GrumpyBiker Posted October 21, 2017 Share Posted October 21, 2017 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 ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frank Turley Posted October 21, 2017 Share Posted October 21, 2017 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. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 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. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GrumpyBiker Posted October 23, 2017 Author Share Posted October 23, 2017 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. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JHCC Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 May just have been for moving them from point A to point B without having to bend over. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 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. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JHCC Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 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 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ausfire Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 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. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GrumpyBiker Posted October 23, 2017 Author Share Posted October 23, 2017 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 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 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. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Will W. Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 Thanks for posting. Definitely neat looking items. I really like that claw hammer, interesting that they put langets on it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 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... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daswulf Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 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. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Irondragon Forge ClayWorks Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 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. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daswulf Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 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. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Will W. Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 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." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daswulf Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 yeah. I really need to make something like that. " the bony blacksmith of Brighton" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Will W. Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 Oh, thats a good one. Dont forget to post pictures Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daswulf Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 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. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tubalcain2 Posted October 23, 2017 Share Posted October 23, 2017 those horseshoes look suspiciously like your equine roller skates, Das. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daswulf Posted October 24, 2017 Share Posted October 24, 2017 I know! I saw those. They have the original style spikes. Very cool. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tubalcain2 Posted October 24, 2017 Share Posted October 24, 2017 studs, but yeah. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GrumpyBiker Posted October 24, 2017 Author Share Posted October 24, 2017 Any idea what hardy tool that is ? Or a guess as to its use? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted October 24, 2017 Share Posted October 24, 2017 Can we see the other end from the side? Take it out of the hardy hole? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daswulf Posted October 24, 2017 Share Posted October 24, 2017 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. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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