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Your oldest domestic tool

Following Janice's post I looked under Wedst Bromwich, and the firm is listed there in 1924 and 1932. Under West Bromwich ,at Hall green foundry and with a Wednesbury telephone number. ?so presumably still at sam site then. but the firm has disappeared in the 1940 edition
 
mbenne said:
My Nan's old flat iron. There were two, but only have the smaller one. I can remember her heating them on a gas hob to do her ironing. No idea of its origin or how old it is but was used up until around 1967. Sadly, the manufacturer details are so rusted I cant read it. Looks something like - E Pugh & Co, the No6 I'm guessing is a size or weight and first two letters at the bottom look like MEA-----?

No longer used for ironing, far too rusty, but makes a good door stop. Any ideas on age, manufacture etc? My Grandparents married in 1930 so the date of manufacture could span either side of that date.

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I wonder how many of those were made (different sizes), late 40’s early 50’s almost every house had at least one holding a door open!
 
mbenne said:
My Nan's old flat iron. There were two, but only have the smaller one. I can remember her heating them on a gas hob to do her ironing. No idea of its origin or how old it is but was used up until around 1967. Sadly, the manufacturer details are so rusted I cant read it. Looks something like - E Pugh & Co, the No6 I'm guessing is a size or weight and first two letters at the bottom look like MEA-----?

No longer used for ironing, far too rusty, but makes a good door stop. Any ideas on age, manufacture etc? My Grandparents married in 1930 so the date of manufacture could span either side of that date.

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pjmburns said:
E Pugh were a firm from Wednesbury who made flat irons. As I found a no 8 on an auction site I guess it does relate to size or weight of the iron.

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Dontb know if there was an industry standard, but here are the the numbers and weights of some produced by William Bullock, Spon Lane. west Bromwich from a catalogue c 1850
Irons bullocks catalogue,c1850.jpg
 
i can remember our nan using the flat iron in her litte back to back house in paddington st

lyn
 
Astoness said:
i can remember our nan using the flat iron in her litte back to back house in paddington st

lyn
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My gran on Alfred St had a least 2 or three of them. One to iron, and two warming on the stove. My aunt had a farm in Wales with no electricity until just before they sold it. She had two or three that sat on the stove all the time while she was washing my uncles shirts, which seemed all the time.
 
We have my partner's old spinner, I don't know how old it is. Its blue and white. About 3ft high. To start it, the wet clothes have to be levelled up, balanced, and you have to hold your knee on it when it starts spinning, and keep an eye as it moves along the floor, we put a bowl right next to it, to stop it you have to unplug it let it slow a bit then use a foot brake slowly several times. It spins the clothes with less creases and faster than the washing machine takes.

I have my dad's shoe horn made from a cow's horn. and my grandparents' shoe brushes and my parents' wooden, hoover brush attachments I use as hand brushes, and my Nan's mint chopper. An ancient tea caddy spoon. Grandparents' garden tools and my great great aunt's spirit measure and my grandparent's thermometer, except a lot of the numbers have worn off.

Also dad was a hoarder but I found his tiny screwdrivers useful for tiny plug screws and spectacles screws and fuses and fuse wire still in the Condor tobacco zipped wallet he got as a free gift. And it stills smells of his baccy.
 
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pjmburns said:
On clearing my late Dad's flat I have found my Mother's mixing bowl. I have fond memories of "helping" stir the Christmas puddings in it. So the bowl was probably acquired when my parents married in 1950. Needless to say it will not be thrown out but will come home with me. Will post a photo when I get it home.
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Collected it today.
 

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I think I've still got one of mixing bowls, or one very similar. White on the inside. I've also got an old hand operated Mincing Machine. Screw clamp to fix to a surface and then wind the handle.

Some years ago, with the grandaughters, we visited the Science? Museum in London. In the display cabinets I was looking at items and saying, "I've got one of them at home." - "I was using one of those last week."

Some of the spanners in my toolbox are stamped "War Finish".

But they still work.;)
 
and we have still got one of them mixing bowls.and a square piece of marble that she rolled the pastery on. i got that from a place in bordesley green rd that cuts marble. when i got it home and gave it her she "said where did you get it" and i said from the grave yard down the rd it was lying on the floor. oooo she said take it back i dont want it. i lol and told her the truth, she had that for years after.
 
Ken_R said:
White on the inside. I've also got an old hand operated Mincing Machine. Screw clamp to fix to a surface and then wind the handle.
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Spong ? The only make I ever saw from Mum's days.

Ken_R said:
Some years ago, with the grandaughters, we visited the Science? Museum in London. In the display cabinets I was looking at items and saying, "I've got one of them at home." - "I was using one of those last week."
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We visited an aircraft museum, Norfolk I think, and I either recognised, had used, or in a couple of cases still used at home, some of the test equipment on display as 'of the period'. I came away from there quite a few years older. My wife still teases me sometimes about it. She just says the one word "oscilloscope", and that knocks me off my perch back to real life.
Andrew.
 
I have a dinner knife that was among my mother's cutlery. It is stamped
"V(crown)R,
WILSON,
60, KING St MANCHESTER."
It's either from my Gran or G/Gran and very sharp !
 
pjmburns said:
On clearing my late Dad's flat I have found my Mother's mixing bowl. I have fond memories of "helping" stir the Christmas puddings in it. So the bowl was probably acquired when my parents married in 1950. Needless to say it will not be thrown out but will come home with me. Will post a photo when I get it home.
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For many years I had a mixing bowl just like this. I don't think it was a family item, maybe got it from a jumble sale. I used it for all sorts of cooking when the family were at home and wine making more recently until it developed a large crack and became crazed. How I miss it though. I now have a horrible plastic one which just isn't the same.
 
Lady Penelope said:
For many years I had a mixing bowl just like this. I don't think it was a family item, maybe got it from a jumble sale. I used it for all sorts of cooking when the family were at home and wine making more recently until it developed a large crack and became crazed. How I miss it though. I now have a horrible plastic one which just isn't the same.
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As you say - they tend to crack and that is why having checked out the bowl I am not sure I will use it. Reluctant to throw it out (don't tell my husband I said that :D ) as it is part of my childhood.
 
Janice, my husband would say "Put a plant in it!"
We used to put plants in the bowl from the jug and bowl set, be sure to use a mat though as it will be porous now.
rosie.
 
rosie said:
Janice, my husband would say "Put a plant in it!"
We used to put plants in the bowl from the jug and bowl set, be sure to use a mat though as it will be porous now.
rosie.
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Rosie - that is so funny :D as it was what was in my mind but I have to drop that idea in gently to my husband. Also I need to think where I could put it as it is quite large and space limited - window sills too narrow. I have a couple of plants in a basket which need repotting so that may be ideal. Thanks for the tip about the mat.
 
I used to use an old watch for my blackheads as a youth. I kept it.I cleaned it! I have a thing about hen shaped egg containers. I still have my Nan's. Our grandparents' utensils would fetch a few bob now in these 'yesteryear' stores. I have an old badger shaped eggcup. He is a bit big for a hen's egg. It says CCHP underneath. I broke my Sooty one. Still have my great great grandmothers brass bottle opener, great great aunt's thimble measure and great great grandad's snuff box. My grandparents' shoe brush. Here is dad's shoe horn too. I would never part with any of them. I will endeavour to send pictures soon.
 
Here they are
 

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Lady Penelope said:
Izzy, This looks very much like the key to our church which was built in 1857. I wonder if the door this unlocks is still there or if indeed the building is still standing?
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I don't know how we came to have it, I remember seeing it at my Grandads when I was little
 
My husband uses a wallpaper scraper that belonged to his Dad in the 1930s.

I have 2 knives and one tablespoon part of a wonderful set of silver plate given to me by my employers 61 years ago for my wedding.
 
I have my grandad's christening cup and saucer. And a stool with the hole in the seat to lift it he made at school. He left when he was 8. Some Japanase plates of my Nan's (she said,) which are actually Chinese! Some crystal blown by her dad. Quite a few of grandad's tools including a ruler that folds up and a spirit level. Screwdrivers etc. Dad's slide rule that calculates. His book of calculatons in pecks and bushels and weights for metal and cotton and grain. Nan's Blackie's Shilling Dictionary. I refuse to part with them.
 
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