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The Part-Time Woodworker
no shop, no time, but enjoying the hand tool experience none the less
Updated: 5 hours 31 min ago
This is for Anonymous...
In my post from yesterday, Anonymous asked me if I was talking about a specific tool dealer, or giving "just a representative composite of tool sellers".
The short answer…
Anonymous, I was talking about tool dealers in general with no one specific seller in mind.
The long answer…
When I started collecting tools I had a rough idea what to expect as this wasn't my first barbecue. I had collected things in the past so I had a pretty good idea how it was going to go.
At first, you fill up your shelves with all the little odds and sods that, in the vintage tool market, cost less than $100.00. That gets your feet wet and you learn how the market works. It also allows you to sort out the vendors, figuring out who you want to deal with, and more importantly, who you don’t.
Eventually, there aren't anymore of the cheaper bits that you want, so you start to move up the food chain, and there is lots of tools in the $100 to $400 range to keep you busy. Eventually, though, your shelf gets full of all you want from that category, so you move up to the next category, the $400 to $800 group. From my experience, there is a pretty limited selection in this category, especially when your sticking close to Stanley stuff, so it doesn’t take long before you are ready to move into the big category, the over $800 category.
My collection, other than the odd bits and pieces, has now put me in this last category. Here, you have to be ready to pay the big bucks for what you want, like a No.1 or a No.9. This is when your obsession with tools starts to cost you serious money, and when I get to the point of spending serious money, I want to be comfortable with not only what I am buying, but whom I am buying it from.
I blame my old man for this attitude. When I was a kid, my parents owned a corner variety store and I worked in it. There was a royal a-hole who walked into the store every single afternoon and bought a quart of milk and two packages of cigarettes. He did this seven days a week. I didn’t like this guy at all, and one afternoon after he left, my old man came up to me and told me that he never wanted to see me treat a customer that way ever again. I’m not sure what I did, but whatever it was, the old man didn’t like it. I thought my dad was kidding and answered that he knew the customer was a dickhead. His reply to me was, “Ya, he is a dickhead, but he is a dickhead that is helping to pay for the meal you are going to eat tonight. Treat him with appreciation or find yourself another job!”
When I lay out $1100 to $1400 for a Stanley No.9, I want to feel that parting with my hard-earned cash is appreciated, otherwise I’m not even going to bother looking for one.
To give another example of what I am talking about, all the grocery store chains here have automatic checkouts and I use them religiously. The reason for this is because the machine and the live tellers talk to me exactly the same and if I’m going to get automated responses, then it bloody well better be coming from a machine and not a live person whose wages I am helping to pay.
Actually, if I had my druthers, I wouldn’t shop at a place that held this attitude at all, but here we are talking about an entirely different situation. You see, I need to eat. I can’t survive without subsidence, so I live through the negative experience of shopping in a grocery store by doing my own scanning and bagging simply because it is the lesser of the two evils. When it comes to buying that No.9, however, I do have a choice. It is the furthest thing from a necessity of life that I can imagine. In other words, I can’t live without food, but I can live long and hard without a Stanley No.9.
There is one tool dealer that I mainly dealt with and if I go back to buying tools again, he will be who I will buy from again. My reason for saying this is simply because he never screwed me once on any of the tools I bought from him over the years, and I bought a lot of tools from him. That said, he was also one of the biggest offenders for not giving any information with his listings, but the few times I have visited his site lately, I see he has improved on that considerably. The thing is, I zeroed in on him and worked at trying to build a customer/dealer relationship with him, putting my money where my mouth is by spending between $3k and $5k over the years to do it. When I hit the top spending category, though, I had a niggling feeling that I was the only one working for that relationship. I appreciated him, but I’m not so sure he appreciated me. It is a free world out there and he has a right to run his business anyway he deems fit, but I am talking discretionary spending here, with the emphasis on discretionary. I may be the dickhead my old man was talking about, but I too was that dickhead who was helping to pay for that guy’s supper that night, and I didn’t feel like he appreciated it.
If I do get back into collecting and start looking for those few seriously priced pieces I would like to have, I won’t be looking to get kissed for my purchase, but I also won’t be willing to deal with a machine and do my own scanning and bagging either.
Peace,
Mitchell
Categories: Hand Tools
Sucking the Joy out of Everything...
I must be getting old and grumpy in my old age, but woodworking and vintage tool sites no longer hold the charm they once did. In fact, I’m getting downright turned off by them.
I have known why I’m not that thrilled with them for quite some time, but I’ve been rather embarrassed to mention it as I’m positive I’m the only one that feels this way. I’m putting it out here now to test the theory.
To those that write woodworking columns…
Guys, I’m in this hobby for the fun of it and your anal retentive attitudes towards it has quickly taken the fun out of it. If I wanted to produce perfect dovetails, or any other joint or cut for that matter, I’d be going to school to learn the craft, rather than looking for down and dirty tips so I can get to the job at hand – which is having fun.
To those that sell vintage woodworking tools…
Guys, I’m in this hobby for the kicks and your take-it-or-leave-it attitudes towards my purchases have caused me to stop buying. I’m not looking for a one-of-a-kind, $5k ultimate brace. I’m looking for usable tools and, as with any purchase of any antique, I’d like a little history about my purchase. I’m not a tool historian and I absolutely have no desire to be one.
I could go on about this, but I'll put it out there to see what you guys think, if anything other than I'm nuts.
Peace,
Mitchell
Categories: Hand Tools
Great Show - Lousy Economy...
The Tools of the Trade Show and Sale was held today in Pickering, a small community just north-east of Toronto. Many of the usual dealers to this twice-yearly event were on hand, with a couple that I hadn't seen before. I arrived fifteen minutes after the doors opened and was shocked at the number of people walking the booths looking for tools. It was probably one of the best turnouts that I have seen. There were so many people swarming the booths that I gave up trying to take photos of the wares.
Standing at the loo just before leaving, two dealers came in and bellied-up on either side of me and proceeded to discuss their poor sales for the morning. Just to remind them that I was standing between them in a rather vulnerable position, I commented that there didn't seem to be many in the crowd that were carrying packages. One of them replied that the reason for this, it seems, is that "they have everything already". As it turns out, the hall was chock-full of people, but the vast majority of them weren't buyers.
I can't say that I can blame the dealers for this situation. I checked out the pricing of every booth and each one had prices that reflected the economic reality of the day. In most cases, it was depressing to see what they were selling things for. An example of this was a Stanley No.10½ that I saw in Doug Orr's booth. It was right in that sweet spot for me; almost too good to be a user, but not quite good enough to be a collector. He was asking $110 for it, far below what I feel is a fair price, which would be $185. Not to prove the loo-dealer right, but I already have a really good 10½, so there was no reason for me to bite.
Another dealer had a Casey round plane, probably one of the widest I had ever seen. While records state that hollows and rounds run up to 1½-inches wide, I swear this one was at least 2-inches. It was so wide, at first I thought it was a gutter plane, but it was toteless. As I had flashlight in hand, checking out every makers stamp on every wood moulding plane in the place looking for H. E. Mitchell planes and saws, I saw that the maker's stamp on this one was, "Casey & Company", the precursor to "Casey, Kitchel & Company", "Casey, Clark & Company" and, of course, "Auburn Tool Company". In my opinion, this was a relatively rare moulding plane for which the dealer wanted a piddly 40-bucks.
So things were very close to a "perfect storm" category. The dealers had the right stuff. The prices they were asking as a starting point were fair. The buyers were out in full-force. The only thing missing to make the sale a success was bank managers - they just weren't onside this time.
The fall show will be held on November 17th this year. If you want more information about it, you can find it at http://www.ontarioantiquetools.com.
Hopefully those bank managers will come around by November and it will turn into a winner for the dealers and buyers alike. It wouldn't hurt if one or two of the dealers found a few H. E. Mitchell tools for me, either.
Peace,
Mitchell
Categories: Hand Tools
I Knew There Was One Out There...
In a past post I asked if anyone had a vintage tool made by H. E. Mitchell. I mentioned that I would be either willing to buy it, but if it wasn't for sale, I would be grateful for a photograph of it. Someone was kind enough to follow through with that request.
I woke up a few weeks ago to find the following two images in my InBox...
The sender didn't include his or her name, nor was there any text at all accompanying the images. Just the photographs.
After a quick look I knew this saw was made by ol' Henry, so I quickly replied with a "thank you" and asked if it was for sale. I didn't receive a response, which was disappointing, but at least I now have an image of an elusive saw made by H. E. Mitchell.
This is huge for me - really huge.
In all the years I have been searching for H. E. Mitchell tools, I have never seen a saw of his, even though he stated in all his advertising that he was just a "saw maker". I saw an outdated listing for one that sold in an auction back in 2005, but it didn't include a picture of it. All this time I had no evidence that the man ever made one. Then these showed up. Wow.
The maker's stamp on the saw dates it from 1865 or 1866. I say this for two reasons. First, it has the "Eastbourne" address and ol' Henry only worked out of Eastbourne from 1865 until he went bankrupt in February of 1868. He then moved to North Road in Brighton and started again. The other reason for dating it from these two years is that the stamp only says, "Mitchell". Henry realized that his stamp could be confused with other tool makers named Mitchell so in the later half of 1866, he added the "H. E." to it.
Whoever sent me these photos, I thank you very much. You really made my day - week - month. I may not have the actual saw, but at least I have photos of one to show that the man actually made them.
Thank you.
Peace,
Mitchell
I woke up a few weeks ago to find the following two images in my InBox...
The sender didn't include his or her name, nor was there any text at all accompanying the images. Just the photographs.
After a quick look I knew this saw was made by ol' Henry, so I quickly replied with a "thank you" and asked if it was for sale. I didn't receive a response, which was disappointing, but at least I now have an image of an elusive saw made by H. E. Mitchell.
This is huge for me - really huge.
In all the years I have been searching for H. E. Mitchell tools, I have never seen a saw of his, even though he stated in all his advertising that he was just a "saw maker". I saw an outdated listing for one that sold in an auction back in 2005, but it didn't include a picture of it. All this time I had no evidence that the man ever made one. Then these showed up. Wow.
The maker's stamp on the saw dates it from 1865 or 1866. I say this for two reasons. First, it has the "Eastbourne" address and ol' Henry only worked out of Eastbourne from 1865 until he went bankrupt in February of 1868. He then moved to North Road in Brighton and started again. The other reason for dating it from these two years is that the stamp only says, "Mitchell". Henry realized that his stamp could be confused with other tool makers named Mitchell so in the later half of 1866, he added the "H. E." to it.
Whoever sent me these photos, I thank you very much. You really made my day - week - month. I may not have the actual saw, but at least I have photos of one to show that the man actually made them.
Thank you.
Peace,
Mitchell
Categories: Hand Tools
