Bootfairs in the Tropics!!

[jimi43]

Well...you can always tell when the summer is really with us...the bootfairs kicks off properly!

The end of May is a bit later than usual but never mind...the best always comes to he who waits. So....I had two dreadful weeks..total depression...saved the budget each time like a good lad...and waited for the sun...so I had a bit more than usual to spend...thankfully!

Bit of a quality haul this week guys and gals....where to start really....ok let's go with a nice little 1/8" pig sticker in pristine condition...

Quite an old one this from Kenyon Sheffield (research Jim!)

Now this would have been my favourite haul...on a really good day anyway...but today...oh ok....a great find...

Nice row of really quality Buck and Ryan Euston Road bevel chisels with Octagonal handles....

Notice I'm not telling you how much these cost...I don't want to be responsible for any suicides on the forum... :mrgreen: ....let's just say I had change out of a fiver and the brand new tool roll thrown in! 8) AND...he has more he's bringing next weekend! :shock:

A strap hammer comes next...50p...rather quaint handle...it curls...and is going nowhere so no refub there!

Then one of these...

...which is going precisely nowhere either...because I have been waiting for Edward to come up with a convex one to complete my collection for simply ages...and it came up today...with the beautiful Preston patented adjuster!

Magic! I shelled out a fiver for this which is way above my individual tool policy...but what the ****...live dangerously! :wink:

I just kept banging into stalls with tools...so much so I got the odd bruzz....(not getting coat...nope..not getting coat...)

I just love these things...and a socketed one as well!!! Pointy bit follows....

Sitting alongside it was a huge firmer...again sans handle...but I need something to do tomorrow! :lol:

At least I've a pattern to work to...

...and this is a behemoth!!!

PHEW...takes breath...

Now...you know how I love Messrs Sorby in all their incarnations...well this in-cannel gouge is Mr I and Mr H...somewhere back there at the beginning....

Again..a lovely huge socket and just check out this mark....

Now that is just prehistoric! And so damn beautiful!

Just when you thought that encompassed the whole of the haul....

An old Moseley...and retailer mark of Maidstone too!....

But check this out...

I got it cheap...because I told him the sole needed flattening..... :mrgreen: :mrgreen:

(Nah..only jesting!)

It was this one that needed flattening....

...or was it this little gem....

Two of these for 50p each...

If this is the quality of their newsletter - I think I might just joint!

Now...don'tcha just LOVE people who use waterstones with oil? Blackened, stinking, grungy....anonymous...

This has been cleaned off as much as I could in a field...and I will "de-oil" it later but you get the idea....

8)

And to finish off the day...a matching set of plastic heron boxes....

Yes folks...I kid you not...boxes in which they deliver different sizes of plastic heron decoys for ponds!!!!! :shock:

Soon to be appearing on my workshop wall as summer (open)/winter (closed) plane racks!! Result!

Well...that's about it...

I was a little disappointed because I didn't find one portable radio worth buying...maybe I'll get lucky next week. I did manage to sell all of the ones I bought previously for a profit though...that paid for the Buck chisels! 8)

What did you guys find?

Jim

 

[AndyT]

Jim, I've got an old radio if you want to do a swap!

That's a seriously sickening gloat there. Not just old diy grade tools that everybody's dad had in the shed, but proper professional quality gear from the 19th century or very early 20th, in good nick too. I suppose I can console myself that they have been sympathetically re-housed - perhaps I need to become an insomniac on Saturday mornings after all.

 

[soulboy]

What did you guys find?

I found out I'm getting up too late at the weekends! great finds, thanks for sharing. :x
chris

 

[jimi43]

Jim, I've got an old radio if you want to do a swap!

That's a seriously sickening gloat there. Not just old diy grade tools that everybody's dad had in the shed, but proper professional quality gear from the 19th century or very early 20th, in good nick too. I suppose I can console myself that they have been sympathetically re-housed - perhaps I need to become an insomniac on Saturday mornings after all.

Andy...thanks for the offer mate but I have all the radios I need... :mrgreen:

So..Professor...I need your help mate...

Just before I went to work at 3pm I was researching the first of my finds...the Kenyon pig sticker...

I was trying to find out about the maker and the 1K that is stamped on the mark...strange that....

And I found this:

CLICK CLICK

Page 47...where it talks about the "colonies" requesting tools to be stamped "1K" for shipment to the USA...around the early 1800s

Knowing that you have an almost limitless library of documents, and with your flair for research, I wondered if you could find out more about this extra marking?

Thanks mate

Jimi

 

[DTR]

Crikey Jim :shock:

 

[AndyT]

Well, well well!

I'd say that you have done your own research there and found that you have a late 18th or very early 19th century chisel, made by Kenyon of Sheffield, and favoured by the discerning American colonists. I think it's a keeper!

Jim, your comments on my research are flattering, but I don't get as hardcore as this. I knew of that book, but don't have a copy and had only seen the extract on Google Books.

What next? I would think that the mark is IK rather than 1K - which makes it the maker's initials - John Kenyon, but using the older form of the letter, before the capital J was established. (You've probably seen planes from IOHN GREEN of York.) It could sort of help to know how long they used the old fashioned style of letter.

You could try asking on the Sheffield History Forum - I found this post about some Kenyon planes with the IK mark. It lists all the Sheffield Kenyons, starting with the Tool Merchant mentioned in the scholarly paper, in Holles Croft in 1787, through to a later John Kenyon in 1925. It also says the firm was founded in 1710, so it's possible that your chisel could be really very early.

Or else it's the sort of question where the Hawley Archive would have the answer - see this post and this website.

All this for (presumably) less than the price of a cup of tea! Am I jealous? Nah!

 

[jimi43]

Well, well well!

I'd say that you have done your own research there and found that you have a late 18th or very early 19th century chisel, made by Kenyon of Sheffield, and favoured by the discerning American colonists. I think it's a keeper!

Jim, your comments on my research are flattering, but I don't get as hardcore as this. I knew of that book, but don't have a copy and had only seen the extract on Google Books.

What next? I would think that the mark is IK rather than 1K - which makes it the maker's initials - John Kenyon, but using the older form of the letter, before the capital J was established. (You've probably seen planes from IOHN GREEN of York.) It could sort of help to know how long they used the old fashioned style of letter.

You could try asking on the Sheffield History Forum - I found this post about some Kenyon planes with the IK mark. It lists all the Sheffield Kenyons, starting with the Tool Merchant mentioned in the scholarly paper, in Holles Croft in 1787, through to a later John Kenyon in 1925. It also says the firm was founded in 1710, so it's possible that your chisel could be really very early.

Or else it's the sort of question where the Hawley Archive would have the answer - see this post and this website.

All this for (presumably) less than the price of a cup of tea! Am I jealous? Nah!

Hi Andy....

You are too modest Prof! :wink:

(homer) IK = Iohn Kenyon....silly me! (homer)

Now...in the back of my mind somewhere...which can be an awfully dodgy place....there is a twinkle of thought that makes me think I have heard the name John Kenyon in relation to the Seaton Chest....will need to follow that thought!

By experience...I have found the "I" vs "J" on a number of earlier 19th C tools...I. Sorby being the one that comes to mind first....but before about 1830~40....my knowledge is rather grey to say the least....and at the moment I am deep into the "Roman Empire Forum"...leading me way offline chasing red herrings...but my tangential brain is now intrigued by Iulius Caesar....(must get back on track! )

Let me know if you find anything...I'm off to flatten me coticule!! :shock:

Jim

P.S. We have posh tea at our bootfair and cappuccino So it wasn't that much!!! :mrgreen:

 

[Pete W]

there is a twinkle of thought that makes me think I have heard the name John Kenyon in relation to the Seaton Chest....will need to follow that thought!

You're right - the saws in the Seaton chest were made by Kenyon. There's a lot of good Kenyon info here:
http://www.sheffieldhistory.co.uk/forum ... on-and-co/

 

[AndyT]

Thinking about it further, do you think you have stumbled across someone selling off somebody else's collection? The presence of the TATHS journals is a bit of a clue, as is the promise to come back with more, and then to get uncommon tools of this age as well...

I think your little strap-headed hammer has a chance of being really rather early, though it may be impossible to tell, and the pattern survived in catalogues into the C19th. The Christies Guide says this sort is called a Canterbury hammer and was an early design - the engraving in Moxon shows something that might be similar, but either the artist was working from memory, or the blacksmith was drunk!

Can we have some close ups of the head? Does it look like smith's work?

And the Sorby gouge just looks really old too.

 

[Setch]

Lovely haul Jimi - but I still rate the lie-in I had this morning after a looong week of work!

Interestingly, one of the pieces I'm slowly restoring to working order is an ash handled gauge, stamped "7/16, IK, Kenyon,Sheffield". It also features a "Cast Steel" logo on the reverse. It needs griniding a *lot* to restore the horrifically chipped edge, but I'm now more motivated to get on with it!

 

[jimi43]

Ah! Ya see there Prof...I was right! You are the man!

I have to go to work in an hour until midnight and then off to get checked at the quack first thing but as soon as I get back I will get some more pictures of the hammer taken for you.

This usually happens Setch...on person finds something about out of the ordinary and then amazing coincidences occur.....

Could you perhaps post a picture or two of yours.

I will probably start another thread on the HAND TOOLS forum so we can research this and other items more thoroughly without mucking up the flow of what was a "what did you get today at the bootfair" thread....mostly in anticipation of loads more hauls this bright and sunny Sunday!

Cheers guys

Jimi

 

[Racers]

Hi, Jim

Nice haul, love the spokeshave and the London pattern chisels and the other chisels and the hammer and, well all of it.

Did not so bad my self this sunday

50p for the raw hide mallet.
50p for the hand vice.
50p for the Stanley Yankee
30p for the More and Wright square.
50p for the wooden square, nice length of box wood for stringing.
50p a bag for the M6 bolts.
And the unused 2" Robert Sorby chisel

Pound an inch

Then this afternoon my neighbour called me over and gave me some more stuff.

Couple of planes a nice set of shallow sweep paring gouges some small carving chisels and a set of gouges, and a turning gouge.

They are mostly Ward and Pane.

Pete

 

[AndyT]

Pete, what are you doing?
Are we supposed to feel comforted that there is someone even jammier than Jim?!!

Don't you have enough mint condition valuable and desirable antique tools? #-o :lol:

(And I know that concept doesn't really mean anything!)

 

[Racers]

Enough? haven't come across that word before :wink: what does it mean?

:lol:

Pete

 

[AndyT]

No idea!

 

[adidat]

whoa there Andy

i hope you're not suggesting Pete is a collector?

adidat

 

[Blister]

Enough? haven't come across that word before :wink: what does it mean?

:lol:

Pete

Pete

Don't PANIC

Its normally preceded by " NOT ' :mrgreen:

 

[Racers]

Hi, Blister

Still not sure, no one has said that to me :-"


Pete

 

[Scouse]

Great hauls there chaps, you lucky b......!!!

Up this end optimism reigned as the weather made for a massive boot sale. Sadly it only seemed to bring out pottery, baby clothes and Harry Potter books!

The only thing I saw (!) was this

R. Groves brass backed dovetail saw, straight and nice and heavy. Proving difficult to date, as always with British tools; it has the 'USE' trademark which puts it post 1850, so that narrows it down a bit...! Split nuts with 'USE' embossed into them make it look fairly old.

It's certainly pre-1938, since W. Marshall, a cutlery and tool dealer, had ten lines in the London Gazette that year, if you know what I mean...

El.

 

[jimi43]

Lordy lordy Pete...those W&P gouges are absolutely stunning...one of my favourite edge tool makers...superb condition!

I was reading the TATHS books I got tonight..(bit slow at work!)....and there was an article about a little Sheffield maker called John Littlewood...

One of the independents that CC was talking about who was sub contractor to many...including W&P and Robert Sorby!

There is a good chance that they were made by them under contract from W&P and if so...they would be of higher quality than W&P as the floor manager was required to ensure that they were as least as good as the ones they made in house...or "came up to the mark"!! If the were not they were rejected and called "cuckoos". Very few were sent back to Littlewoods though...and they made 11,000 tools in 1900 for others suppliers...which is apparently one every 3 1/2 minutes!

Scouse mate...that saw is gorgeous. I love the handle and the marks on the back. Groves is a great maker...you did very well there. How much did that little baby set you back if you don't mind me asking?

Jim