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When Mark Spiller moved to Maine from New Brunswick in 1890 he was already an accomplished axe maker who hailed from a family who had been making edge tools since 1815. In 1902, he went to work for Emerson &...
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Making an axe handle seems simple enough. Take a piece of wood, cut a pattern, and carve it into shape. Easy. Well, not quite. In the late 1800’s, edge tool makers were cranking out thousands of axes a day. ...
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Old black & white pictures, moldy leather-bound ledgers, thousands of jumbled penny postcards, carbon copies of letters (remember carbon paper?), and invoices are among the artifacts that we reviewed at the University of Maine's Fogler Library, the Oakland Area Historical...
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In mid-July we visited the remains of the Collins Company in Collinsville, Connecticut. In the late 1800’s, the Collins Company was the largest integrated axe manufacturer in the world. Founder Samuel Collins’ vision of a global edge tool company built...
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One of the best documents we have of axe making in the early 20th century is Peter Vogt’s 1965 film about the Emerson & Stevens shop in Oakland, Maine. Not only is this short film frequently viewed on our website...
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