Popular Woodworking 2000-01 № 112, страница 27
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of well-heeled, well-educated society, I suspect that Stickley and his magazine created more furniture customers than furniture makers. But the furniture designs themselves, with their simple joinery and low-key decoration, have proved over the years to be ideal projects for home-shop woodworkers. As the 20th century progressed, traditional tool manufacturers and suppliers began to notice the growth of do-it-yourself home repair and improvement and hobby woodworking. From its 1843 origins as a manufacturer of bolts and hinges, The Stanley Rule and Level Company had grown by the 1920s to dominate the North American market for carpenters' tools. As early as 1905, the company produced an inexpensive line of tools aimed in part at the expanding household market. In 1923, Stanley launched the "Four Square" line with what tool historian John Walter calls a "classic of early modern American advertising... a nationwide promotion aimed at the public and hardware dealers, utilizing film strips, street car ads, whimsical storefront display figures and special packaging." (Walter's book, "Antique & Modern manufacturing made drill presses — once a high-price item — a tool every woodworker could afford. Photo courtesy of Delta Collectible Stanley Tools," covers Stanley's vast output in fascinating detail.) Beginning in 1921 and continuing through the 1960s, Stanley sold tools sets for home workshops. Carl Stoutenberg, a longtime Stanley design engineer and unofficial company archivist, described some of them to me. At the top of the line was the Number 850 Tool Cabinet, produced from 1922 to 1942. The 1925 version, which sold for $95, included a double-doored walnut cabinet and 50 hand tools. At the other end of the line was the Number 907 Tool Assortment, selling for just $5 in 1929. Included were seven tools in a cardboard box, which doubled as a store display, with plans and hinges for a wooden tool box to build yourself. Stanley quickly realized that homeowners and hobbyists, unlike tradesmen, might not know how to use the tools or what to build with them. How to Work with Tools and Wood, first published in 1927, was among the first of a steady stream of Stanley instructional materials that included booklets, wall charts and film strips on specific tools. It joined a growing body of books and magazines purporting to reveal the secrets of woodworking and other domestic trades to amateurs. How to Work with Tools and Wood was in continuous publication (with revisions) into the 1960s, selling about 10,000 copies a year by promising to "open the way to make useful projects, to repair furniture, and to do odd jobs around your home." Despite Stanley's promise to "take all the mystery out of using tools," hand tools and the time and skill required to use them were still an obstacle to many would-be home shop woodworkers. As I think back to my father's 1950s basement workshop, it seems clear what, more than anything, fueled this century's explosion of amateur woodworking — compact, high performance, low-cost machines. Occupying no more than 300 square feet, my father's shop contained a 10" table saw, 14" bandsaw, 6" jointer, a drill press, a shaper, a combination 6" belt sander 40 XXVII Popular Woodworking January 2000 |
