What is it? Set 259

[Rob H.]

We need help from a Civil War expert for the first piece in this week's set:

[Alexander Thesoso]

1467 Slide tray. Feeds slides into a slide projector.

1468 Ice delivery indicator. Put it in a window so the Ice man knows how much ice to schlep up to the upper floor for your icebox.

1470 Screw Jack (I'm not trying to be nasty to someone named Jack.) General purpose lifting jack from the era before hydraulics.

[DiggerOp]

1465 Could it be a device for indicating wind direction by compass point? Perhaps used in gunnery?

[humunculus]

1465: I gotta believe that this is a wind vane for directing artillery, or else for launching hot air balloons that they used for observation. 1466: baling pliers. The baling wire is grasped by the pliers, which are twisted around, tightening the wire. Then the pliers are opened and the wire is cut. 1467: Linear slide carousel for a slide projector. 1468: Ice thickness indicator for roads that cross frozen ponds in the winter. I'd hate to be the guy who has to retrieve the sign in the spring.... 1469: The case and bone latch makes this Chinese, for sure. (The chopsticks help, too). I think its a pharmacology toolkit, for making medicines from bark, etc. 1470:

[Ed Edelenbos]

Well,

1466 (a guess) wire bending pliers

1467 is easy enough... a slide tray for a slide projector.

1468 ???

1469 (a guess), some sort of Japanese tea set.

1470 a Jack stand. 1 1/4" is probably good for a ton or two.

[Barbara Bailey]

"Rob H." wrote in news: [e-mail]:

to help the gunner allow for windage.

1468: it's an ice order card. You set it in your window with the number representing the amount of ice you wanted uppermost, and the iceman delivered accordingly. As it's photographed, he would deliver 20 pounds. 1469: Japanese or Korean eating kit for travel. The small skewer is for sticking small tidbits (like the toothpick in an hors d'ouever) The two- pronged thing is a fork. is Korean

[Dwayne]

1465 navigation tool for boats. I quess the navigator would get the piece lined up with magnetic north then set the arrow in the direction they needed to go. I would guess that the unit has a gimble? to keep it upright with the motion of the boat. 1466 looks like a tool to tighten wire or something. Maybe for banding stuff together. 1467 Floppy disc holder? 1468 no idea but I am sure I have seen this somewhere, My guess would be that it tells the user what the acceptable temperature is for a substance. 1469 pass???

[Dwayne]

oops missed 1470 but its a jack.

[Leo Lichtman]

"Barbara Bailey" wrote: (clip) 1469: Japanese or Korean eating kit for travel. The small skewer is for

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ The small spoon on the opposite end is suspiciously like those used for sniffing dope.

[Steve W.]

1465 - Looks like a portable wind vane. May have been used for launching balloons or for weather monitoring. 1466 - Wire former

1467 - Slide tray. Used for film slides, the side notches are for use when they are stacked.

1468 - Ice order card. You hung it in the window to tell the ice monger how much you needed.

1469 - Japanese utensil kit. Used by a traveler when eating at the common tables in the Inn.

1470 - House jack. Used to jack up your house or barn to enable you to work on the stone foundations.

[DoN. Nichols]

1465) The device is obviously designed to show the wind direction. You set it down with the North-pointing needle pointing to the 'N' on the compass rose, and then the arrow will point into the wind.

It is obvious that there are provisions for adjusting the balance of the arrow -- to minimize lateral forces on the bearing, and to prevent a slight tilt of the base from affecting the reading.

I find myself wondering what might be revealed if the two thumb nuts on either side of the compass were removed. Is there something stored in the base?

For initial thoughts (ignoring the two pistols which might or might not not have been intended to be part of the setup) it might have been for determining wind direction prior to taking a long range target shot with a rifle. It would be more beneficial if it included a way of measuring the strength of the wind as well as the direction. Hmm ... part of a sniper's equipment -- used with a good quality rifle?

The pistol shown is a single-shot one, cap-and-ball style, and it appears to be missing the hammer, which should have been on the square shaft end visible in the side plate.

It is also missing the ramrod, which would normally have been stored under the barrel. However, the fitting at the end of the barrel looks more like something to allow a support to be attached for target shooting.

Pity that a friend has such a slow net connection. She spent several years in civil war re-enacting, and studied things very deeply. Well ... next time she is up visiting. :-)

If the two pistols are identical (within the manufacturing capabilities of the period, and given the changes which come with age), then I might consider them to be a set of dueling pistols, and the wind direction gauge to be used to select an orientation which does not favor either duelist.

Is there a way to attach the cover to the base, so the handle on the top will carry both?

1466) Looks like a tool for bending wire as part of jewelry. 1467) Very obvious -- a slide tray for a pre-carousel 35mm slide projector, -- and obviously a Revere slide projector. 1468) From the days when ice was delivered (and milk, and other needs of the time). You hung it on the outside insulated ice box with the selected number up to tell the delivery man how much you needed this delivery, 20 pounds being a single large cube of ice, and the others being longer pieces than plain cubes -- or multiples of the cubes. 1469) This looks like a cook's set for oriental cooking with a wok. The two small containers would contain ingredients prepared to go into the wok at the proper moment. The chopsticks for serving, or perhaps controlling certain thing. The long-handled spoon for keeping the parts of the meal moving so nothing is burned and stuck to the wok. I'm not sure about the needle or the strange fork, however. 1470) A house jack. In some (warmer) parts of the country houses are mounted on wooden posts clear of the ground to allow airflow under the house. Occasionally, one of these will rot, and need replacing, so a pair of these jacks go on ether side while the post is dug out and replaced. The rotting is more likely to happen along the outer row of posts, where the access is greater, but it is possible to climb under the house and exit the other side -- based on the house which I lived in in as a kid in South Texas

We had one of these stored under the sink in one of the bathrooms.

Now to see what others have said.

Enjoy, DoN.

[DoN. Nichols]

[ ... ]

Actually -- the notches (rack gear along the bottom of the ridge on the near side) engages a gear in the slide projector and was used to advance the tray precisely one slide position at a time.

[ ... ]

Stone -- and wood posts in warmer climates.

Enjoy, DoN.

[Steve W.]

Yep. they are also numbered so that you can read the slide numbers when stacked.

Warm climate? What's that? We have 12 degrees here.....

[Andrew Erickson]

indicator, possibly so you can figure out how to tweak in your aim? Probably not for use with pistols of the era, which I'd assume would lack the accuracy to make this a worthwhile exercise, but maybe for field artillery and such like.

1466 - Yet another fence tightener, perhaps? Tightening fences seems to be somewhere around trapping mice as fertile grounds for inventors. 1467 - Box to hold...ummm...maybe tape cartridges with commercials or announcements for a radio station? Maybe IC wafers during processing, in the days of yore when such wafers measured 3" or 4" (a few generations of technology ago)? 1468 - The center text rather gives this away, in my opinion. In the days of iceboxes (with actual ice), you'd hang this outside your house so that when the iceman cometh he knows how big a block to deliver. Calibrated in pounds, presumably, and color coded so as to be read at a distance. 1469 - Possibly an oriental mess kit, to carry your favored utensils to your friends house when dining there. The bottommost implements look like chopsticks. 1470 - Screw jack, used for jacking up axles or houses or whatever needed to be lifted. Operated by inserting a bar in one of the holes on the top part and screwing or unscrewing it from the base. Note the convenient carry handle, although I suspect it's still rather on the heavy side.

Now to read the other guesses...

[humunculus]

From

"Circleville Ice Company .--In 1862 J. H. Bennett established an ice business, of which his son, H. J. Bennett, took charge in 1870. The latter conducted it until three years ago, when the plant was purchased by a company and incorporated with a capital stock of $10,000. The first officers were : John L. Krimmel, president ; George Bennett, vice-president; Irvin F. Snyder, secretary; and W. C. Morris, treasurer. The present officers are: George Bennett, president; Milton Morris, vice-president; Irvin F. Snyder, secretary, and W. C. Morris, treasurer. The board of directors includes the four officers just named and Emanuel S. Neuding. In 1895 Mr. Bennett built new ice houses on the west side of the river, which were destroyed by fire the following year. He then purchased a tract of land on the Island road, where the present company's plant is now located. The buildings were again destroyed by fire in the summer of 1906. The company is now erecting large and better structures on the same site."

What I find really interesting is that they were bottling and selling mineral water in 1882! I thought that was a recent fad!

--riverman

[Rob H.]

Below is a link to a photo of one of the thumb screws when removed:

've been trying to figure out what they're for, best thing I've come up with so far is they are for mounting the device on something, maybe some leather straps with holes go over the screws, they you could tie the other ends around whatever it was sitting on. Makes sense if it was used with one of those spy balloons that someone mentioned. Although my first thought was that the device was used with artillery, as several others have posted. Anyone else have a theory on these thumb screws?

I think to remove the compass, you would have to take out all of the small screws, which would be interesting but seems like this piece is too valuable to risk marring it with a screwdriver.

The hammers on both guns were totally rusted away when found and were just powder in the newspaper.

One was a flintlock, and the other a percussion cap, which is shown on the site.

Yes, the case has two pivoting tabs that fit into slots under the brass plate. I'll post a couple more photos on the answer page that show this.

This is a great piece, a friend who is a collector and goes to a lot of auctions estimated that if it could be documented to the Civil War, it would probably be valued at $20,000-$30,000. But unless it could be found in an old photo or described in detail in some papers, I don't know how you could prove its provenance.

Rob

[DoN. Nichols]

as though the threads which go into the brass frame are intentionally deformed, to cause the screw to jam in place. But it may be that the brass frame is not threaded, but instead simply drilled to clear, so with both of them loosened the brass frame (with the compass) could be lifted clear of the base.

No more on them as this one appears.

Understood.

O.K. That suggests that the metal of the sideplate and works was a different alloy than the hammers. Or perhaps the contact of the newspaper with the hammers wicked moisture to the hammers, but not the rest.

O.K. Then simply a private collection.

O.K. Thanks.

Indeed. And I somehow find it offensive that something utilitarian (at least at the time) rather than designed as a work of art would have so high a value. Something like that should be still used, not set on a shelf behind glass.

Enjoy, DoN.

[DoN. Nichols]

Actually -- those numbers on the top angle of the rack were either indicated by a pointer in the projector, or viewed through a window in the projector -- so you could slide the carrier along until a specific slide was in position to be loaded and projected. Stacked had nothing to do with it, since you don't care what number is where when there are multiple carriers stacked up -- only when there is a carrier in the projector, or when you have a carrier in your hand and wish to pull out a specific slide. There is typically a clear plastic dust cover which snaps over the carrier when it is not in the projector, and there is a label on which you can write a very short description of each slide by number to help you find the one you want.

In later carousel trays there are similar index numbers around the skirt for quickly rotating the carousel to position a specific slide for projection.

Where is "here"? And which temperature scale? C or F? I'm currently in Northern Virginia, and it is sort of hovering a bit over the freezing point.

But the place which I was describing was deep South Texas. Close enough to the border so you start to experience the exponential spice rise as you approach the border (from either side). :-)

There, the ability of a breeze to flow under the floor is beneficial most of the year. Up in North Dakota, it is something which you certainly don't want to happen. :-)

Enjoy, DoN.

[Steve W.]

REAL Upstate NY (as opposed to the folks who think that 10 miles north of NYC is upstate) Fahrenheit scale, Oh and it has dropped just a bit, it's about 6 outside at this time.

[Leo Lichtman]

"E Z Peaces" wrote: (clip) Before a battle, the general has one of these instruments at his HQ.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ The procedure you have outlined would work, but I can't believe anyone would build an instrument for sighting directions, and not have the measuring scale next to the pointer.