Out-of-the-Ordinary (a Reel, a Wheel, and a Loom)

On August 10, 2024 By BrendaIn Antique reel, antique spinning wheel, antique tape loomLeave a comment

Although these three pieces are now in new homes, I want to include them in this blog because their unusual features should be documented for future reference.

THE REEL

The first, a reel I named “Annabelle,” came as a package deal with two wheels from Canada. I have no idea if the reel is from Canada, too. Given that the reel’s shiny glory is a metal bell, and metal was incorporated into many Quebec wheels, it is possible.

On the other hand, most (but not all) Quebec reels, called “dévidoirs,” unlike this one, are horizontal, barrel style reels, so it may not be from Quebec at all. Sadly, its origin remains a mystery. Its vertical design and counting mechanism is generally known as a clock or click reel.

Except in this case, the rotations are marked not by a click but by a ringing sound, because, upon 40 rotations, the wooden clapper hits a bell.

It is a louder and more pleasing way to count rotations, but I suspect having metal work done for a reel was not worth the extra expense for most people.

A shame, because it is lovely and practical feature. And, very rare.

THE WHEEL

The second out-of-the-ordinary piece, a great wheel I named “Felice,” was the wheel that hooked me on great wheel spinning.

I bought her in southern Maine. The seller had, in turn, bought the wheel in New Hampshire from a woman who said it was Shaker. While the beauty, simplicity, and craftsmanship would fit well with the Shaker approach to design and construction, I have not seen any evidence that Shakers make wheels with features similar to this one.

The legs are chamfered rather than turned.*

The table also has transitional, chamfered bottom edges.

The wheel post has a perfectly fitted thick horn collar, a feature found on some early Shaker wheels.

The drive wheel rim has beautifully made joins.

My favorite feature, though, is the hub, which is a perfect pear shape. I have only run across one other wheel like this one. It was found in Peachum, Vermont.

In my mind, these wheels are more beautiful than the typical Shaker great wheels. Mine also was a joy to spin on.

THE LOOM

Finally, another piece that may or not be Shaker is a very unusual two-person tape loom. I wrote an article about it for the Spinning Wheel Sleuth Handloom Supplement Issue #24, but this post will supplement the article with more photographs for those curious about this wonderful little loom.

It came up for auction near me last year and I fell head over heels for it at the auction preview. Designed for two people to weave simultaneously, with a petite, pleasing design, what put it over the top was that it was in fantastic condition, with string heddles and reeds made of actual reed.

It is only 39 ½ inches tall and 13 ¾ inches wide, but big enough for two people to weave tapes at the same time. It has no space-hogging treadles, which allows for a compact footprint. Each side has two shafts, connected by an overhead pulley.

Each shaft also has a cord running down to a lower pulley and then to an upper pulley,

ending with a wooden knob which the weaver pulls to raise each shaft.

Each side has its own warp and cloth beams, with cords for attaching the warp. Interestingly, the cords have water stains around them even though the rest of the loom shows no water damage at all.

One possible explanation is that the cords were moistened to make them swell and have a tighter grip on the beam when weaving. I found that without wetting the cords or otherwise securing them, they tended to slip around the beams when under tension.

The warp beams are held in place with wooden pegs and the cloth beams have metal ratchets and pawls.

The reeds in the overhead beaters have some newer cord on them, indicating that they have been repaired or replaced.

They also appear to be taller than the original reeds, based on the darkening of the wood on the beater sides.

*The sides of the beater have lighter patches where the cross bar holding the reed used to rest*

The loom came with two extra pieces that were a total mystery to me.

It turns out that the piece with the prongs is a stretcher used to tighten webbing when making chair seats. The other piece, which looks very old, is something I believe was used to hold the reed in place for sleying. But, that is just a guess.

This treasure of a loom was well-cared for and apparently well-used. There are even numbers scratched on the loom top—24, 22, 24—presumably to keep track of something.

The auction house said that the loom came from the Baxter estate in Benton, Maine. Wildly curious about who would design and use a two-person tape loom, I started researching it right away and found that several have turned up. One other, just like it, but in much worse condition, was at the Fort Ticonderoga Museum and pictured in Bonnie Weidert’s book “Tape Looms Past & Present.” (photo 2-22, p. 24). A little research revealed several others—but designed for a single user—at Hancock Shaker Village Collection (1986.024.0001); Enfield Shaker Museum (2018.51); Marshfield School of Weaving Textile Equipment Collection (1959.1.12); and Jeanne Asplundh’s collection, photographed in “Spinning Wheels and Accessories” (fig. 14-67, p. 182).

Finding that two of the looms were at Shaker museums, I dove into research to see if there was an established Shaker connection (more on that in the SWS article). Ultimately, I could not find evidence to either prove or disprove that these were used by the Shakers.

The looms would be perfect for weaving the large amounts of the tape used by Shakers for chairs but the only documented Shaker chair-tape looms that I could find are a different style. If not Shaker, would they have been used in some other institutional setting such as a rehabilitation facility or a school? Having hand-operated looms would make sense for those unable to use their legs or for short-legged children.

Whatever its history, I am just thankful that it was preserved with such care so that it can be appreciated by us and future generations.

Page, Brenda, “A Two-Person Tape Loom,” The Spinning Wheel Sleuth Handloom Supplement, Issue #24, April 2024

Weidart, Bonnie R., Tape Looms Past and Present, 3^rd edit., Bonnie Weidert, Henrietta, NY, 2012

Pennington, David & Taylor, Michael, Spinning Wheels and Accessories, Schiffer Publishing Ltd., Atglen, PA, 2004

*I refer to pieces with multi-angled faces as “chamfered.” While I understand that others use the term to refer to 45 degree angled edges, until I learn of a more fitting term for the multi-angled faces that we find on legs, spokes, and supports of wheels and reels, I will continue to use the term chamfered.

Betty M.

On February 5, 2023June 27, 2024 By BrendaIn antique spinning wheel, great wheel, walking wheel4 Comments

This wheel has the feel of a city-made wheel—sophisticated and finely finished. Not surprising, since it was made just outside of Philadelphia. I spotted it on Facebook Marketplace in Connecticut, where it sat for weeks and weeks, with the price lowered from $50 to $25 as the seller appeared desperate to just get rid of it. Although it did not have a spinning head, I had to rescue it—fine Philadelphia great wheels do not come along very often.

It is a solid heavy wheel, made by Windsor chairmakers, Benjamin Love, and his step-son, Isaac Whitelock.

Love, a Quaker, was born in 1747 in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. He married Eleanor McDowell in 1768 and they had ten children over the next two decades, several of whom died young. By 1780, when he was 33, Love was living in Frankford, five miles north of Philadelphia, where he was admitted to the Frankford Preparative Meeting (Society of Friends or Quakers). Their Frankford meetinghouse was built in 1775-76 and now is the oldest surviving Quaker meetinghouse in Philadelphia.

Records show that Love was a Windsor chair maker from 1781 to 1820.

He also took care of and did repair work on the Frankford Meetinghouse, according to the Meeting’s minutes. His wife, Eleanor, died in 1793, and, two years later, in 1795, Love married Elizabeth (Smith) Meharry Whitelock (1752-1829).

Love’s new wife, Elizabeth, had been recently widowed and left with several children, including a son, Isaac Whitelock (1778-1848). In addition to their sizable combined clan of children, the couple took in the daughter of widower, John Davis, who later married Elizabeth’s daughter, Mary Whitelock. In his autobiography, Davis describes Benjamin Love as a “respectable” Quaker Friend. Davis also noted that Isaac Whitelock, Love’s stepson, was in business with Love. (p. 33)

Isaac was about 17 years old when Love married his mother, so a prime age to be trained into Love’s chair and wheel making business. In 1807, when he was 29, Isaac married Ann Woodcock Marot (1785-1865) a Quaker from Delaware. Her uncle Davenport Marot (also spelled “Mariott” and “Marott”) appears also to have been a chair and spinning wheel maker in Philadelphia (from 1771-1829).

Love & Whitelock’s shop was large enough to have an upper loft or attic, called a “cockloft,” where an apprentice may have slept. (Evans, p. 9) By 1818, a few years before Love’s death, it appears that they also expanded into lumber sales, because Love is described as a “Lumber Merchant” in one document. At the time of Love’s death in 1821, Whitelock was described as a “Spinning Wheel & Chairmaker.” At some point later in his life, Isaac Whitelock gave up chairmaking altogether and focused on dealing in lumber and hardware, running a lumberyard in Frankford from at least 1837 on. (Evans p. 84, fn. 147)

The wheel itself is sturdy and well-made, with a straightforward design of few embellishments or fancy turnings. Its an attractive wheel and I am surprised that there do not seem to be many that have survived. I know of one in the Mercer Museum in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, and have seen another one for sale in St. Louis, but compared with some other makers, Love & Whitelock wheels seem to be hard to find.

This one is in excellent condition. The wide drive wheel rim is undamaged, without any cracks or chips. The two-piece rim is neatly joined.

The spokes gently widen as they near the rim, decorated with burn marks midway and near the rim end.

They are firmly attached to the rim with screws.

The hub has intact metal bearings on both sides.

The axle is threaded on the wheel side

and held in place on the other side with folded over metal pieces.

The wheel sits on the axle at an angle, giving more room for the spinner’s arm to turn the wheel.

The table is made of heavy-grained wood,

with grooves down each side, and tall rolag holders.

The barrel tension has a screw for tightening on the non-spinner side.

The wheel came without a spinning head.

I found this direct drive head for it because it is similar to the head on the Love & Whitelock that was for sale years ago in St. Louis. The legs are simple and heavy.

All of the posts extend well below the table and are pegged in place.

The table’s underside included a surprise. The names “Betty Megargee” and “Franklin Lewis” were carefully carved in large squared-off letters, along with the date “1934.”

After some on-line research, I found a Betty Naomi Megargee (1911-1995) who married Benjamin Franklin Graves Lewis (1908-1967) in Philadelphia in 1939. I wonder if this wheel may have been an engagement present. If so, it would have been given in the depths of the depression, which might help explain a five-year engagement.

In the 1930 census, when Betty was 18, she was listed as a Stenographer at a bank and Franklin Lewis as an apprentice electrician. From what I can tell, this Betty and Franklin did not have any children and always lived in Pennsylvania. So, if this wheel belonged to them, I have no clues as to how it ended up in Connecticut. I wish I could confirm that Betty Naomi was the owner of this wheel and that we knew more of her and Franklin’s story.

References:

U.S. Gen Web Archives Philadelphia Wills for a copy of Benjamin Love’s will, witnessed by Isaac Whitelock “Spinning Wheel & Chairmaker.”

Ancestry.com for genealogical research on the Love, Whitelock, Marot, Megargee, and Lewis families, and minutes from the Frankford Preparative Meeting 1772-1794.

Maryland Historical Society, Volume 30, Issue 1, Baltimore, 1935, Autobiography of John Davis.

Evans, Nancy Goyne, Windsor-Chairmaking in America, From Craft Shop to Consumer, University Press of New England, London, NH 2006.

The Pamphlet of the Historical Society of Frankford, Pennsylvania, 1912.

Woody Hill and Rose

On August 25, 2022August 25, 2022 By BrendaIn antique spinning wheel, great wheel2 Comments

A few years ago, I wrote about two distinctive flax wheels, Julia and Jerusha. They are part of an instantly recognizable family, with vase-turned legs, painted rims (usually), star/sunburst/flower stamps, secondary upright supports, and distinctive chip carving. Speculation was that these wheels were made in Connecticut or Rhode Island. Some are unmarked, some marked with the initials JC, IC, or SC.

I am besotted with these wheels and always on the lookout for them. So, my eyes lit up when one came up for auction last September in Rhode Island. The auction was a benefit for the Babcock-Smith House Museum in Westerly. (https://www.babcocksmithhouse.org/). I thought perhaps the museum would have some background on the wheel, but put off contacting them because I was busy and did not have high hopes of getting a response.

I finally shot off an email about a week before the auction. What I thought would be a fruitless email turned out to yield a rich harvest. We still do not know who made these wheels, but what a pleasure the hunt has been.

The museum referred me to one of their trustees, Ellen Madison, who, despite knowing little about spinning wheels and having a packed schedule preparing for the auction, unhesitatingly gave her time and attention to my questions. Ellen found not just one, but two, wheels from the museum’s attic coming up for auction.

*Second auction wheel from attic, for which someone had made a new distaff post*

The one in the auction photo had a “JC” stamp and the other “IC.”

When I explained to Ellen that I “rescued” old wheels, she mentioned her family’s great wheel for which she wanted to find a new home. When she sent me photos of her wheel, I was intrigued.

It was four-legged and tensionless–unusual features for New England great wheels. My interest in the wheel skyrocketed, however, when Ellen wrote that her brother had found initials on the wheel–not just any initials, but a “JC” stamp.

Could this great wheel be by the same maker as the flax wheels? At this point, I decided that I needed to go down to the auction myself and bring home Ellen’s great wheel to add to my collection.

Knowing I would be in Rhode Island, I checked out wheels for sale and did a double take when I saw a great wheel in North Stonington, Connecticut—a town bordering Westerly–that looked identical to Ellen’s. It also had a “JC” maker’s mark. Things were getting exciting. On the day of the auction, a friend, Sue, joined me and Ellen kindly showed us the wheels in the Babcock-Smith house.

*Babcock-Smith House great wheel, unmarked*

There were two wheels on display–an unmarked great wheel looking just like the two “JC” wheels, and an unmarked flax wheel with a family resemblance to the ones from the attic, but with simpler maidens and spokes.

We then perused the auction lots and, to top off the house’s wheel treasure trove, I found a reel with a “JC”—a huge surprise since reels are not often marked.

I bid on the two flax wheels for my friend, Tina, who, like me, is fascinated with these wheels. Sadly, I was outbid, but did win the reel. So, I set out for home the next morning with Ellen’s great wheel, now named “Woody Hill,” and the reel, which I named “Rose.” In the meantime, Sue picked up the North Stonington wheel for Tina. Some months later, Ellen contacted me about a gorgeous wheel that she had spotted at a friend’s house, marked “SC.”

Her friend’s father was a third-generation scrap metal and junk dealer in Westerly, who had an eye for antiques. He had picked up the wheel years earlier, likely in Westerly. When Ellen’s friend decided to sell the wheel, it happily found a home with Tina.

This cluster in Westerly and North Stonington–three great wheels, four flax wheels, and one winder—could not be coincidental, could it? Eight within a ten-mile radius. It seemed as if we were homing in on the area where the wheels had been made. Surely we could track down the maker or family of makers. Ha.

*Woody Hill’s beautiful hub* *and bearing*

I, and others, spent the next months pursuing every imaginable avenue. There were plenty of likely candidates, namewise, around Westerly and North Stonington—Clarkes, Chapmans, Congdons, Churches, Culvers, Chesebroughs, and more. Some had ties with the Babcock family, some were weavers, some carpenters, but I could not find any definitive links to spinning wheels. I read and read about early Rhode Island, searching for clues.

I dove into different aspects of Rhode Island history, learning about its furniture, weavers, coastal trade, plantation system and slavery, town histories, and early industrialization of spinning and weaving. With Ellen’s help, I tracked down people who might provide leads. I contacted museums, historical societies, authors, professors. All fascinating, but I have not been able to find our wheel makers.

I thought the wheels themselves might provide clues. The flax wheels do not look like other New England wheels. They are more festive, colorful, and elaborate. In fact, the decorative stamps and secondary upright supports running to the legs are features associated with Pennsylvania wheel makers. Similarly, the great wheels do not resemble other New England wheels. With the exception of a small cluster of wheels from the Narragansett, Rhode Island area, four-legged wheels are rare here.

They are usually found in Canada, and very occasionally in the south. Even more unusual is the lack of a tension system, something uncommon even in the south.

*No mechanism for adjusting the drive band’s tension*

But we know that the great wheels have been in the same families for generations and likely were made in the area.

*The spindle support is wedged in place under the table*

Were the wheel makers involved in Rhode Island’s vibrant coastal trade and influenced by wheels in other areas? And, when were the wheels made?

There has been some thought that the flax wheels may have been produced during the nation’s centennial in the 1870s. The decorative nature of the wheels supports that theory. But most of the flax wheels show heavy use, which likely would not have been the case for centennial celebration wheels, especially in Rhode Island, where industrialized spinning overtook home spinning fairly early in the 1800s.

Also, the great wheels in particular, look much older than the 1870s. My thinking, based on the wear, the wheels’ histories, and the area history, is that the wheels likely date from the late 18^th century to early 19^th century—but it’s just speculation at this point.

We are fortunate to have some history for Ellen’s wheel, Woody Hill. Ellen lives on land that had an 1857 house belonging to Abby Burdick, one of Ellen’s ancestors. In 1819, Gideon Burdick, Abby’s grandfather, was granted a pension for his service in the War of the Revolution, and listed “2 old spinning wheels” as part of his household goods when applying for the pension.

Could those wheels have been passed on to Abby (who lived until 1906) and could one be Woody Hill? In any case, by the early 1900s, Woody Hill was hanging from the rafters of a corncrib on the same land, then belonging to Ellen’s grandfather.

*The corncrib in the background–Woody Hill’s home for decades*

In Ellen’s memory, and the memory of her aunt, born in 1908, the wheel was never taken down from its perch in the rafters. It even survived the legendary 1938 Hurricane, when the corncrib was blown aloft–picked up off its granite posts and landing several feet away. In the 1970s, Ellen rescued the wheel from its corncrib perch when she built her home. Her brother made a bat head for it out of an oar

and her father did an expert job at replacing one of the spokes.

*The replacement spoke–beautifully made*

It graced her antique-filled house for decades and now I am honored that her family has entrusted me with this wonderful wheel. If only I could figure out who made it.

So many questions remain unanswered. We do not even know if the great wheels were made by the same “JC” as the flax wheels.

While it appears that the JC mark is the same, at first look, I would not have guessed that the great wheels were made by the same hand as the flax wheels. In contrast with the flax wheels’ elegant turned legs and spokes, the great wheel legs are simply chamfered.

There are no decorative stamps and the spokes are plain.

The wheel and spindle supports are turned but are huge and heavy, seemingly built for strength rather than beauty.

Their wood is fairly coarse grained,

possibly chestnut, with beautiful oak on the drive wheel rim.

In looking closer at Woody Hill and Rose, however, similarities with the flax wheels start to emerge. Rose, the reel, seems almost like a transition piece.

Her table and legs are much like those on the great wheels—almost rustic in feel.

But the upper part was crafted with great precision,

attention to detail,

and an eye for beauty.

There are dark decorative bands,

similar to those on the flax wheels, and traces of dark paint (much like the paint on Jerusha) applied selectively,

*The lower half of the arm bars were painted with a dark paint*

*while the upper side was left unpainted*

which must have made a lovely contrast with the wood.

The reel has a delicate, finely-made handle for turning the arms.

As with the great wheels, the uprights extend way below the table, with large wedges holding them in place.

All have grooves running down the sides of the tables.

The reel and flax wheels have slightly chamfered underside edges, while Woody Hill’s are pronounced.

All have some form of chip carving on the ends, with variations.

Whoever the maker was, Woody Hill was made to last.

Aside from some wood-boring beetle damage, its massive posts and sturdy legs survived decades in the corn crib quite nicely.

A few spokes were loose,

with extra nails on the rim and hub showing previous tightening repairs.

All it took to get it spinning was stuffing some wool around the clattery spokes and finding a bat head that fit.

In no time, Woody Hill was spinning again, with a smooth, easy cadence. Although the posts are massive, the wheel itself is not that large, with a 43 inch rim diameter and relatively small table, 5 3/4 inches wide and 41 1/2 inches long. Its size, weight, and four-legged stance give it a sturdiness that provides a good anchor for spinning.

This is no tippy, band-throwing, temperamental wheel, but a solid legacy of endurance and hard work from those who made and used it.

I am taking a break on researching these wheels for now. Perhaps the next step is a visit to the Rhode Island Historical Society. I would like to read the Westerly store accounts of Rowse Babcock, which are housed there. In the 1790s, he was a commission agent for textile outwork, exchanging store goods for spinning and weaving. Perhaps he also sold spinning wheels.

Thank you so much to Ellen Madison for her interest, enthusiasm, generosity, photographs, and help on this journey.

Mag Reiver and a Finger

On July 22, 2020June 8, 2022 By BrendaIn antique spinning wheel, great wheel, Maine spinning wheel2 Comments

Around the time that I picked up Polly, the Thomson bobbin winder in the previous post, I also bought a Hannibal Thomson great wheel.

It’s funny how related wheels often seem to come out of the woodwork in waves. None in sight for years and suddenly three pop up within weeks of each other.

This wheel was for sale in Waterboro, Maine—about sixty miles south of Turner, where Thomson made his wheels. Just as with Thomson’s flax wheels and bobbin winders, the Shaker influence is obvious in the overall design.

*The spokes are flush with the hub, marked in place with three scribe lines*

It could almost be mistaken for a Shaker wheel with its pewter collar, clean lines, and beautiful wood.

But it has Thomson’s imprint, too, in the collar’s scallops,

his signature spokes,

*The spokes don’t run down the center of the rim, but are spaced from side-to-side, presumably to angle the rim to help keep the drive band on*

the fine decorative scribe lines,

and the table-top maker’s mark.

The nail pattern on the drive wheel join is the same with this wheel and Thomson’s bobbin winder.

Over time, this wheel has acquired its own particular oddities—missing bearings, surface scratches, and a strange leg. It’s fairly common for old great wheels to lose their hub bearings. This one was bearing-naked front and back, leaving a gaping hole around the axle and no support for the poor drive wheel.

The original front bearing appears to have been six-sided where it met the wooden hub, which is not unusual for this time period. New bearings can be made from various materials, including metal and plastic, but I’m always in a hurry to see how a new wheel spins, so usually just fold some sturdy leather in there and give it a go. The leather works great, which invariably means that I leave it in and new bearings plummet to the bottom of the wheel-repair priority list.

Without looking carefully, it’s not obvious at first that there are fine scratches over many parts of the wheel. The close-up photos really make them apparent.

I’m guessing that someone had a vigorous sandpaper workout on this wheel to clean it up at some point and that’s what left the scratches. If anyone has other theories, I’d love to hear them. I kind of like the scratches—they are subtle to the naked eye and are part of the wheel’s history—remnants of some person’s time and attention on the wheel. I view them as fine wrinkles on a beautiful face.

The strange leg is more of a mystery. First, a matter of terminology. I believe it’s fairly standard to refer to the legs on the right side of wheel (facing the wheel from the spinner’s side) as the back legs. I just don’t get that. Since great wheels look like magnificent herd animals ready to go bounding down hill wheel first, the legs on the wheel end should be the front legs, right?

So, since what seem to be front legs to me are back legs to most, I will refer to great wheel legs as the “uphill side” and “downhill side” legs. With the downhill side legs on this wheel, the spinner side leg is about an inch longer than the far-side leg and it splays at a slightly different angle. In some wheels, such leg differentials are purposeful, to make more room for the spinner to walk back and forth. I believe that is the case here, since Thomson’s bobbin winder has a similar leg, but the difference in this case may be exaggerated due because the leg does not seem to be set properly in its hole.

There is an unstained portion of the leg showing below the hole, which indicates that it once was more deeply set. On the other hand, the leg hits the floor at the proper angle, the table isn’t askew, the leg is clearly a Thomson leg, and the leg is tightly wedged into its hole. In any case, it gives the wheel a distinctive look.

The wheel has scribe marks for setting the angles of the spindle support and a peg to keep it from pulling out. Some Shaker wheels have similar marks and pegs.

In comparing this wheel to my other great wheels, the table is quite narrow—only a little over five inches wide—

and the drive wheel is high and wide of the table, especially in comparison to the Connecticut wheels (previous posts “Mercy” and “Big Bear”), where the drive wheels ride directly over the table, with little clearance.

Despite the differences, the height of the hubs is fairly consistent with all the wheels, with only about an inch differential.

This wheel came with an accelerated head made by Fred B. Pierce & Co. Accelerated heads were first manufactured in the early 1800s to increase spinning efficiency and output.

They are often referred to as “Miner’s heads,” because Amos Miner had an early patent on the design. Miner and others manufactured these wildly popular heads through the 19^th century, with the Pierce family in New Hampshire dominating the market from about 1850 to 1900.

As an example of their output, Benjamin, the father, oversaw the manufacture of more than 60,000 heads in 1865 and many heads that we find today have a Benjamin Pierce label. Benjamin’s son Fred took over the business and the heads with his label were manufactured between 1882 and 1890.

That means the head on this wheel is relatively new compared to most. That may be why the corn husk bearings are still in good shape.

As a bonus, this wheel came with a wheel finger, also sometimes called a wool finger, wheel boy, or wood peg.

These were used to turn great wheels and bobbin winders, placing them on the spokes and giving greater reach and a break to hands, I guess, which must have gotten pretty stiff, achy, and arthritic over time.

Some great wheels will show wear on the spokes from use of a wheel finger, but this one doesn’t. The finger itself, however, has a good deal of wear, creating a lovely curve where it goes from the hand-holding hefty part to the narrow neck that hugs the spoke.

This finger spent a lot of time in someone’s hand.

For more information on Hannibal Thomson, see the previous post, “Polly,” and the references there.

My resources for information on Pierce accelerating heads:

Ramer, Alvin, “Accelerating Wheel Heads: A Comparison,” The Spinning Wheel Sleuth 54 (October 2006).

Big Bear

On April 19, 2020June 8, 2022 By BrendaIn antique spinning wheel, Connecticut spinning wheel2 Comments

Silas Barnum (1775-1825) was part of a group of Connecticut wheel makers working in the late-1700s to mid-1800s. They spanned generations and had numerous connections–some clear, others more elusive. I like to refer to the early generation–Barnum, Samuel Sanford, John Sturdevant, Jr., Solomon Plant, and J. Platt–as the “double flyer boys,” because they are best known today for their distinctive upright double flyer wheels.

These men and their wheels share many similarities. With the exception of Plant, who lived a few towns away on the coast, they lived in neighboring towns in southwest Connecticut.

Their families were early settlers in the area, with a web of interconnected family relationships. For example, Silas Barnum’s older sister, Sarah, was married to wheel maker John Sturdevant, Jr.

This chart is the best I’ve been able to do in tracking the family connections.

We don’t know whether some of these men apprenticed or worked for others or if the similarity in their wheels simply reflected what was in demand at the time.

It’s doubtful that the similarities were just market driven, however, since Silas Cheney—who was working in the same time period just a couple of towns away—made wheels in an entirely different style (see previous post—”Sweet Cicely and Chancey”). And, with all of the family ties, there must have been shared work and design tendencies to leave such a legacy of style.

I found my Silas Barnum great wheel, “Big Bear,” on Facebook.

The seller, a spinner in New Haven, Connecticut, had recently bought it at an estate sale of her artist neighbor—a very old man at the time of his death.

She believed that he had owned the wheel for many decades. It’s a big, solid wheel, with a two-posted barrel tension system and lovely direct drive head. It’s hard to tell if the head is original to the wheel, since they were so often replaced or interchanged.

The style is right—many of Barnum’s wheel predated accelerated heads and these nicely turned spindle supports were typical of the time and region.

The wood is lighter than the wheel itself and, interestingly, has the dark bands so prevalent on the flax wheels of this group of wheel makers.

The wheel has a large crack in the table that was nicely repaired with pegs.

The drive wheel rim is beautiful ray-flecked oak, with a generous 3 inch width, and a 41 ½ inch diameter.

It’s a good spinner, with a wheel that invites the body to lean in and work with its heft, weighted so that the wheel comes to rest at a certain point.

*The spokes are set in a deep groove (similar to Platt’s great wheel)*

There is a remarkable similarity to J. Platt’s great wheel (“Mercy” in previous post), although the Platt drive wheel has a larger 44” diameter and the rim is a smaller 2 5/8 inch width.

I did a lot of research into possible connections between Barnum and Platt—digging into family trees and probate records. As with most wheel makers, probate inventories reveal a lot (and give a fascinating glimpse into 19^th century life).

Barnum’s shows clearly that he was a wheel maker, referring to “timber in shop for wheels,” and “1 wheel part finished large.” In my research, I found several J. Platt connections with Silas Barnum. But none of their probate records showed a wheel maker. The first was through Barnum’s wife, Martha Platt. I had high hopes that her brother James might be J. Platt the wheel maker, but probate records showed that he was a city dweller and no craftsman.

A Josiah Platt was another good possibility. He married Sary Sanford, sister to wheel maker Samuel Sanford, but there is no evidence at all that he was a wheel maker or had anything to do with furniture making and the timing isn’t quite right. There is a Joseph Platt that could possibly be our man—he had some connections with Barnum and appears to have done some furniture making—but the evidence is inconclusive.

So, I’m still researching the Barnum/Platt connection. Whatever the maker’s relationship, the wheels look like siblings—closely related, but with their own unique characteristics. More information can be found on Silas Barnum and his double flyer wheels in the Spinning Wheel Sleuth, Issues 31 and 32.