Bush Hammer
date: label: date made
content: 19th Century
name: label: associated user
content: Pirie, W.
label: associated user
content: Woods, C.
label: manufacturer
content: Pinel Brothers
label: maker
content: Pinel Brothers
notes: label: Description
content: This is a bush hammer. A bush hammer, also known as an axe hammer, is a masonry tool used to texturize stone and concrete. In 1831, Joseph Richards (1784–1848) of Braintree, MA, invented the bush hammer. The US patent was issued February 20, 1828, for a stone-working tool, with a patent number of X5010 or 5010X. His patent sparked many other inventors' designs for the bush hammer.
label: Description
content: This particular hammer has inscriptions reading PINEL BROS [/] QUINCY. [/] MASS [/] 1886 [/] No 1231 in reference to the manufacturer, and C. Woods, for the owner.
label: Description
content: It has an iron body ("pole") gibbed across the top and bottom and four bolts which usually secure two sets of sharp plates or teeth inserted into jaws at either end of the head (5 on each end). There is a wooden handle force-fit into the eye of the pole that has a drilled hang hole, not original to the piece, added by a tool collector for display.
label: Description
content: The Pinel brothers formed the Pinel Tool Company in South Quincy, MA, and they manufactured tools for quarrying and stone cutting. It was composed of Alfred Pinel and his son Alfred P. J.
label: Description
content: Alfred Pinel, Sr., was born in Jersey Channel Island, England on April 5, 1852. He learned the blacksmith trade with his brother, Philip Pinel, and in 1872 went to Quincy, finding employment with Charles H. Hardwick & Co., and later with Frederick Fuller.
label: Description
content: He then became associated with his brother, Walter P. Pinel, and under the firm name of Pinel Brothers engaged in the tool manufacturing and blacksmith business, which they conducted for eighteen years. Alfred bought his brother's interest and later he sold out and formed the Gifford-Pinel corporation which in turn sold to the Vulcan Tool Company. The same year the present firm was established and in 1908 they built their present up-to-date plant where they do blacksmithing in all its branches as well as manufacturing granite cutters and contractors' tools of various kinds.
label: Description
content: They were the prime movers in the introduction of drop forged hand bush hammers.
label: Description
content: Alfred Pinel Jr learned his trade with Pinel Brothers and after eight years went to work in the United States Navy Yard at Charlestown, Mass., where he had charge of the making and repairing of all tools used by the construction and repairs department. In 1907 he became traveling salesman for the Gifford-Pinel Company, and when they sold out to the Vulcan Tool Company, he built the shop occupied by the Pinel Tool Company and started business under that name in 1908, being joined the following year by his father, who had been acting in the meantime as manager for the Vulcan Tool Company.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
setName: label: See more items in
content: Work and Industry: Hand Tools
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: The Olde Country Store of Witmer, PA
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1979.1265.18
label: accession number
content: 1979.1265
label: catalog number
content: 1979.1265.18
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Hammer
label: Other Terms
content: Hammer; Stonecutter/Stone Dresser; Stoneworking; Striking & Prizing Tools; Hand Tools
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: metal, iron (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: metal, steel (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: wood, hickory (overall material)