Skip to main content

Bob wrote a great article about tools in the Model T forum on Facebook, and mentioned he has inherited tools from his dad, who was given them by his grand dad... that is so cool!


(and here is what he wrote:)
What Dad Taught Me About Lending and Borrowing Tools

The loan of a tool is a sacred, holy thing, especially when it involves that kind of rare, extremely hard-to-replace, vintage implement that does the job oh-so-much-better than anything manufactured in the last half-century (and you know the type I'm talking about; they're always rust-colored without actually being rusty). Man, that's an expression of trust!

I was brought up by a second-generation, Italian-American Dad in a paper paint hat, shoulder-strap undershirt and leather tool-belt. Grandpa wore the same uniform. Both made their livings as disciplined craftsmen and both treated their tools like a priest treats golden altar utensils. When he gave me my first bicycle, Dad, in ceremonial solemnity, withdrew from his tool cabinet, a satchel-grip of ancient hand tools—and with laser beam eye-contact, gave me permission to use them as I needed, explicitly conditional on their diligent care and return. One made certain to be careful with the tools Grandpa had handed down to Dad. Respect.

Well, Dad has been gone for a number of years and his tools are mine, now (and they sure as hell don't go in the plastic bucket with my Harbor Freight junk). Some of them have the Ford imprint, for Giuseppe and Conrad were Ford men; and when I reach for one of those wrenches to use on my Model T—

which is identical to the car in the sepia-tone photo of Dad and Uncle Lou, for they two went partners on a 1915 Touring just before the war—I get a feeling of heart-tugging nostalgia. I gaze at that tool in my hand and from the archives of my memory, a video is selected much the same way an old Wurlitzer juke box would extract a single record from a horizontal stack of 45’s. As it plays, there’s Dad looking not quite forty years old, and he smiles patiently as he tells Bobby, not yet Bob, "Before you screw on the nut, turn it backwards till you feel the click; THEN spin it on."

https://www.facebook.com/groups/Fordmodelt/permalink/10158638924515548/

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Larrabee Deyo trucking company, whatever happened to them? Anyone ever heard of them?

“The fame of Binghamton is being carried to the far corners of the Earth by its products, and especially by the motor trucks which are made here.” In 1919, this quote appeared in The Binghamton Press with an announcement that the Larrabee-Deyo Motor Truck Co. had received large orders from New Zealand and Sweden. Business was booming for this local manufacturer, and with their trucks, “Made in Binghamton” was being heard around the world. The new company grew out of two successful Binghamton manufacturing concerns. Sturtevant-Larrabee had a reputation for manufacturing high-quality horse-drawn wagons, carriages and sleighs since the 1870s. The Deyo-Macey Engine Co. built gasoline engines in a plant on Washington Street. Now, with H.C. Larrabee as president and R.H. Deyo vice president and general manager, the new company was advertised as having “the advantage of the services of men experienced in both the construction of gas engines and in carriage building.” In 1923, nationally known

wow, how about this, the original pay at the pump!

WOW, a spare tire method of quickly getting back to driving I've never heard of before