The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-06-29
AGE HOUSE IS
 TOLDBY LATCHES
Door And Window Fit
 tings Reveal Period Of Construction

when no records exist to establish its axtiQuity? Such a question must have come into many persons minds when they heard such and such an old house glibly set down as belonging to such and such period.
 Henry c. Mercer has recently made study of some 120 old houses in Bucks county and Philadelphia, Pa, built in the eighteenth and early nine teAnth centuries, from which he draws certain conclusions which seem to prove satisfactory tests for dating old houses by internal evidence. These conclu- sions he believes will apply equally to the old houses of New York; New Eng land, and the southern states where the same builders material, carpenters methods, tools and hardware were em- ployed in the period referred to- These conclusions he sums up in the April number of "Old Time New England, y the quarterly journal of the society for the Preservation of New England Anti quities.
 : The features which, according to the writer, disclose within reasonable limits the age of the house, are the kind of nails used, the style of hinges, the door panels, the Norfolk latches, the cast iron thumb latches, the wood screws and the sawed laths.
 Handmade Naik
 Handmade or wrought nails of soft malleahle iron, with rectangular shanks drawn by hammer blows to a point and with clearly hammer marked heads, were universally used in house build ing, until about 1900 when, cut nails, because of their cheapness, superseded them. Therefore, where the original nails of a house dates before 1900, or where cut, after that date. Nails used at the time the house was built are nearly always to be found in the garret floors.
 The wrought nail is easily distin- guished from the machine-made or cut nails. It was made from rectangular strips of malleable iron, several feet long, and about quarter of an inch : thick, called nail rods, which were fur nished the blacksmith.
 The far more easily made cut nail consists of a rectangular, taperlng shank of iron, not hammered into point by hand, but tapered, by single cut, across a plate of iron. The smith was here furnished, not with nail rod, but with strip of plate iron, several feet long, about two and quarter inches wide, and often about one-eighth of an inch thick. This strip he slid into a cutter, worked at first by hand-power, resmbling those used by bookbinders to trim books. This cutting, rising and falling rapidly, clip ped off the end of the iron plate cross wise into narrow, tapering rectangular slices or nails, whose length was es- tablished by the width, and thickness, by the depth of the nail plate. The taper of the cut alone, produced the point, but not the head. This was made at first by dropping the freshly cut piece, point downward, into a slot ted clamp or wise, and then spread ing the larger projecting end with hammer.
 Gut nails are easily distinguishable from wrought nails. Both have rec tangular shanks, but the wrought nails tapers on all four sides; the cut nail on only two opposing sides. :,
 These cut nails everywhere super seded the ancient wrought nail, not long after 1797, when two cut-nail factories had been established in Phil adelphia, and, therefore, if used by the builder, they will date house as hay ing been built after that year.
 Wrought Iron Door Hinges
 In the Colonial period in America, house door hinges were made always of wrought-iron until 1776 to 1783, when castiron hinges suddenly and uni yersally took their place.
 Door panels, before' 1776, if edged with mouldings, always show a plain, unbeaded ovolo or quarter-round rnounding on their outer margin, while immediately following the Revolution, after 17S3, these same ovolo mould ings became scored with one or two quirks or headings or changes into the ogee. .'.
 The Norfolk latch is easily distin- guished from the wrought thumb . latches, in having it's hand grasp not enlarged at each end into plates, or cusps, but riveted upon long, narrow sheet-iron escutcheon. Though long known in England as hand wrought by local blacksmiths, it nevertheless ap- pears in American houses examined, as a factory-made and not smith wrought product probably at first imported from England.
 We may conclude, from the evidence, that the Norfolk latch, if contempora- neous with the building, will date house between 1900 and 1S4O, or, al- lowing for survivals, 1850.
 POintlesS Wood Screws
 Numerous dated examples found, ! show that Blake's typical cast-iron thumb latch, with circular catch plate mortised and screwed into the door hntel, hollow patent bar pivot, hollow staple guard, and saucer lift with op- posite down curve, first came into gen. eral use in 1840. This latch, when complete and original, as the evidence clearly shows, will date house as built after 184O.
 The unmistakable pointed woodscrew, now universally used, was patented by United States patent No. 4704, Au- gust 20, 1S46, before which time, all woodscrews in general use, unless pointed by hand filing, were built.
 Because these pOintless screws would not start by driving into the wood, or penetrate, except by a previous gimlet hole, the pointed woodscrew suddenly and universally superseded them. Therefore, the woodscrew if pointless and original, will date house before 1S46; if pointed, after that date.
 These facts, marking the end of the old house building period, though only aplicable to the very latest buildings, are nevertheless important restorations or additions and show when kitchen fireplace doors stopped open fire cook ing, or where old latches, hinges, or doors have been shifted out of time or place.
 
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