The tale from the German Hickory Hone

[fatwade]

Introduction:
Doing my researches digging deep in the archives of the WWW and Newspapers i actually found another interesting and funny story to tell. Its about the phenomenal "Old Germany Hickory Hone".....did you ever heard of if ? I dont think so, actually i found no evidence a post like this was ever created....

here is the story to be told:
Ok lets start with the background, it starts in the years 1884 until 1885. The articles were printed with the nearly the same content at different Newspapers. Reno Gazette Journal, St. Louis Post Dispatch, The Argos Reflector, The Morning Astorian, Pittsburg Post Gazette, The Times.....probably there were more....

There was an article named "Some Razor Hones". A interview like told story to a "Barber" about different types of hones for honing razors. They ask questions which hones can be used. Nearly the end of the story they come to a point where the Barber is asked: "What do you consider the Best Hone ?

and now guys, what comes now ? any guesses ?

The Barber replies: "The Hone i like the best and the most wonderful in material and construction is that of petrified German Hickory. Here is one", and he exhibited a small, smooth, dark stone, hard as adamant, mounted in a wooden block. "This german hickory", he continues "is in itself a wood almost as hard as a stone. It is cut from large cultivated forests, then carefully seasoned, sawed into small blocks about this size and imbedded in a peculiar wet clay soil, where it is allowed to remain about 8 years. When removed the wooden blocks are discovered to have turned into stone. Their manufacture is confined solely to certain parts of Germany and Prussia.The experiment of petrification in this particular line has been tried in many lands, but has never been proven successful outside the countries named. That is, I guess because of the peculiar soil. Westphalia, in Prussia, is where they are principally made and there is one mill there which constantly employs 100 hand in cutting, mounting and dressing these hones.".......the story keeps going some sentences further, i skipped them....
So what ? 100 People producing all day these hones, the best hones in the world, wood petrification within 8 years :shrug: opcorn:
So any body heard of those wonder hones ? Now comes an additional part....

The story continues in 1906, Harrisburg Daily Independent:

"Women Razor Sharpener", "She hones 10.000 a year and makes money with it"

The story kind of continues with a women who is honing razors to do her living with it. She uses "A Hickory Hone and an imported German Razor Hone".

So far so interesting, now i did search for some findings of those hones, to proof their existence :gl:

So what do you all think about the story ? Anybody owns a Germany Hickory Hone ?
If so please share pictures here :rofl2:

 

[FarmerTan]

Thanks for the History lesson! Cool, never heard anything like it.

 

[Bushdoctor]

Yes, I've read something about this wood hone in the past, always want to have one but never get it.
Here a picture of one that I think could be a Hickory Hone.

 

[SliceOfLife]

That's a piece of wood. It's not petrified.

Belgian Coticules are referred to as "Hickory Hones" in some old texts. I don't recall offhand the name, but one has a 2-3 page "hone" section that says basically; "You've got three choices. Oilstones aka Belgian Hones aka Hickory hones; Waterstones aka German Hones (Eschers); or synthetics of which the Swaty is the preferred one." This is mostly repeated in a few other texts, but one in particular pulls no punches that Belgian hones are called "Hickory" hones.

There's also a brand of labeled coticules called the hickory hone. My guess is some very misinformed barber with a wood-grained coticule and some German pride gave this speech.


https://archive.org/details/barbersmanual00mole

 

[fatwade]

Yes, I've read something about this wood hone in the past, always want to have one but never get it.
Here a picture of one that I think could be a Hickory Hone.
View attachment 701014

Hey Fabrizio, thanks for that Picture!! Actually its the first true "trace" to that stone! If it really existed that way.....yeah its a bit of a fable thing...

I have to admit, i ordered two slabs of petrificated wood [emoji23][emoji23] just because i wanne try it out...

 

[fatwade]

That's a piece of wood. It's not petrified.

Belgian Coticules are referred to as "Hickory Hones" in some old texts. There's also a brand of labeled coticules called the hickory hone. My guess is some very misinformed barber with a wood-grained coticule and some German pride gave this speech.

Yeah Ian, its really a type of fable or misused term. Besides the Coticules which exist (ive seem a picture on SRP) we have the New Hickory Hone from A.M. Hone....

 

[SliceOfLife]

Someone else here played with petrified wood as a hone awhile back (I think because of the Panama petrified wood claims). If memory serves it worked about the same as agate and similar very fine, questionably abrasive hones.

 

[fatwade]

I remembered that i have that A.M Hone "New Hickory", probably a marketing campaign from A.M. Hone :beer1:

Actually they look like Petrified Wood...sure they are not!! But they used a comparable Term...

 

[fatwade]

Someone else here played with petrified wood as a hone awhile back (I think because of the Panama petrified wood claims). If memory serves it worked about the same as agate and similar very fine, questionably abrasive hones.

Who was it ? Would be Interesting to know...

yeah some Panama Hones do show that swirling where it was discussed if they used petrified wood....

 

[SliceOfLife]

Sorry, I remember a member buying one and posting pictures awhile back, but can't recall the name or the thread. Hopefully someone else does. It May be somewhere in the "making your own hone" thread?

Panama hones directions also refer to one side as the "petrified wood side".

That hone (the New Hickory) looks pretty much like the standard fine side of 00's and a lot of other frictionite hones. Not saying it's not petrified wood, but I don't see any reason to suspect it is; as if it is, more than likely all the rest are too... and the two sided ones have pretty strong evidence they aren't in the seams. That said; as coti's were referred to by some as "Hickory", that is likely a reference that you see in LOTS of vintage synthetics that it's the "new coticule" or "as good as" or "Even better than" a Belgian. That claim is all around in these hones and I'm sure several were named in such a way as to refer to Belgian hones... since they were pretty much the "top dog" of barber's hones for centuries.

 

[SliceOfLife]

Here's my "Old Hickory", showing that "Hickory" was eventually trademarked; likely why it fell out of use to refer to coticules in general. It'd be like if we still referred to all cars as "Fords".

 

[David]

Wow. Nice stone. I've never seen that label before.

 

[fatwade]

Wow. Nice stone. I've never seen that label before.

Yeah agreed!! Ian thanks for sharing it here in context to the mystery "Hickory Hone"

 

[David]

At first glance it resembles a rose rock label.

 

[SliceOfLife]

No problem. I posted it in the show off thread, but it was many years ago... likely in the first few pages. It's a nice stone. And the original buyer even got it on sale! $0.78. It was just a ripoff at its full price, I guess.

Montgomery Ward & Co item # 3278 Stock # 2-F-H6

Now where'd I put my MW&Co Catalog?

 

[fatwade]

Ok lets update with another puzzle/detail of history written down......


"Own's Barber Hone, Made of Hickory, 200 years Old"
Seven Valleys, Aug. 27 - H.L. Shive, local merchant, has an old barber's hone, used to sharpen razors, which has been in the Shive family for over 200 years. It is made of Hickory Wood, is about eight inches long and the black part of the hone is presumed to be a bark of the wood. In olden times, people would petrify wood by placing it in a hollow place in the ground, to make stones for putting edges on tools. The stone was at one time possessed by Luther Shive, known as Ludwig Shive, who died in 1740. He was the great grandfather of the owner......


Taken from: The Gazette and Daily (York, Pennsylvania) / 28th August 1934


The text continues but doesn't deliver further details....

 

[SliceOfLife]

Yeah. That doesn't actually work though. Hard to take statements like "We petrify wood by burying it for a few years" seriously. Modern theories of "instant" petrification are the invention of creation scientists and are based on acid-bath methods of saturating organic materials with silicates that attach to the structure of the organic material; not actual silicification. Making actual petrified wood is a process that takes at minimum tens of thousands of years.


"The black part of the stone is the bark of the wood"

Yeah... or it's the BBW of a wood grained coticule in the mind of someone with a very active imagination.

 

[David]

Didn't they used to use wood loaded with a powder type abrasive to hone knives? Maybe that's what they're talking about here and the "black" is just accumulated swarf from years of use?

 

[SliceOfLife]

I know that there's that one type of wood that works like a knife steel or pasted strop that someone was playing with awhile back... from Italy I think? I've never heard of actual edge leading HONING on any wood though.

 

[David]

the knife board is what I was referring to.

(See Internet)
1. "In the kitchen, the knives where sharpened on the oakknife-board. The board was 15-cm. wide and 70-cm. long.At the bottom of the board was a box containing silversand. Some sand was sprinkled on the board on which theknife was whetted. There were people with a dogcart filledwith silver sand that they sold door to door."
2. "I used to fetch a bucket of that white sand from thestream for granddad's knife knife-board. A sand box wasfitted at the end, and out of that came a bit of fine dry sandwhen the board was tilted. Granddad honed the knives forthe entire family."[COLOR=rgb(0.000000%, 0.000000%, 100.000000%)]http://www.achterhoekeengedicht.nl/Logoud/log1a.htm
[/COLOR]3. "One corner was separated from the rest by a woodenboard, half a meter high, it was the "stacker" - or "peatcorner", where fuels (wood, peat) were stored. The oak,
a plank, about 12 cm wide could serve as a seat and wasregularly used as a knife-board, sprinkled with ashes froma pile nearby, to keep both the knife used for cutting thebread and clasp-knife sharp.
[COLOR=rgb(0.000000%, 0.000000%, 100.000000%)]http://www.hei-heg-hoogeind.dse.nl/historie_gebied/oud_brabants_dorpsleven/brabantse_boerderij/brabantse-boerderij.htm
[/COLOR]4. "The knife-board is narrow and elongated and has at theend a bowl in which some small debris from roof tiles(klinki ie dak) or hard clay is kept. To sharpen a knife, theboard with some grit or clay on it was held at an angle andthe edge of the knife went up and down on over the dustthat was sprinkled with water first. After use the board washung on a nail in the wall".
5. "By rubbing this clay or limestone on the knife-board, apowdery substance is left behind that serves as an abrasive.The knife was sharpened by moving it across the knife-board. The clog-maker calls this: The cutting edge becomespure".