While we are on the subject of axes in The Ozarks, lets examine the kinds of such hewing axes through time. In the first photo are three broadaxes arranged in chronological order from top to bottom. The top axe is an American Pattern specimen dating from the late 18th Century through the early 19th Century and js the type of axe that was brought here with the first Scots-Irish pioneers after The Louisiana Purchase. The three large touchmarks on the axe tell me it was probably made in Pennsylvania and brought here by an early settler. Such an axe would have been used here in log cabin construction. The second broadaxe dates from 1843 to 1869 and was made by H.H. Date in Canada. This type of axe would have been acquired through trading posts here in the Ozark hills. At that time they would have been used to hew logs for cabins. The bottom axe is early 20th Century in origin and is the axe I use for hewing jobs. This specimen was sold by The Witte Hardware Company in St. Louis and is a common type in the Current River Watershed because it was the favorite for the many tie hackers who hewed railroad ties. There were cheaper broadaxes but this was the one the tie hackers preferred because of the quality of the steel in the blade. This one is marked with a deep Witte Hardware IXL logo. Several times when I was a youngster, my pa would hew long sills for barns with such an axe. Neighbors and kin liked to have continuous sills under barn walls, much longer than would fit on the carriage of a shotgun sawmill, so my pa would hew timbers as long as 42 feet for folks needing them. I loaned the Witte axe to the crew who used it and other broadaxes for hewing the replacement sills for Alley Mill.
Posted on: Mon, 21 Jul 2014 22:34:02 +0000
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