Quote:
Originally Posted by
mycarver
very interesting ,thanks!
I know quite well the feeling of getting lost in the ethers!
I too have been leaning heavily towards the fundamentalist approach and bring these razors back to what they once were. Many times that's more of a challenge than buffing them willy -nilly and slapping on something called scales.
Sometimes, after really intensive sculpting (digital, in my case), it can take me a couple of hours to remember how to talk. I'd love to figure out how Clive Barker manages to spend hours every day doing both art and writing.
One of the things I like to keep in the back of my mind when I'm doing restoration work is the following statistic from Lloyd's 'The Cutlery Trades'.
In Sheffield, circa 1880, this was the case:
An out working spring knife cutler working with his fourteen year old son made in one week 56 dozen knives. For these he was paid 5s 3d per gross, fourteen dozen being counted to the gross. They worked fully 70 hours per week and sometimes 16 hours a day.
Razor manufacture was about the same, maybe a bit more, and in razors it was common for a dozen to be either 13 or 14. That's in the neighborhood of a 100 articles a day between two people.
There's a film from the mid 70's, showing an old Sheffield guy making a pocket knife. It's amazing to watch him work.
I really cherish all the time I've got to spend preserving the work those folks did.