COMBMAKERS
Location: [unknown]
Surname/tag: Occupations
Contents |
Norse comb production
The favored material was antler, mostly from elk, with red deer antler also used. The antler was cut into sections, some short and some long. Combs were cut and then assembled in a three-part construction: two long pieces formed the back plate, with short pieces sandwiched between them to form teeth, making a composite comb with the pieces rivetted together with fine bronze or iron rivets. In the 11th century the composite comb was replaced by the double one-piece comb (teeth on two sides, usually one side with large teeth and the other with very fine teeth). From the middle ages the preferred comb was the composite double comb, like a double one-piece comb but with rivetted connecting plates strengthening the middle of the comb.[1]
Comb making in England
Those early Saxon combs found in England have much in common with the early Norse comb: they are made of antler and are composite and rivetted. One later example has "wings" at either end.[2] Comb-making as distinct from other forms of horn- and bone-working was recognized with the formation of the Worshipful Company of Comb Makers in 1635/6 in the reign of Charles I. The 1881 census has a large number of workers in the comb industry. The jobs listed include: comb maker, cutter, grinder, polisher, presser, stainer and a steward in the comb works. Combs were made both by artisans and in manufactories. Comb making in York is particularly well documented.[3]
Post-colonial American production
Originally, American colonists imported combs from England, but in 1759 a horn comb manufactory was set up at West Newbury, Massachusetts by Enoch Noyes. Though the demand remained, importation of combs almost completely ceased with the Revolutionary War, making American comb-making a profitable business.[4] In the early days, combmaking was often a one-man or one-family affair, requiring little capital investment.[5]
Commonest in the 18th and 19th Centuries were horn combs. To manufacture these the tip was sawn off a horn which was then held in the flame of a wood fire (a process called roasting), which made the horn nearly as soft as leather. While soft, the horn was split open on one side and pressed between two iron plates and plunged into water, which hardened and flattened it. It was then cut to size. Three or four blank pieces were laid on a pair of tongs over a fire of hardwood shavings and turned frequently, to soften them. When sufficiently soft the pieces were put into a vice which was screwed tight to complete the flattening. A worker then shaved and planed or scraped off any roughness. The smooth horn blank was then passed to the person who cut the teeth. The blank was gripped into an instrument called a clam which had a long handle and which the worker sat on to steady the horn blanks, as both hands were required to cut the teeth. Teeth were cut by a double saw with a fine blade. This left the teeth square at the tips and rough on the inside edge of each tooth. These were smoothed down using a series of tools that looked like knives but had teeth like a file, each tool having finer teeth than the one before it. Finally, one stroke was given to each side of the comb with a rasping tool to give the ends of the teeth a small bevel. Finally, the comb was polished with rotten stone and oil applied with buffing leather.
Ivory combs were similarly made, though the ivory was first sawed into thin slices.
In the late 18th Century machines for comb-making were invented that allowed two combs to be cut in about three minutes. Isaac Tryon was granted a patent for an "improvement in the cutting and pointing of comb teeth" on 22 Feb 1798 and Phineas Pratt of Connecticut was granted a patent for the comb-making machine on April 12, 1799. One such machine, Kelley’s machine, scribed one piece of horn, wood or ivory to form two combs with the teeth of one occupying the interdental spaces of the other (like interlaced fingers). A second pass through the machine repeated the scribed cuts more deeply, with the two combs pulled gently but firmly apart at the end of the process. The comb blank was moved uniformly through the cutter through a gear mechanism so the teeth could be evenly cut.[6]
Combmakers also made other small items of the same materials, such as button hooks and small brushes.
A book of 1858 describing the manufactures of Philadelphia contains a page on comb making.
- Combs are made in this city, of Gold and Silver, Horn, Buffalo Horn, and Shell …
- Horn Combs constitute the leading and staple product. They are made of all descriptions and of very good quality, at more than a dozen different establishements, and many others individually. …
- In Tortoise Shell and Buffalo Horn … we have three or four principal manufacturers, whose work … has secured to Philadelphia the pre-eminence in the Comb business of the United States. … Our manufacturers export their Combs to the West Indies, Mexico, California, and all parts of the Continent. The capital employed is between $40,000 and $50,000. The number of hands [people] altogether employed is little short of two hundred; their average wages $7-1/2 [$7.50] per week, and the annual product about $150,000.[7] One specific mention is made of "Mr. Redheffer" who had patents for several machines used in comb-making.
There is still a demand for hand-made combs, which are made in England, Canada, the U.S. and Germany, among other places.
Sources
- ↑ For a full description see Combs and comb-making in the Viking and Middle Ages
- ↑ Two Late Saxon Combs from Longmarket
- ↑ Comb making in York in the 19th Century
- ↑ Greeley, Horace, et al. (1874) The Great Industries of the United States: Being an Historical Summary of the Origin, Growth, and Perfection of the Chief Industrial Arts of This Country, J. B. Burr Publishing, Hartford, Pp. 1180-1
- ↑ Musser, Mary ( 2015?) "Massachusetts Horn Smiths: A Century of Comb Making 1775 – 1875" in Old Time New England publ. Historic New England, p. 62
- ↑ Knight, Edward Henry (1872) Knight's American Mechanical Dictionary: A Description of Tools Instruments, Machines, Processes, and Engineering; History of Inventions; General Technological Vocabulary and Digest of Mechanical Appliances in Science and the Arts. Houghton Mifflin, Boston, Volume 1 pp. 597-8
- ↑ Freedley, Edwin Troxwell (1856) Philadelphia and its Manufactures, Applewood Books, Carlisle, Mass., p. 407.
Later developments:
Potential Lines of Enquiry for Information about Particular Combmakers
- In the USA in 1836 comb makers formed a national organization of local (i.e. city) organizations that had been established earlier. If records of such local and/or national records can be found, it may be possible to determine whether individual comb makers belonged.
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