Building an 18th Century Barn using 18th Century tools

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When you watch a video like this you realize just how important an axe was in those days.

 

[catspa]

As well as funny hats and breeches.

So I see tools from the colonial, revolutionary and westward expansion periods there, if I’m not mistaken.

Curved hafts on some of the axes/hatchets require the user to choke up on them when driving pegs with the poll.

Good use of log dogs, but I didn’t see any slick chisels or pedal powered stone grinder.

Good video anyway, thanks for posting it.

Parker

ETA: Y’know, I do see a slick being used as a peeling spud at 3:56. Good work.

 

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but I didn’t see any slick chisels or pedal powered stone grinder.

At the very beginning there is a drone fly in of the building site. On screen left there is a pole tent setup. The resolution is not very good but you can just see the outline of a wooden shave horse, and there's something round behind the person at the shave horse that would just about be the size treadle grinder.

 

[John A. Larsen]

Very interesting, thanks for posting that video on the barn building! My parents moved from NJ back to my Mother's home state of Ohio, and got a place in Englewood, OH. Visiting we drove to a restaurant they liked in Versailles, OH, past beautifully kept farms, almost all of them with a "Wood Lot" still on the property. One funny story was they had a cousin and the cousins Mother visiting from Norway and as they drove along the Mother from Norway started to yell about stopping the car! They thought she was having a problem, but she just wanted to take a photo of the flat farm land as no one in Norway would believe her without photos. As a kid we visited my Mother's aunt, this would have been in the 1950's and the aunt was in her late 90's, and she talked about the wagon trains going by heading West. She said when Ohio was first settled a squirrel could get up in a tree and cross Ohio and never have to get on the ground, as it was all forested. The vast majority of those trees were cut down with axes to make those farms, what a great amount of work it took. My Mother's Father, who I never met, came to the USA from Germany after the Civil War and was a Master Carpenter. There is a Nature preserve near Englewood, and one night some years back an arsonist burnt down several barns, one on the Nature preserve. There were several barns in the area my Grandfather had built and they found one that had the exact footprint of the burnt barn, took it down, piece by piece and rebuilt it on the foundation of the Nature preserve barn that had been burnt down. Large, at least 10" by 10" beams, and you could see they were hand hewn with axes and pegged together with wooden dowels, it was quite impressive to see how it was made.
Another story about the Uncle of a man who was in my Company. He was known for buying antique furniture and paying more than some people thought they were worth. This was in NY state. He was also known for buying wood from old barns, or buildings being torn down. On Antiques Road Show I remember seeing stories about furniture that were reproductions, and the Experts could tell because of the tool marks, indicating modern tools had been used. This Uncle also had period tools, so his "Reproductions" had the correct tool marks and the wood was old. Might not have fooled the true Experts, but would fool most of them. So he would make several copies of the original piece of furniture, sell those as real ones, later also sell the Real piece of furniture, so made his living doing that. John

 

[John A. Larsen]

Reference the use of axes during this time period. I would think that just about any village blacksmith could make a useable axe, but few would have the skill or material to make an efficient saw. Thereby most of the work, felling forests and making homes/barns would be done by axes, along with draw knives, something again most village blacksmiths could make. What do others on this forum think? John

 

[transmaster]

In the UK a big thing is experimental Archeology. This is starting to take off here in the States. You have artisans, iron founders, Bronze tool makers, carpenters, cooks, Barber/Surgeons, weavers, coopers, cobblers, all who historically re-create how things were done in past centuries. In the UK they have over 3000 years of technology from the past to bring back, in the US it is only a few centuries. When you see what UK has for its history you really get envious. One thing that has been recreated in the states in stone tools. In Europe stone tools were gone 2000 years ago but in the states in was used by the indigenous people just a couple of hundred years ago and knowledge of their fabrication was maintained into the 19th century. In the 1890's ethnographers ( the original name for an anthropologist) sat down with the remaining Indian stone tool makers and learned the art. These artisanes are so good recreating stone tools that they have to put a makers mark on them so their tools can not be sold as originals. I have watch YouTube from the UK were using stone, and bronze tools built neolithic, and bronze age Round Houses.

 

[transmaster]

Reference the use of axes during this time period. I would think that just about any village blacksmith could make a useable axe, but few would have the skill or material to make an efficient saw. Thereby most of the work, felling forests and making homes/barns would be done by axes, along with draw knives, something again most village blacksmiths could make. What do others on this forum think? John

Strap saws, or tree felling crosscut saws were not locally made in the frontier. Most wood saws and the blades for bow saws came out of iron works in Philadelphia. from Keystone, Disston Saws in the 1840's. They were expensive and there were generally just a few available to homesteaders and were passed around as needed.

 

[catspa]

At the very beginning there is a drone fly in of the building site. On screen left there is a pole tent setup. The resolution is not very good but you can just see the outline of a wooden shave horse, and there's something round behind the person at the shave horse that would just about be the size treadle grinder.

I’m watching it on my phone, no wonder I didn’t see it.

I’ve got a thing for stone wheels. I don’t claim that they’re the most efficient way to sharpen, but once you have one it doesn’t need any additional infrastructure to keep it running.

I’m thinking of converting one of my motored ones to a springpole-like set up.

Parker

 

[Old Axeman]

The pedal grindstone shown in the US Forest Service video "AN AX TO GRIND" was a original to the Nine Mile Ranger station, Montana, remaining from the CCC training camp era. It was out of round, as they all get, but still worked fine. We did not want to dress it back to round and remove some of its history. I hope it is still at Nine Mile and still useable.