Whats-It?

Here I will picture some tools we have not been able to identify in hopes that you might have some clue as to their intended use. Any serious suggestions will be much appreciated.

If you have one you are curious about, send me a good picture and we'll list it here. No price tags on any of these.

Send an e-mail to me at toolman@gatctools.com. Any suggestions will be appreciated and carefully considered.

A dealer friend found this and wondered what it may have been used for. 
It certainly looks a bit like a barking spud, but how to handle it?  Any ideas?

Mike Carron writes: Regarding the "Barking Spud". The tool looks like it would have been very handy for stripping wooden shingles or tar and gravel from roofs.
The spade part could get under the shingle and by pushing down on the handle the shingles would pop up. The way the handle is reinforce it would appear
the tool slides flat the way you have it shown and then downward force can be applied to leverage the spade end up. Although the design is different
roofing spuds are still used today. Just my thoughts.   Mike Caron   2/12/12

Thanks, Mike.

Richard sends this protractor,originally (to him) belonging to his grandfather. Intricate markings, perhaps hand stamped, measuring to the tenth of a degree. He writes: "I don't know how clear the picture was for you but looking at the actual tool it is appearent it is handmade yet it has elaborate markings to allow for 10ths of a degree measurements. My grandfather was a carpenter. Most of his tools were from the late 1800's. This tool doesn't seem to fit his work. The best match I can find for such a tool is a machinest protractor but machine tools in the late 1800's weren't really capable of 10th of a degree accuracy. It is ironic that someone would make a handmade protractor with all the obvious and expected roughness of a handmade tool from that era and yet make it to measure a angle to 10th of a degree!"

May, 2007 - I received this message:

I was looking through your site and came across your “what is it?” It indeed could be a machinist or woodworking tool, but there is another possibility. At an antique show a couple years ago I saw a similar device that was used during the late 1700s as a targeting device for artillery. It was placed on the barrel and in some fashion used to site the cannon. There is enough similarity between your piece and the one I saw to merit research along that line. Good luck!

George Short

Campton, New Hampshire

Bruce writes:
I came across your website on a search for leather tools. As a background, I have a custom leatherworking business 
and deal in older leather tools a bit also. I noticed you are looking for DR Barton tools. I have one I picked up 
a month or so ago. At first I thought it might have been a tool for making beadlines on leather. The more I look
at it and ask around, I am more inclined to think it is a woodworker's tool.  It has a half rounded concave profile 
on the bottom and toe of the tool. 

I am attaching some pictures of it and would appreciate any insight you might have on it. 

    
I just found (quite by accident) a tool called a "Slice Gouge" on Page 196 of Alvin Sellens book, "Dictionary of American Hand Tools".
I quote: "A gouge with a unique bend. Listed as a ship builder's tool." (10/13/2011 - Walt Lane)