If It’s Good Enough for D. M. Goodwillie…

A while back in A Different Hinge You Won’t Use I wrote about the ring/loop hinge that I found on three different munitions cases. As is typical, I had never seen these hinges until I came across three of them in a relatively short period of time. Over two days I found three more examples in Asheville, NC  this time all food related. Two in one shop. I wouldn’t usually write about more of the same if it weren’t for the fact there were more unique feature.

First is this red crate labeled RICE:

See, it says “RICE”.

Somewhat crudely made:

Not Thos. Moser.

And the hinge:

From the outside.

And inside.

What I found unique was the latch:

A wire latch.

This is on the lid.

And inset on the carcass.

What is driving me crazy is that I know I have used a latch just like this. I have the sense memory of using it and recall how often you can release one side while the other hangs.

Across the shop, I found a crate used for transporting water bottles for Buck National Beverage:

Is there a legal definition of promptly?

A familiar looking hinge.

And another wire latch:

Only one wire in this latch.

On the carcass.

The inside of the crate is not well finished. I was having trouble trying to get a picture of the printing therein because of the texture.

Can’t quite read due to the texture.

A flash helps.

It’s Goodwillie. D. M. Goodwillie. Of the Chicago t777

Another rare item is this handle:

A nail on handle insert.

The function of the backing plate is unknown unless it is to keep fingers from being  smashed by freely moving bottles. Or to keep the box sealed against our little insect or rodent friends.

A safer handle?

While poking about, I found an auction listing showing a similar box claiming the box was from 1919. I also found an obituary in the July 17th, 1934 Chicago Tribune for a Douglas Monroe Goodwillie, 38, who died suddenly of heart disease.

The next day I found this newer box at another shop in Asheville:

A newer, bright shiny box. Joinery seems to be nailing strips at the corners.

This box looks more like a promotional item than a shipping container.

Bright, shiny familiar hinges. Made by Hager, a maker of many types of hinges.

 

Ring/loop hinge looks the same except for the shine.

And, finally, a bonus box not used for edibles:

Another box with nailed-on joinery.

Nail-on, fastener-free hinge.

This box also seems to be more promotional than functional.

From our favorite multinational consumer products company.

Now that I’ve beaten this topic to death, we move on.

 

 

The Answer or At Least An Answer.

When last we spoke, I was threatening to disclose the function of the slots on the top of J. V. Hammond explosive boxes.

Slots! Why?

The answer can be found in US Patent #2278850 dated April 7th, 1942. The patent was filed February 20th, 1940. It took two years to approve the patent for a wooden box…

I found this patent number on the side of the large box:

There’s a patent number there.

This patent number was not on the previously posted picture of the box because I removed it to stretch the blog out for another week and to look smarter than I really am. The patent explains it thusly:

Formed in the top wall, substantially medially of its width and extending the major portion of its depth, is a dove-tail shaped guide slot.The guide slot communicates with the forward edge of the wall and slidably receives a guide.element which is formed on the under side of a latch member, said latch member being of substantially rectangular shape in cross section and being of a length substantially the same as the depth of the complete dynamite box. As will be seen by referring to Figure 2, the guide element terminates short of the forward end of the latch member a distance equal to the thickness of the front closure presently to be described in more detail.

In order normally to urge the latch member forwardly, I provide a rubber band.

The patent drawings look something like this:

This makes it clear.

In reality, it looks like this:

A rubber band what slides the latch closed.

And this:

Showing the latch action. I had to build the latch.

When the lid is opened, the latch slides back out-of-the-way:

The lid holds the latch back.

Close the lid, and the latch is automatically returns to the locked position:

Powered by a single rubber band.

The patent reveals that the box was designed to not fall apart (dovetails), be made without any metal parts (pegs) and to latch automatically (rubber band), all good things when your intent is to carry explosives into a dangerous environment. You can read the patent HERE.

Hammond built their box in several sizes sharing the same basic construction:

Image borrowed from an online auction site. Used without permission because this is the internet.

Reader Jeff Kester described the latch in a comment earlier in the week. I just found and approved his comment five minutes ago. I’m not sure how that happened…

I am looking for a catalog or manual so I can order some appropriate replacement parts. Let me know if you have one.

A Glass Act

It’s been a while since I did a binge post. I feel the need for another hardware binge but there have been too many pictures since the last binge. To keep things manageable, I decided to break them down by type. Today we will see glass pulls or knobs if you prefer.

Glass knobs can be simple:

This one is simple.

Or very elaborate pressed glass patterns:

Not so simple.

Not much else to say. They are glass. They are pulls. They are HERE.

Next, pulls of wood.

A. R. Brown Gets Around.

Or at least his cabinets do.

This is another case of finding three related things that I had never observed before in a short period of time. They were probably out there but I didn’t notice them. And I usually check out labels. No, my ego tells me I never saw one before.

First one I found was at an interesting antiques shop in Breaux Bridge, Louisiana:

A forty drawer, revolving, octagonal cabinet.

With different depth drawers.

Drawers on opposing sides are half the depth of the cabinet meeting in the center. Drawers on the perpendicular sides depth is limited by the longer drawers.

And a maker’s brass plate:

Only upside down. Looks like is always been upside down.

The plate reads:

A. R. BROWN
ERWIN, TENN.
PATENTED MAY 7, 1901

Five days and 60 miles east I found this one at the “mercantile” building at the Rural Life Museum in Baton Rouge:

An eighty drawer cabinet.

Same design concept:

Same drawer design but twice as many.

This manufacturer’s plate is on right-side up:

You can read this one.

Then back home, sixteen days later and 884 miles north-east at the summer Country Store Auction, there was this behemoth:

Now 112 drawers.

Squaring the octagonal allow another four columns of drawers to be added. Drawers are of different sizes on all four sides. Click here for an eBay listing of a similar cabinet with more pictures.

Same drawer arrangements.

With a slightly different plate:

Same text, squared off shape with decorations.

A. R. (Albert Rosencrans) Brown was an interesting character, entrepreneur and civic leader. Brown was born in Knox County, Tennessee in 1863 and was orphaned in 1865. In 1894, he arrived in Erwin, Tennessee, where he opened a hardware and mercantile store, A. R. Brown and Company. He organized and was president of the First National Bank of Erwin; served as president of Unicoi Bank and Trust Company, Erwin Water Company, Erwin Manufacturing Company, Erwin Cemetery Company, Erwin Inn Corporation and Unaka Academy; served as secretary-treasurer of the Erwin Development Company; served as vice-president of Unicoi Telephone Company. He died in a traffic accident  in 1937.

Below is a page from The Iron Age (1900) that has a description of Brown’s Perfection Bolt Case with a top view of the internals of one of their cabinets:

From a Google Books scan.

Factory Bodged

I have written a few blogs about bodging and being bodged. My most favorite were My Mother was a Soviet Bodger and Teenaged Mutant Ninja Bodgers. Bodging as I use it means doing what must be done to make things work the best you can. Often modifying hardware to make it work.

The last blog was mostly about using bail or pull escutcheons for keyhole escutcheons. Like this:

Not the prettiest mod ever.

Last week, I saw a chest that had escutcheons that seem to be designed to work either way. This is an escutcheon used with a bail.

Note the outline of a keyhole.

And the keyhole version:

Was it a knockout or were tools required?

It works. Keeps down your escutcheon inventory.

And it looks better than just banging in a hole.

Nathaniel Gould Was Not a Bodger, He Fitted Skillfully.

Today I visited the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts. The main reason for going was to see the exhibit:  In Plain Sight: Discovering the Furniture of Nathaniel Gould.  Chuck Bender wrote about this exhibit in September on his late Popular Woodworking blog.

I went and am now in the dog house. I picked this weekend based on the fact my wife and a group of our friends were going to the beach on Emerald Isle, NC. It is a beach house that has by rented by our group for six of the past eight years. Problem is I don’t love the beach as they do. I grew up in Western Pennsylvania. We didn’t have beaches. They go to the beach, I go to Boston. Seems fair.

Now the bigger problem is that my wife’s work schedule changed and she isn’t able to go to the beach and I still went to Boston. The airplane tickets were non-refundable. At times the word conspires against you.

Back to the woodworking content of the blog. In February, I wrote the blog Bodged, it’s not what you think with a follow-up last Friday, They Did It the Hard Way, Bodged II. This is not bodging, it’s custom fitting.

Looking at this Nathaniel Gould secretary:

An exceptional secretary.

It deserves another view.

I took a look at the brasses and saw they were not all lying flat but some had been well fitted to the slant front and drawers.

Well fitted into the recess.

More fitted brasses.

And it goes both ways:

Around the recess.

And over the block front.

Not fitted but no lock either.

And this last picture is neither fitted nor bodged but it is a nice carved shell:

Somebody in the Gould shop was highly skilled.

Oh, what the heck, the top shell and finial are interesting, too.

A broken arch pediment with shell and finial. They carved interior and exterior shells.

Only time will tell how much trouble I’m in. Probably not all that much. I have a truly understanding and tolerant wife. I do. Really.

They Did It the Hard Way, Bodged II

Way back in February, I did a blog on bodged items. (See it here at Bodged, it’s not what you think.) The definition I used was essentially just doing what needs to be done to make it work. Maybe not pretty but functional. I have found a few new example I want to share. Why, because it’s what I do.

First in an interesting way to fix stripped hinge screws:

That is one way to do it.

Most of us would addressed the stripped out wood. The average person might use the “toothpicks and glue” technique to reinforce the hole. Others might drill out the holes and use long grain plugs (but not a dowel). They chose to drill and countersink new holes on the hinge. Dang overachievers.

I like this one too. They centered the lock but didn’t notice the key wasn’t centered on the lock:

Technically a very well done repair.

And you might have the non-standard use of a(n?) escutcheon:

Not as designed but it works.

Same here:

Who decides what up is? Who ordered the wrong lock?

And the improvised escutcheons:

This one is a bit rough.

I can almost believe this one was made this way. Hard to say.

And that’s all for tonight. I’m exhausted.

A Questionable Blog, But It’s Short

If you are a genteel person with a sensitive nature, you should leave now. Some might find this topic shocking, not in the Howard Stern or South Park sense. More like the stereotypical maiden aunt from Dayton expectation of shocking.

If you are still reading you either are a curious person or don’t have a freakin’ clue what I am blathering on about. Whatever your reason, read on.

I have seen the following item in the men’s room of several higher-end restaurants and bars. I’m not sure if it’s a hipster trend or there is just a really good salesperson out there catering to all the right places. Well, here goes.

There are now toilet seats with handles:

It’s got a handle. Click for a larger view. Really?

This looks like the Kohler White Stronghold® Elongated Toilet Seat With Integrated Handle and Self-sustaining Check Hinge, $28.46 street price. Available in Almond, Black Black and Biscuit at slightly higher prices.

Is this a growing niche market? There are many similar products including add on handles called Nifty-Lifty and Flipsit (Antimicrobial) and a foot powered lifter. There are a lot of really odd products out there related to toilets that I hope to forget once this blog is finished. There are some things you can’t unsee. Research takes a toll.

I asked my wife if there are similar things in the women’s room. She shouldn’t recall. In fact, she couldn’t say if the toilet seats are open front or closed front (horseshoe or oval). Part of me is glad. We don’t need two overly curious minds in the family. I will just need to do research on my own.

Or not.

Things for the Metal Fan from the Rural Life Museum

There’s a lot for the ferrophile (iron lover) at the Rural Life Museum in Baton Rouge. There are manufactured products, furniture parts, house parts, and a blacksmith’s shop. It took a while to decide how to sort the images since they are throughout the entire museum grounds.

There are several display boards of manufactured products like these:

Display of manufacture items.

More products.

Some really big bellows:

Need wind?

All sorts of interesting hardware in and on the buildings. Many of the buildings are from the same plantation so it would make sense that they may be of similar design and construction.

One of many pintle hinges.

And finally, the smithy’s shop:

Looks like a blacksmith’s shop…

Click HERE to see all 35 pictures from the LSU Rural Life Museum.

Yet Another Different Hinge (Take 2)

Let’s try this again.

Still sorting through the Rural Life pictures. In the mean time, the local high-end auction house is having it’s catalog sale this weekend. I went over there yesterday and took around 280 picture. And in the sale I found yet another hinge I hadn’t seen before. You might remember my last new-to-me hinge from the same auction house back in May:

A different hinge from the past. Well, May.

This new hinge is a cousin, distant cousin, but a cousin:

My newest different hinge.

And for a closeup of the fixed side:

Not something for sale at most stores.

And it lives on this rather handsome chest:

A conventional chest with a unique hinge.

I amazes me how many different ways there are to accomplish the same end.

You can go back and look at my last different hinge post by clicking HERE.