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I just recently purchased a vintage Illinois strop and based on feel I'm wondering if it might be Cordovan. It is a "Barber's Delight" and Scottish Tanned leather; I don't recall the model number just now. Did Illinois ever use shell leather back in the day?
If it's scottish tanned it's probably not Cordovan. Whether they made them I don't know.
I would imagine that they did, particularly back in the 1960s and prior. Just so many old barber strops were, if not cordovan shell, horsehide. My impression is that back in the old days between glue factories and leather processors there was plenty of the stuff to go around. I'd bet it was more reasonably priced for the manufacturers than bovine was in those days. When my parents were kids there were still plenty of horse drawn wagons used in cities around the country. Also other sources for horsehide. When my parents were kids there were plenty of horse drawn wagons still used in cities for various things.
Is the strop thin and has a finish that is smooth like patent leather?
Bob
I will try to take a pic of it later. It seems the same thickness as my other shell strop. I wanna say the number is 6540. I can't believe the deals you can get on vintage strops. They may have some blemishes but they are completely functional.
I thought I read that even the 835 I had with the embossed horse head stamp on it,
It was still only meant to be cow hide not horse let alone shell cordovan
it is only about 1/16" thick and very soft and smooth
A great little strop I passed on to my son in law
Correct me if I am wrong but I do not think Cordovan is a type of leather,all is made from horse shell granted.
Cordovan may be used only for the color and the tanning process.
I think you're right Bill, it names the process they use on the leather IIRC ..... but ...... all horsehide is not shell. That comes from a particular area of the horse's butt, and is tougher than the adjoining areas of the hide. At least that is my understanding from memory.Quote:
Originally Posted by pixelfixed
Cordovan and shell are synonymous for the most part. Shell refers to the hide with the fibrous leather in the rump and shell cordovan is the finished leather. Now I am no leather expert, but that is how I understood it; please correct me if I'm wrong. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shell_cordovan. There's the Wiki page but wiki is hardly Cannon either.
Shell is the butt cheek leather correct
You may be right about the cordovan being the precess Bill
not sure myself
Maybe Neil will chime in,I would like to know myself.
It looks like Cordovan came from the the region of Spain where it originally began. Also interestingly goat was originally used.
Advanced search ..... key word , cordovan, member Neil Miller ;Quote:
Originally Posted by pixelfixed
http://straightrazorpalace.com/strop...hell-mean.html
And from a different thread .......Quote:
Originally Posted by Neil Miller
The leather guy I spoke to once told me that Cordovan (or something like it) is/was the name of a place in Spain that gave its name to the process used to tan and colour the leather they used to make there. This was centuries ago, apparently.
Cordovan is also the name of a colour. One of my cousins is a fashion designer and she mentioned it once as an autumnal thing.
So if I had to guess, I'd guess for leather it is a process. Possibly a process only applied to shell-type leather.
James.
IIRC Neil Miller has mentioned that this tanning process to produce Cordovan leather was brought to the region of Spain now known as Andalucía. Cordoba is a city in this region of Spain for which the process was named, I believe, Córdoba, Andalusia - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia .Quote:
Originally Posted by aa1192
Bob
I think the issue is the term cordovan has two meanings. For instance you can buy a pair of shoes with cordovan finish which is just the color-a shade of brown. It also has a technical meaning referring to the actual tanning and processing procedure and to complicate things further it seems to be used interchangeably with "shell".
Shell is very small piece of the horse, so it's always been special, commanding higher prices and labeled accordingly to justify the price. If it only says 'scottish tanned' bit not shell it's almost certainly not shell.Quote:
Originally Posted by aa1192
My two user strops, I think they are shell, cordovan? no clue
Attachment 180587
Cordovan simply means 'of Cordoba' - a place in Spain. Shells are the two ovals found under the skin in a horses butt. As the skin has to be removed to get at the fibrous, muscular shell, it is not really leather at all. That is why it is found in such a small, localised area and why it is so expensive.
Today, shell refers to the (lets call it for simplicity's sake) leather, and cordovan refers to the tanning and finishing stages. It is vegetable tanned (some legend in his own lunch time writing in stropping forum recently and giving us the benefit of his microscopic leather lore erroneously led himself to believe otherwise), then hot stuffed with oils and waxes, then stretched out on a glass frame, dyed and hand polished.
The spaish city of Cordoba also gives us the rather old fashioned name of cordwainer, still used in the rarefied world of the gentlemans outfitter in places like Saville Row when I was a schoolboy), for makers of fine gentlemans shoes. In this application, cordovan was any fine soft expensive leather, not just horse.
Cordwainer seems a long way from Cordoba, until you realise that it the anglicised version of a french word for shoemaker - cordonnier, introduced after the norman conquest (1066 and all that).
'Cordwainer' goes back to the 12th century in england, but the cordovan process was introduced into Spain in the 11th or 10th century, and originally it was goat that was used. The process was not even the same, the leather being tawed instead of tanned. In tawing alum is used, and it is an imperfect process inasmuch as it can be reversed by aperiod of wetting, giving us back a soft slimey skin that stinks as it corrupts. Fortunately Moors had a natural immunity to stinks being brought up in hovels and tents with all manner of beasts and a seeming disregard for form of lavatory paper other than the hand, hopefully with a bit of not too gritty sand in it. Doesn't get that wet in the Moorish part of Spain and North Africa eitner.
Over time kid and pigskin were used and the dried leathers were gilded and painted and used as wall hangings.
So, originally it was a whitish tawed leather, then a maroon goat or sheep leather, then a gilded and painted goat, sheepskin or pigskin, then the burgundy colored shell leather.
Today - and for quite a considerable time - it comes in black, tan, chestnut and burgundy.
The cordovan process, or part of it, anyway, has been used for other leathers. Horse hide (thicker and considerably cheaper), and so-called steer cordovan, which is even cheaper cowhide given the cordovan treatment.
Scottish tanneries were qite famous for producing top notch shell leather. Interestingly, most shell frm that time is much thicker than we find today, around 4 to 4.5mm thick as opposed to 2mm thick now. One can only conjecture why. Then, the norse was a beast of burden. It pulled canal boats along, delivered kegs to pubs, ploughed fields, trucked supplies to rail yards, provided cabs and long distance transport, and was worked till its great heart burst and it dropped dead in the street.
Tho occurrence was so commom, especially in great cities like London and NY, that the knacker man would not come until putrefaction set in - easier to chop them up and move them tben when they are stiff, Sometimes their bellies ruptured from gases engendered of corruption, while they lay dead in the street cushioned by the vast amounts of excrement produced in life. Cities were not pleasant in tbe heat os summer.
So, they were very robust beasts, all their muscles at peak condition. Also, tbe finish of the old shell strops was not glassy and flat for the most part. Its a bit of a mystery, but must have its answer in what prevailed at the time, and like today, marketing probably had more tnan a little to do with it.
Regards,
Neil (often stroppy) Miller
I'd bet they are what they say they are. As I posted earlier, I think before WWII there were a lot more horses in use, and a lot more slaughtered when they were no longer useful. Glue and leather goods were probably the main uses, along with dog food. So chances are the shell was more plentiful, and therefore more reasonably priced. Neil will correct me if I'm (shudder) wrong ...... :rolleyes:Quote:
Originally Posted by pixelfixed
Heaven forbid!Quote:
Originally Posted by JimmyHAD
My dear sir, to my certain knowledge you said you were wrong once before, but upon further reflection it transpired that you were right...
Regards
Neil
That certainly makes sense Neil regarding the thickness of the older shell quite rightly back in the day traditional breeds such as the Suffolk Punch Clydesdale and Cleveland Bay were all beasts of burden with over developed muscle structure so the cordovan would be much thicker and no doubt these genetic Characteristics would be past on to their off spring, as these breeds basically died off with the greater industrialization of agriculture and use of tractors these horse were of no use and died off so obviously the only shell available to the tanneries would be fine skinned animals such local hunters and smaller native breeds.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suffolk_Punch
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland_Bay
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clydesdale_horse
I have only this to add. I have no idea what type of leather this strop is. And I'm not about to cross swords with Neil on the subject of strops :D
Attachment 180676Attachment 180677Attachment 180678
It is what it says it is, ie shell, ie horse.
I have noticed that when an expanded description is used, particularly in the early days of Illinois strops (founded 1907 by James Simons then handled by son Edwin before changing the name to Fromm International in 1984 I believe) "shell horse hide" was often used.
This did indeed come from draft horses, and the location of Chicago was chosen because it was a major meat packing centre, had a number of tanneries and was a major rail hub.
Indeed, Isidore Horowitz, a ukrainian jew who learned the tanning trade abroad set up his company there in 1905 - I. Horween & Co. They made shell strops too, thicker than the shell cordovan used today, but only for a brief period, say up to 1916 or thereabouts when ever growing sales of safety razors forced them out of that particular market. Their signature and oldest leather was chromexel though, similar to latigo of 10 years or so ago, being a pull-up type of cowhide with superior strength. These days it comes in a very greasy form to moderate draw form.
Illinois Strop Co were of the opinion that shell was the best leather available for strops, particularly for hollow ground razors, recommending the russian style for more wedge like razors, altough it too worked well on hollow grinds, it just needed proper breaking in first (by which I mean pumicing in tne direction of the grain with heavy tallow based lathering).
In the mid 1960s Illinois began to push Fromm shears and other products, leading to the name change in the 1980s. It is certain thar since that time only cowhide strops were produced by them, still marketed under the Illinois name.
Regards,
Neil
Ps shucks Mike, you make me sound all argumentative and ornery - say it aint so... :)
Neil, your knowledge of strops, their manufacture and history is matched only by your cosmic curmudgeonliness...;)
And I Thank You for the excellent info on Illinois Strops.
Curmudgeon definition: a crabby, ill-tempered, crusty old man.
How very dare you Mike - I'm not that old... those wrinkles soon fill out when I stand fully erect!
Regards,
Neil
I have one of the old butt illinois 226 strops, that says "genuine horsehide" on it. It's horse butt strop, and as neil described, it's not similar to a shell cordovan strop.
Illinois coated the strop with something, and the coating has not held up well. As a user of butt strops in general (but usually just cut from a horse butt strip), they are a great strop after they are broken in with use, but that presents a problem in selling them. I guess illinois must've come up with a process to apply to the butt, I just like a broken in butt strop better. They become very slick and hard with low draw. In my opinion, something like horween is best at brand new, but as it wears and the surface treatment is damaged, it is not as good. Shell like on a kanayama probably gets better, it starts soft and supple.
Horse butt is far off from either of the types of shell (the slicked horween type or the supple kanayama), but it improves significantly with use. A brand new piece has enough abrasiveness that it needs to be stropped on about 30 times before it loses its edge. Not 50 strops, but 30 sets of 50...if the leather is just cut from a butt strip (and the butt strip needs to be clean and clear without curl or random wrinkles). To a user, this means bringing a separate razor to the strop every day when stropping another razor, and stropping it briskly - for a month. At the end of that month, the strop improves the edge coming off of the linen instead of abrading it (and a fresh piece does abrade the edge of a finely honed razor).
Broken in butt is my favorite strop material, above and beyond cordovan. One can take something like mineral oil on a rag and clean the surface of a butt strip piece and have no effect except to make it even slicker and finer in finish on the razor. I haven't tried doing such a thing to a softer strop, but I suspect it would have the opposite effect, to increase draw.
I have a Koken, Barbers Hand finish, Imported Shell Horse Hide Strop that also has a Scotch linen strop included. At the bottom of the horse hide strop it says "Made by the worlds finest strop makers"!
With a little treatment with Wilson premium ball glove oil, this has become a great strop for my razors & knives. Any idea when this strop was made? Also says No 1 Selection.
Slawman
I've got a Koken with the same imprint on the bottom. On the top it is marked, "Imported Shell, Natural Finish." It is a very old strop, but in virtually NOS condition. Thinner in depth than my C-Mons, dubl ducks, Red Imp and other vintage pieces. Not quite as thin as Neil Miller's shell cordovan. A great strop it is. Koken was a supplier to the barbering trade. Their barber chairs are were among the most ornate that I've seen. I'm pretty sure they had the strops made for them with their emblem. If mine is typical of the breed they are as good as it gets.Quote:
Originally Posted by Slawman
I guess we are stealing the "Illinois" thread but I love Koken stuff. I have a Koken "New Charmer" Straight that is my second favorite Solingen made razor. My favorite razor period is "The Peoria" from J.Schnider & Co. A Barber supply from Peoria IL. It is Solingen made piece also.
I just got some Fromm strop dressing & applied it to my Koken Barbers Hand Finish, Imported, Shell Horse Hide No.1 Selection strop. It is about 4.5 mm. thick. The linen Side So is marked Scotland & I assume the horse hide came from there also.
I have the dressing applied as directed & it just smoothed the edge on all my blades. Another $8.00 flea market find!
Any thought's on this strop?
Slawman:)
