Tool Owners Ghosts

Tool owners ghosts.

Recently I purchased a box of about 50 rusty toolmakers callipers and dividers in an estate auction, while brown with fine rust they were made from good quality steel, I thought that with a little care they could be brought back from the neglect they had suffered.

So i set to cleaning and polishing them. One by one they were washed the rust rubbed back and polished. The steel was indeed of good quality and they started to gleam.

After I had done a few, names and initials started to appear. Apart the manufacturers names there were the names and initials of previous owners, sometimes scratched on sometimes carefully engraved or punched. While not the first time I have thought on names found on tools this box with so many names moved me to think on what was being revealed on the bench. The tools themselves were of various ages some late 20th century a few maybe early twentieth century one probably 1850's there sitting on the bench were tools that represented well over 100 years of Engineering progress, and there for all to see were the names still not forgotten as long as the tools are passed on to the next generation as these tools had been.

These are not the only named tools in my workshop there are many others. now that I have been awakened to thinking on this there every time I see a name on the tools I use daily I wonder what its owner was like.

Then there are also special tools highly prized, like the first Micrometer I bought as a lad paying a good part of my wage for it. The tools I used in my teens a few of which I still have. Or the Dial indicator given to me by my late uncle in law, a fine Engineer, I use it daily. Each tool has a character of its own some work better than others for a specific job. They become old friends always ready to help solve a specific problem.

I will not keep most of the 50 tools in the box, now they have been brought back to life I can pass them on to good homes. their spirits have to continue.

Regards
John

What a nice tribute to past owners John, I too have handled old tools that have been separated from their original owners but not waxed as elegantly as you about them.

Brian

I find this with all my old gear, wondering where and why it was bought etc. As I read old copies of the Model Engineer from the 40's and 50's it is odd to think that most if not all of the contributors will be long gone. I wonder what happened to their models and tools. As far as good quality tools go, we are merely custodians. I get a lot of pleasure from taking a rusty long-forgotten tool and restoring it to usable condition and doing actual work with it.

All the apprentice pieces I made, many useful tools, are stamped with my 4 digit BAe "Clock Number" I wonder what people will make of that in the future.

I too have a few tools like that [dont we all ?] I often wonder about the owners,what were they like,what did they do?

When I go on my merry way,I will leave behind many,many items that someone will look at and say,"What the hell was this for?" Apart from this,a lot of my stuff will be good to use for many years to come,I only hope that it will go to someone who will make more use of it than I did. I would like to think that it would go to some young lad who really cared about what he was doing. Are there any of those still around?,I find it hard to find any of them,the I,Pod seems to rule these days. Any comments?

I have a toolbox from my father, a lifelong pattern maker, it contains tools stamped with the names of previous owners. I think all were given during his working life by retiring work colleagues. Firm now gone, swallowed up by larger vulture.

It is nice to have passed on tools. When I retired from a large communications company one of my colleagues donated his toolbox from his previous employment as a toolmaker.

All sorts of 'goodies' including his apprentice pieces.

I'm not sure I would have done that. A generous gesture.

Of course he initialed everything but needless to say his aren't mine.....

As I've said before I restore Lister stationary engines, my Father in Law worked as an Agricultural engineer for a big Company called Cornish and Lloyds, there buildings are now re erected at the Anglian museum of life near Ipswich, any way 40 years ago I married his Daughter and he retired from work the same year, as a surprise present from him to me he handed me all of his tools which had all touched Stationary Engines and pumps that he worked on and all carry the mark EK, I still use them and occasionally show my wife what I use them for. If anybody in the Newcastle/Sunderland every come across tools marked 008 they are mine as twenty years ago some low life nicked my car with my work tools in and mine all carried the number 008 as that was my apprentice no and I bought them with bonus money.

Martin P

Martin,

The guy who niked your car most likely just dumped or flogged the tools for half nothing,since he would be too thick to use them anyway. Same thing happened to me years ago,whole van cleaned out,over two grands worth,gone in a flash ! Sold on for drink money,I suppose.

In a more enlightened age,these morons would have been burned at the stake. Pity it ever went out of fashion.

When I started work tools were supplied but I took in my own teaspoon and spark engraved it. I still have it at home but don't take it to work for fear of losing this memento. I have some tools marked not with a name but "IV" for Intelsat V the first project I worked on.

Sometimes I am sure the Ghosts of some original owners come back and retrieve their favourite tools, although we normally seem to blame the workshop elves!

Despite my putting home made tools into boxes (often lately containing ice cream) and hoping that the sticky labels stay on (some hope!) future generations will, no doubt, ask "What's this? What is it for?"

With so many traditional skills being lost as we pass awayI, this is going to happen more frequently.

Let's hope that very little of our output is not scrapped out of hand.

Howard

Nice OP.

“He was like a Dad to me and when I use them I feel that he is with me.”

Good man Carl, Grandad will love to hear you say that.

I often think about previous owners of some of my old tools, quite a few whose names / initials are engraved / spark eroded / etched on some of my kit and wonder at what they had been working on when using their tools. For instance, both a set square and a scribing block I own are inscribed with identification that places their origin in tool rooms associated with the development of Concorde.

Even obscure etched annotations such as “Bin1”, “Inspections” “First Off” or "Stores" have meaning for me having been there and done it!

Of course, it becomes much more personal (and poignant in some cases) when the tool is marked with the owners / makers name.

I am very pleased to be the curator of a little bit of our industrial heritage - it probably means little to folk these days but it means a lot to me!

Rik

I engraved all my tools. Didn't stop some **$$£** stealing them though. £3000 they cost to replace, luckily they were insured. Downside was I couldn't get some imperial stuff anymore.

I have a 6" engineers square stamped RAF 1916 and it came from the Royal Aircraft Factory in Farnborugh.

It's funny how thing have changed, I was expected to supply my own tools as an electrician working in a car factory Testgear was supplied and stuff like conduit benders but all small tools were mine. Now you are forbidden to use your own tools and a fully kitted roller cabinet is supplied, any type of measurement tool is calibrated and regularly checked.

Mike