Primary
Sources:
Documents of the Amateur Woodworking Movement
Why Primary
Sources in Woodworking History?
This
online history of woodworking will be primary-source driven. As much as
possible, the history will be told from the perspective of people and
events contemporary to the period being discussed. Already -- as
Appendix 2 -- I have uploaded several
primary sources associated with the development of the Morris Chair.
Before amateur
woodworking could become an matter of wide-spread interest, several
factors, outside the purview of woodworking, needed to be in place. To
be viable tools, tablesaws such as Delta's, below,
on the left, needed to wait for a market that included
electrification and the availability of fractional HP electric motors.
Both urban electrification and fractional horse-power electric motors
were not available before the 1920s.
We
get an example of this with the illustration from the
catalog (in pdf format) of Delta Manufacturing's late
1920s-early 1930s tilting-table saw. Naturally, this saw, and it's
accompanying accessories -- pictured below,
on the left -- generated much interest, especially since they
appeared on the scene in the midst of "the Great Depression", when many
Americans, unemployed and anxious for activities that would provide an
income, visualized these tools as a lifesaver. That is, with these
tools, many of the unemployed anticipated that these tools would help
them overcome the poverty of the Depression by giving thme an income.
(Unfortunately, as yet, I have not found the "perfect" primary source
document that illustrates these points in as dramatic fashion as I
would like. The US Dept of Commerce's series,
You Can Make It For Profit, comes
close. Items in this series was reprinted recently by the Canada-based
woodworker tools firm, Lee Valley.)
As
shown
on the left below, this tool, in effect, anticipates the
combination tools -- such as the Shopsmith -- that came on the market
early in the post-WW II era.
(These
topics will be covered in much greater detail in the chapters on the 1920s and the
1930s.)
Here's
the opening paragraph for a 1934 article in Popular Mechanics:
WITH
the cost of motor-driven wood-working
machines so low that almost every craftsman can afford to own homecraft
power tools. Hobbies are becoming singly popular. Practically every
working operation done with hand can be done by machine...
Other
things to
keep in mind, from the perspective of the 21st century: this saw has a
6" blade, which Delta claims can be "satisfactorily operated" with
either a 1/4 hp or 1/3 hp electric inductive motor. With a 6" blade,
you can barely saw through a 2 X 4, flat-side down. Accessories
included additional power tools such as 4" jointer and a horizontal
mortiser.
Fearful their
readers couldn't make the crossover from hand tools to power tools,
i.e., that numerous functions, jointing, mortising, rabbeting, and so
forth, in the new power tool were familar to readers in their hand tool
formats, but needed introductions for the power formats, the editors of
Popular Mechanics cleverly
match hand tool functions with their power tool equivalents in the
picture reprinted below.
Document 1: P H Adams
Reclining Chair
May 1902
An
article that
originally was published in the remarkable magazine, Amateur
Work. Published in Boston early in the 20th
century, AW, unfortunately didn't have a long
life, and obtaining info on it is difficult.
Document 2: A L
Hall Workshop at Home 1908
Document
no. 2, an 1908 magazine article, chronicles the creation, equipping and
operation of a home workshop by a suburban New Yorker. In that era,
before electrification became widespread in urban areas, primarily a
phenomenon of the 1920s, home workshops are rare, even among the
affluent.
Document 3: H H Windsor How
to Make a
Morris Chair
First
published in Popular Mechanics,
1909;
reprinted 1980, as Mission Furniture: How to Make It
Document 4: Otter Morris
Chair 1914
(reprinted 1923)
"The
Morris Chair"
from Paul D. Otter, Furniture for the Craftsman: A
Manual for the Student and Mechanic, 1914, 1923.
Document 5: Creden
"America Rediscovers Its Hands" 1953
Document
no. 5, a 1953 magazine article,
is a popular account of the impact of the end of WW II on American
society, with many 1000s of returning veterans moving back into the
civilian society, a "baby boom", a "housing boom", and a Do-It-Yourself
Movement.
Document 6: a 1904 article heralding
"The Significance of the Arts and Crafts Movement for Woodworking"
In
1904, to an
observer like Frank T Carlton, a professor at Toledo University School
, the potential impact of the Arts and Crafts Movement on American
society was quite evident and today, in 2006, a century later, we can
only marvel at how remarkable his insights are, but in an uncanny way.
Document 7: Mark Duginske,
"Thoughts on a Working System"
On
the occasion of
a demonstrating products of Switzerland-based Inca Power Tools
manufacturer, at Highland Hardware, Atlanta GA, in spring, 1983,
Duginske penned these words of wisdom about the need for woodworkers,
amateur and professional alike, to early develop a personal "working
system".
Document 8: On
"Skill-Hunger", or "How the Hammer,
Saw and Try-Square Can Satisfy" 1946
From
Popular Science Publishing, How to get the
most out of your home workshop; all the home craftsman needs to know
about the use of hand and power tools in his own home. Published in
1946. In this book, the preface observes, "How the Hammer, Saw and
Try-Square Can Satisfy". More significant, though, I think, is the
reiteration of the 1930's phrase, "Skill Hunger".
Document 9: "Notes
on Progress of the Use of Electricity in the Industrial and Domestic
Field" 1921
A
lucky find for
me, this document presents very dramatic evidence about the astonishing
rapidity of electrification and the equally astonishing impact of the
development, production ond distribution of the fractional horse-power
inductive motor. Just for fun, I counted the number of electric motors
in my personal workshop. In stationary tools, know its over 15 -- one
unit, a combo power tool, contains 3 electric motors, while each of the
numerous portable tools, including cordless -- drills, sanders, biscuit
joiner, several saws, grinder -- all, taken together, help argue that,
for the woodworker, the fractional horse-power motor has had a major
impact.
The
decade,
1921-1930, is pivotal to amateur woodworking, because -- following
closely the introduction of a marketable small-scale electric motor --
it is in that decade that the early models of scaled-down woodworking
power tools first were brought into the marketplace.
Document 10: Hobbs
Working With Tools 1935
WORKING
WITH TOOLS
is a 95-page publication of the Leisure League of America. The book's
author, Harry J Hobbs, over about three decades, edited the monthly Home
Craftsman, wrote numerous books dedicated to
woodworking, including becoming co-author, in 1975, of the
authoritative Know Your Woods: A Complete Guide To
Trees, Woods, And Veneers.
Document 11:
Gordon B Ashmead "Precision Makes the Shopsmith" Source: Western
Machinery & Steel World January 1951, 66-68, 92-93
Document
12: Formation of the National Homeworkshop Guild 1933
Document
13: The Importance of Projects
in the
Education of Boys 1926
Document
14: Principles
of
Bauhaus Production 1926
Document
15: C M Woodward, 1887, on the
importation of the Russian system of teaching woodworking.
Document 16: Joseph Aronson on "modern furniture" 1938
Document
17: Judson Mansfield
Woodworking Machines
-- History of Development, 1852-1952
Document
18: N C Brown From Handmade to
Mass-Produced Furniture 1952
Document
19: Gustav Stickley -- The
Motif of 'Mission'
Document
20: Anonymous "Riding a Hobby
Leads to
Profit" Furniture Record 1937
Document
21:
Frank Lloyd Wright -- Art
and
Craft of the Machine 1901
Document
22: Henry B Allen --
Improvements in Steels for Woodcutting Saws and Knives 1930
Document
23: John Shaw Portable
Electrically-Driven Machines 1928
Document 24: Paul D Otter on
"Mechanic", "Cabinetmaker", "Craftsman", "Carpenter" 1923
Document 25: Electrical
World 75 May 15 1920
Document
26: Herman
Hjorth on the Radial Arm Saw Home Craftsman Magazine
J-F 1950
Document
27: Gustav Stickley: "The
Structural
Style in Cabinet-Making" House Beautiful
15, December 1903, pages 78-93
Document
28: Walt Durbahn: "Our House is
Different! Yours Can Be Too!" 1954
Document
29: R A Wagner "The Development
of
Skilled Mechanics" The Building Age 36
1914
Document
30: George A Schock:
Early History of the
Baldor Electric Co., 1920-1976 1992
Document
31: Dr Arthur Dean's Advice to
a Mother About Buying Woodworking Tools For Her 12 Year Old Son 1927
Document
32: Walt
Durbahn: A Model for Work Experience: The Building Trades in
1950s
Document
33: Walt Durbahn: "Make a Hit
With Your
Handyman" 1954
Document
34: The Development of the
Induction
Motor in America
Document
35: Anonymous,
"Electric
Service in the Home", Electrical World 75 May 15 1920
Document
36: Anonymous, “Cost
of
Electricity: Government Figures Show It to Be the One Important
Commodity to Decrease in Price,” Electrical World 81, no 18,
may 5, 1923, page 1052
Document
37: Robert M. Davis,
“Looking Ahead Ten. Years,” Electrical World
January 5, 1924, pages 17-24
Document 38: J B C. “Electricity in the
American Home,” Commerce Monthly 6, no 10 February 1925,
pages 3-10
Document 39: Harry
Jerome, "Mechanization In
Industry" New York: National Bureau Of Economic Research, 1934, pages
174-175
Document
40: Manual Arts and the Modern
Art
Movement 1928
Dear Spica:
Your suggestion that the Craft Guilders
attempt something in
design in the Modern Art manner appealed to me particularly, for I was
so
fortunate as to spend a long summer vacation on the coast of Maine in
association with one whose life is given to the study of art problems,
and who
had recently acquired a large amount of material illustrative of the
Modern Art
Movement. A corner of the cottage living-room
became a design and drafting nook, and the kitchen, with its primitive
dining-table, a workshop. Here things were created in paper
and wood and paint, with a deal of satisfaction and much
enlightenment to the workers, and with some polite
commendation, tempered by skepticism from the
colonists....
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