The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1924-12-16
1HIMBLE IS THE
SYMBOL OF HOME
,,,1ru FIRE SHOVELS 1T HELD
pIACE LATTER LOST WITH
GOING OF HEARTS,.

The thlmble ana tne HIe SnoVel
...d on their travels some 5000 to
1000 years ago.
since the most remote ages the
.,;nbIe and the fire shovel have been
,,nbols OF the home.
When women of the American from
u.anted thimble or fire shovel
'Ed, often were forced to use rawhide
ln'y niece of heavy cloth to protect
.bo;r sewing finger, or a piece Of
ad for a shovel. Theirs was the
v.u1ct;ce OF the women of old, points
ia the National Foreign Trade Coun-
'"' Fire Shovels Rare Now.
Todav there are some hundred and
IA million thimbles in American
I on The hearth fire shovel has all
h 0 cone The older and finer makes
D.o being sought after as antiques,
@nd preserved for the same reason
abat are the splendid fire shovels of
tbe Nvcenaean age, made some thous-
ond years before the Christian era.
W. make snow shove1s and coal show
els and steam shovels by the ton, but
fever hearth shovels.
TmDortant as the article is, the max
mo ri thimbles has always BEEN a
n;9n7v among the industries. Indus
rial history has played hide-and-seek
With it. Its making has always been
s,omcthing Of a mystery
Once Worn on Thumb.
II IS known that since the earliest
lime, there have been thimbles OF sill
YER cold. ivory, porcelain, bone, iron
and bronze, and that is about all. The
women of the ancients, in China, AS
.yr.a. Egypt, Rome and Gaul, first
,,.sd the thimble on the thumb, in the
farm of a ring. Then, olive-shaped, it
travelled to the forehnger, and finally,
In modern times, to the middle finger.
These old thimbles had dents IN
(which to catch the needles, but no
lions. The word thimble is an abbre-
|yiation OF thumb-bell."
Made in Holland.
In the seventeenth century Holland
WAS the center OF the trade OF making
decorated gold and silver thimbles Tor
tbe ladies' of royalty and houses OF
|"nobjlitv." Thimbles were used as
bridal presents, with coat-of-arms en-
|qraved on them and fanciful phrasings,
II, 1T is sweet to be remembered,
|"Love me always and truly"
In 1905 a Hollander took the thin
bile 10 England and made a fortune,
selling it as a novelty
1t once took 20 men to make the
|tbimbIe. Now the cheaper, forms are
made by machinery, in big lots like
cartridges, and milled by hand tool.
Now Made of Celluloid.
The American modern thimble is
made of celluloid, tin covered brass or
steel or nickel, and gold and silver.
hi is one of the $l,000,O00 industries
Hiatt has passed unnoticed among the
100000 other industries OF the United
States Commerc reports seem to have
Neglected it.
1t is lost among the general classl-
Idcation of $4,000 miscellaneous indus
Itries There are few records OF I'M
|ports or exports of thimbles, yet one
Philadelphia house exports nickel
|thmbles all over the world and some
gold ones to South America.
Barring those made of gold and sill
|yer the women OF America could not
4 have their thimbles but for the raw
nickel that comes to us from Canada
|or from New Caledonia, the celluloid,
one OF the constituents OF which IS
camphor from Japan; and tin, chiefly
from the Malay Peninsula, partly from
Bolivia and partly from China.