• This site has scanned old texts, which can be viewed and printed a page at a time.  They are indexed for searching and also can be located using the historical highlights listings.

American Museum of Natural History

• The national museum of tools and the machine tool hall of fame.

American Revolution.org

• This website includes a huge list of links to other American Revolution websites.

American Textile History Museum: 491 Dutton Street, Lowell, MA 01854-4221, (978) 441-0400.

• Dr. Birkett's research includes topics on "Why didn't historical makers need drawings?" and "a detailed analysis of historical wire-drawing technology and the development of an economically viable modern technique for replicating carbon-free, high phosphorus content historical iron wire."

Antique Gun Room: This is a business that sells guns, their website includes a great set of links to sites on Colonial American history.

Area Vibes: A Guide to New York Historical Resources

• "a unique array of primary source material from 18th Century America. Scenes and portraits from original newspapers, maps and writings"

ArchNet: Worldwide Web Virtual Library for Archaeology.

Association for Manufacturing Technology: 7901 Westpark Dr., McLean, VA 22102-4206, 703-893-2900.

Association for Preservation Technology International: 4513 Lincoln Ave., Suite 213, Lisle, IL 60532-1290.

• This publisher specializes in books on tools and trades and is now owned by Finney Co..

Bahr's Mill: Gabelsville, PA, 610-369-7266, fax: 215-679-5388.

• Definitions and descriptions.

Boring Tools

• Hole making and screw driving tools: braces, geared drills, push, bow, pump drills, tool handles, screwdrivers

Boston Athenaeum: 10 1/2 Beacon St., Boston, MA 02108, (617) 227-0270.

• Wooden and metal clamps, uses, manufacturers, etc.

Charles River Museum of Industry: Charles River Museum of Industry, 154 Moody Street, Waltham, MA 02453

Crabtree Publishing Company: Dept 2TPHC1F, PMB 16A, 350 Fifth Ave. Ste. 3308, NY, NY 10118, (212) 496-5040

• A great source of children's books on a wide variety of topics: Native Americans, colonial life, tools and trades.

Collectors of Rare And Familiar Tools Society (CRAFTS): 38 Colony Court, Murray Hill, NJ 07974.

• Manufactures and tools from West Concord's factories.  Also Native American artifacts, Paul Revere/American Revolution, Thoreau, and Emerson.

Connecticut Antique Machinery Association, Inc.: P.O. Box 1467 New Milford, CT 06776.

• Link here for a free one-day trial to do patent research.

Directory of American Tool and Machinery Patents

• "The information in DATAMP is gathered from the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) online database by a group of volunteer "Data Stewards" from the OldTools and OldWWMachine lists."

The Disstonian Institute: Online Reference of Disston Saws.

• Their mission is to gather and publish information on all aspects of C. DREW & CO. and its products. They are also eager to gather and publish information on Nahum Bailey, Daniel Bisbee, Thomas Cushman, John Washburn and other tool manufacturers who worked in Kingston, Massachusetts.

Early American Industries Association (EAIA): 167 Bakerville Rd., South Dartmouth, MA 02748-4198, (508) 993-4198.

• "The earliest tin items were manufactured by hand using forming stakes.  It wasn't until 1806 that machinery for forming and tinwork was invented.  By 1819, a machinist from Southington, Connecticut had patented several metal working machines.  Many of the companies that received patents then are still in existence today -- such as PEXTO, Roper-Whitney, and Niagara.  Tin manufacturing thrived in America from the early 1700's through the late 1800's.  Tin items were used for many functions in homes." Randy Hulsey, Jennings Creek Tin Shoppe, Bowling Green, KY.

The Furniture Institute of Massachusetts. 116 Water Street, Beverly, MA  01915. furniture@verizon.net. 1-978-922-0615.

Genesee Country Village and Museum: 1410 Flint Hill Road, Mumford, NY 14511, Fax: (585) 538-6927, Telephone: (585) 538-6822.

• Of interest to the Davistown Museum due to its collection of cooper's tools.

Hagley Museum and Library: PO Box 3630, Wilmington, DE 19807-0630, (302) 658-2400.

• Hagley On-line Library

Hamau Webdirectory

• "A collection of more than 800 historic maps spanning nearly 500 years, from the sixteenth century through the early twentieth century."

Harvard Business School Baker Library

• Marketing in the Modern Era: Trade Catalogs and the Rise of 19th-Century American Advertising (exhibit) and selected bibliography.

Historic Deerfield: Box 321, Deerfield, MA 01342-0321(413) 774-5581, Fax: (413) 775-7220.

• "A museum of New England history and art within the carefully preserved 330 year old western Massachusetts village of Deerfield."
• Historic Deerfield On-line Library

Hopewell Furnace: National Historic Site, 2 Mark Bird Lane, Elverson, PA 19520, 610-582-8773.

• This site contains information on conversion charts for historic to modern chemicals/materials, tables of historic weights and measures and receipts for stains, coloring, cements, cleaners, etc.

L. S. Starrett Company: 121 Crescent Street, Athol, MA 01331, 978-249-3551, FAX: 978-249-8495.

• This website includes information about the Mayflower, Pilgrims and Plymouth, including genealogy.

Medieval Woodworking Resources: Tools & Technology: Gary R.Halstead

• This site includes information on medieval carpenter's tools and museums with tools that are located in Europe.

Mercer Museum: Pine and Ashland Streets, Doylestown, PA, (215) 345-0210.

• "Conversations in Collecting: Bucks County in the 20th Century."

Mid-West Tool Collectors Association: P.O. Box 8016, Berkeley, CA 94707-8016.

•   Wrench Glossary

Mocotagan: A nice website describing crooked knives, which is, unfortunately, no longer available. Elliot Sayward, now deceased, had posted this information. If anyone finds a new link for crooked knives, please let us know.

• Natalia Paruz plays the MUSICAL SAW, keeping this old American tradition of making music with a carpenter's saw alive.  History of musical saws, sound clips, composers manual, CDs, poetry that mentions saws, etc.

Mystic Seaport: P.O. Box 6000, 75 Greenmanville Avenue, Mystic, CT 06355-0990, 860-572-0711.

• A maritime museum including a "bustling 19th-century village of tall ships and historic buildings, exhibit galleries brimming with the culture of seafaring lives, and a unique shipyard where the nearly lost art of wooden shipbuilding endures."

National Ornamental Metal Museum: 374 Metal Museum Drive, Memphis, TN 38106, 901-774-6380.

• Stanley, Fafnir Bearing, Landers, North & Judd and American Hardware are included in this museum.

New England Historic Genealogical Society

• Great Migration Study Project

New Hampshire Historical Society: 30 Park Street, Concord, NH 03301-6384, 603/228-6688.

• "The museum re-creates the daily work activities and community celebrations of a rural
19th-century town in authentic -- living history -- fashion."

Old Woodworking Machines

• "Information on the history, restoration and use of vintage woodworking machinery."

Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture: P.O. Box 8781, Williamsburg, VA 23187-8781Telephone: (757)-221-1110, FAX: (757) 221-1047, E-mail: ieahc1@facstaff.wm.edu.

• "Exclusively dedicated to the advancement of study, research, and publications bearing on the history and culture of early America to approximately 1815"

Oyster Bay Historical Society:  P.O. Box 297, 20 Summit Street, Oyster Bay, New York 11771-0297,  (516) 922-5032.

• A museum of art, architecture and culture.  Its Phillips Library is "a major resource for residents and scholars with interests in genealogy, maritime history, New England history, or documents relating to the museum's vast and diverse collections."

Papawswrench: 1711 W. Willis St. , Alvin , Tx. 77511; 979-482-0626.

• Dedicated to collectors , buyers , and sellers of old adjustable screw wrenches, monkey wrenches, alligator wrenches, vintage end wrenches, and others.

Pigeon, Joseph A. Grave Locator entry. Some sailing ship keeper and belaying pins that belonged to Joseph A. Pigeon reside in the museum collection. Pigeon worked on a number of naval ships throughout his career and owned boat shops in Taunton and Charlestown, Massachusetts.

Popular Woodworking University: Ayer, MA. (978)772-0030. sdbranam@gmail.com.

Robbins Museum of Archaeology: 17 Jackson Street, Middleboro, MA 02346-0700, 508 947-9005.

• This site has several bibliographies on tool manufacturers including: Belknap Blue Grass, Brown & Sharpe, Capewell, Craftsman, Dietzgen, Disston, Keen Kutter, Luftkin, Millers Falls, Red Devil, Stanley, Starrett and Winchester.

Saugus Iron Works: National Historic Site, 244 Central Street, Saugus, MA 01906-2107, 781-233-0050.

• "37 buildings that are home to vast collections of fine and decorative arts, paintings, folk sculpture, weathervanes, decoys, quilts, toys, dolls, circus memorabilia and more. Even the buildings are historic, with traditional New England structures dotting the Museum's beautifully landscaped 45 acres."

Slater Mill Historic Site: 175 Main Street, Pawtucket, Rhode Island 02860, 401-725-8638.

• A collection of early American tools and implements located at the Kent Furnace site, Route 7, Kent, CT.

Smithsonian National Museum of American History: 14th Street and Constitution Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C.

• "The purpose of this Society shall be to further the exchange of ideas and information among scholars of various disciplines who study the literature and culture of America to approximately 1800."

Society for the History of Technology (SHOT): Department of the History of Science Medicine, and Technology, 216B Ames Hall, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218, (410) 516-8349 FAX: (410) 516-7502.

• "Directories of historical society listings [for the whole country] are the result of contributions from dozens of volunteers."

Squantum (Squanto, Tisquantum): The website contains information about his life history.

• This website is an important information source containing tons of information on Stanley Planes.

Tillers International: Cook's Mill Learning Center, 10515 East OP Avenue, Scotts, MI 49088.

Trade Axe & Tomahawk Collectors Association

• "Devoted to the exchange of information about, and images of early trade axes and tomahawks, and to share the joy of collecting these."

Timber Framers Guild: PO Box 60, Becket, MA 01223, Phone and fax 888-453-0879.

• "The online place to learn about the tools and trades that made America."

Tremont Nail: 8 Elm Street, Wareham, MA 02571, 800-842-0560

• Established in 1819, nail makers for over 180 years, the present nail factory has about 60 nail machines and was completed in 1848. Through all the changes and the hurried pace of modern industry the same product is still being produced for customers who prefer the superior holding power and durability of this time-tested nail.

Understanding the Colonial Economy: This website is part of the National Council on Economic Education and offers lesson plans for teachers.

• This website contains reprints of many references written by Pete Taran in The Fine Tool Journal on Disston saws and other saw related information.

The Virtual Tools Museum: Southern Polytechnic State University.

• A classic center-chimney house with period rooms furnished to show changes in the cultural life from 1750 to 1850.  There are permanent exhibits of dolls, toys and dollhouses.  Its home, the Sloan-Raymond-Fitch House, was constructed in 1757.  A description is on the web at http://www.wiltonnewyork.com/HeritageM.htm and http://chuckrichards.net/~phil/history/museum.htm.

Winterthur Museum: Winterthur, DE 19735, 800-448-3883.

• "A museum of early American decorative arts that opened to the public in 1951. The collection of more than

  89,000 objects spans the years 1640-1860 and is displayed in two buildings, the Period Rooms and the
  Galleries."

Worcester Historical Museum:  30 Elm Street, Worcester, MA 01609, 508/753-8278.

Yesteryears Tools: Tom Lamond, 30 Kelsey Place, Lynbrook, NY 11563.

• This link will take you to their search page, where you can look up a mystery tool by its name, shape or craft.  The link is to the English site, but they also have French and Flemish(?) ones.

Canada

• A digital library providing access to 1,834,223 pages of Canada's printed heritage. It features works published from the time of the first European settlers up to the early 20th Century.  ECO is produced by the Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions (CIHM), a nonprofit organization for preserving and providing access to early Canadian publications, first on microfiche and now online.

MacLachlan Woodworking Museum: 2993 Hwy 2 East at Grass Creek Park, Kingston, Ontario, Canada K7L 2Z3, (613) 542-0543 Fax (613) 547-5968.

• Mon. - Fri. - 9 a.m. - 9 p.m., Sat. - 10 a.m. - 6 p.m., Sun. - noon - 5 p.m., Holidays - noon - 5 p.m.

The Tool Group of Canada: 2929 Elgin Mills Road, Markham.

Denmark

• Museum in a former cloth mill. Exhibitions of early Danish industry: The Brede Værk, I.C.Modewegs Vej, 2800 Lyngby.
• The Open-Air Museum: Kongevejen 100, 2800 Lyngby.

France

• Currently this website is only in French, a look at the history of sheep shears and some of the makers of shears.

Germany

• "The museum not only sets out to investigate the historical development of the natural sciences, technology and industry, but also to demonstrate their cultural significance."

Deutsches Werkzeugmuseum: Historisches Zentrum Remscheid, Cleffstr. 2 - 6, 42855 Remscheid, Germany, 0 21 91/16 25 19, Fax 0 21 91/16 31 55.

• German tool museum.

Germanisches National Museum: Kartausergasse 1, D-90402 Nurnberg.

• 15,000 woodworking tools (mostly planes).  The website is in German.

Städtisches Museum: Am Löwenwall, DE-38100 Braunschweig, Germany.

• The museum of the Bremen Joiners' Guild includes displays of tools, a workshop, and antique steam-powered machinery, the website is in German.

Italy

• "The museum's material is divided between two sections devoted to pale-ethnology and ethnography. The pale-ethnological section mainly concentrates on Latium prehistory and protohistory, with exhibits from the local human settlements dating from the Iron Age onwards."

Museo Del Falegname (The Joiner's Museum): Via Papa Giovanni, 59 24030 Almenno S. Bartolomeo (Bergamo), tel. +39-035-549198.

• It has "the aim of collecting together all the pre-Roman antiquities of Latium, southern Etruria and Umbria, and mostly contains finds from excavation conducted in Latium between the Tiber and the sea and belonging to the Etruscan and Faliscan civilizations."

Netherlands

• Netherlands Maritime Museum Amsterdam.

Sweden

• "The central museum for the culture of older times in Sweden, above all the prehistoric and medieval times of the country. It manages the central archaelogical collection of the country and is the museum responsible for the archaeological field. "

United Kingdom

• It contains one of the world's great collections of Roman, Anglo-Saxon, Viking and other medieval tools.  An essential reference for The Davistown Museum.

The Canal Museum, Stoke Bruene: Towcester, Northamptonshire NN12 7SE, Telephone 01604 862229.

• "An internationally important collection of edge-tools and cutlery, mainly from Sheffield, but with complementary material from Britain and the rest of the world."

Jorvik Viking Centre: Coppergate, York Y01 9WT, UK.

• "A wide ranging collection of articles covering all aspects of maritime history, although the general emphasis will reflect reflect our own interest in naval history. We will continue to publish original naval documents from the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th centuries."

Museum of English Rural Life: The University of Reading, Whiteknights, PO Box 229, Reading RG6 6AG, Berkshire, England. Telephone: (0118) 9318660. Fax: 0118 9751264.

• An excellent collection of Roman iron tools; also some nice Viking tools.  The London Museum is in a new modern building with wonderful display spaces, but the main entrance is very difficult to locate.  Take a bus to St. Paul's cathedral and hunt around the back streets - its worth the struggle to find it.

Museum of St Albans: Hatfield Road, St Albans, Hertfordshire AL1 3RR, UK, Telephone 01727 819340, Fax 44 01727 837472, Email a.wheeler@stalbans.gov.uk

• The Salaman collection of trade tools, an excellent hand (mainly woodworking) tool collection.

National Maritime Museum: Greenwich, LONDON SE10 9NF, UK.

National Museum and Gallery, Cardiff: Cathays Park, Cardiff, CF 10 3NP, +44 (0) 29 2039 7951.

• The Mary Rose Museum is part of this complex.  When the Mary Rose sunk during the reign of Henry VIII (1545), a large cache of carpenter's tools went down with the ship (along with +/- 700 crew).  Approximately 20 planes and many other tools have been recovered and provide information about the design and forms of woodworking tools at the beginning of the 16th century in England.  Please see our comments on the Mary Rose as well as the introduction to Goodman's British Planemakers from 1700.

Salisbury and South Wiltshire Museum: The King's House, 65 The Close, Salisbury, Wiltshire, SP1 2EN, United Kingdom, +44 (0) 1722 332151.

• "The Museum's fine archaeological collection traces Man's activities from the Old Stone Age to the Saxon period.  Flint and bone tools, pottery and [bronze age] metalwork..."  There is also an exhibit on Stonehenge.

The Science Museum: (Victoria & Albert Museum) Exhibition Road, South Kensington, London SW7 2DD, United Kingdom, +44 (0)870 870 4771

• The Science Museum is part of the Victoria and Albert complex of Museums in South Kensington and a must visit for anyone interested in the history of technology.  It contains the most comprehensive exhibition on the history of the development of the steam engine of any museum.

Sheffield Industrial Museums: Kelham Island Museum, Alma St., Sheffield S3 8RY, UK, 0114 272 2106.

• The story of Sheffield and the history that made the city the steel capital of the world.

Tool Archives: A community-driven archive of information on the history of Hand Tools, Power Tools, Vises, and Tool Storage Solutions

Tools and Trades History Society: Southay, Trull, Taunton TA3 7EX, UK.

Webster Instrument Signature Database: A comprehensive database of signatures found on tools and instruments.

White's 1857 Directory of Derbyshire:

• This website includes a Sheffield alphabetical directory of names and another of trades and professions.