Excerpted from The Chronicle, Vol. 32, No. 4, December 1979 By Donald L. Tuttle and Joyce Baudin, Illustrations by Linda Scharf-Jones Chairmaking in small shops in eastern Pennsylvania reached its peak shortly after the middle of the nineteenth century and before the close of the century had given away completely to the competition of mass …
The following is excerpted from The Chronicle Vol. VI, No. 2, April 1953 By W. Parker Crutchfield “The man who built that must have been a bachelor ” announced a lady tourist who was seeing the eighteenth century cabinet· maker’s tool chest on exhibition at the Ayscough Shop in Colonial Williamsburg. She looked admiringly and …
Excerpted from The Chronicle, Vol. 23, No. 1, March 1960 by Edward Durrell Perhaps you could not call a baby walker a tool but it certainly isn’t a toy and I am sure in the pioneer days, when baby sitters were many miles away and mother needed both hands, both feet, and a good head …
From The Chronicle Volume XII, No. 1, March 1959 by Eloise Stedman Meyers When you broil that juicy steak over a charcoal fire in your backyard, have you ever thought what an important part this black vegetable fuel played in the history of this great country? Without charcoal we might even now be paying taxes …
From The Chronicle Vol. 2, No. 5, June 1938By Joseph E. Sandford [Mr. H.’ L. Mencken, to whom I submitted the following article for his comments, has written me as follows: “So far as I am concerned you are certainly quite free to print the enclosed. I have read it with great interest and amusement.”] …
Excerpted from The Chronicle, Vol. XVIII, No. 3, Sept. 1965by Alexander Farnham For our early ancestors, the stone and muller, fig. I, and mortar and pestle were about the only means athand to grind paint for preserving their houses and barns and decorating their homes. John Smith, C. M., in his book, “The Art of …
Excerpted from The Chronicle Vol. VIII, No. 3, July 1955 By Edwin C. Whittemore Printing, in the sense that we think of it today, began back around 14 5; when John Guttenberg used metal type for the first time in the printing of the “Mazarine Bible.” Flourishing under patronage, it bloomed as an art form, …
Excerpted from The Chronicle, Vol. II, No. 3, January 1938; no author credited Prior to about 1820, pipes for conveying water, both in this country and in England, while sometimes of stone, were usually of wood. The Bank of the Manhattan Company, chartered as The Manhattan Company, in 1799, primarily for the purpose of constructing …
From the The Chronicle Volume XIV, No. 4, December 1961 by Charlotte Woodhull Judging from accounts of the home life of our early ancestors, they were not particularly fastidious about laundering. Their garments, furthermore, were not usually made of washable materials. Considering the scarcity of implements for the job and the crudeness of those available, …
Reprinted from The Chronicle Volume VI, No. 1, January, 1953 A report prepared by M. W. Thomas, Jr. and W. D. Geiger in connection with the operations of the chandlers craft in Colonial Williamsburg. General History The use of the berries of the Bayberry bush, ( Myrtle bush, Candleberry bush, Virginia Myrtle) seems to be …