nails sold by the pound. They were like the cannon ball tongs only smaller. I miss that old store they had virtually everything in stock.
October 23, 20178 yr Got some pictures. They are 19" long. Pretty cool how they were made. Flat bit tong design with the "teeth/ fingers" forge welded together and on. I picked up a metal ball with them and it works but certainly seems like it would be awkward to try to load a ball into a canon with these. Oh, and you have no idea how hard it is for me to not mess these up and separate them and add thumbs for skeletal hands but I have a deep appreciation for good antique tools so they are safe. Plus, I'm a blacksmith, I'll make my own for artistic purposes.
October 23, 20178 yr 27 minutes ago, Daswulf said: Oh, and you have no idea how hard it is for me to not mess these up and separate them and add thumbs for skeletal hands but I have a deep appreciation for good antique tools so they are safe. Plus, I'm a blacksmith, I'll make my own for artistic purposes. They remind me of Jack Skellingtons hands. Tim Burton presents "The Blacksmith."
October 23, 20178 yr yeah. I really need to make something like that. " the bony blacksmith of Brighton"
October 23, 20178 yr Hah! No worries, I will. I have more ideas then time to work on them at the moment. I am truly interested in what these tongs actually are tho. I can't find any in reference to nail keg tongs or other searches but this reference here and one other to canon ball tongs. Yet Irondragon has seen them as nail grabbing tongs as I was told these were.
October 24, 20178 yr At a guess, it looks similar to a tool my friend Pete made me that goes in the pritchel hole and swings out to hold longer stock to work on. That one looks like it is fixed in the hardy hole. Just a guess.
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