10/10/2016 by Scheong

Unlocking the Past: Straits Chinese Keyholders (ca. 1890)

On the last day of my trip through Malaysia, Singapore and Tokyo, Japan I decided to make the most of the last few hours that I had before making the customary mad dash for the airport at the eleventh hour.

To make this a reality, I as usual, headed out bargain-hunting! I wasn’t expecting to find anything – antiques in Malaysia are usually pretty pricey and outrageous as far as value for money goes. But with nothing else with which to occupy my time, I went hunting anyway.

I’d spent about an hour or so at the Amcorp Mall flea-market (the only such market really worth visiting in KL), and was beginning to give up hope until I took a detour into a shop called “Teh Collectible” – big red sign with swirly, yellow letters on it.

The shop was jammed with all kinds of antiques, from suitcases to typewriters, sewing machines to cameras, tiffin-carriers, furniture and all kinds of dusty, kitchy junk. The display-cabinets were full of all kinds of miscellaneous bric-a-brac, from watches to porcelain and novelty drinkware.

In amongst all this detritus, I stumbled across a pair of nondescript yellow-metal items. I freely admitted that my heart skipped a beat – I knew what these things were – but I also knew that they were rare, and therefore, likel to be expensive. Like I said, most antiques in Malaysia are heavily overpriced.

Anyway, I tried my luck and after a lot of haggling, I was able to chip down a third off of the price, and came away with these:

Never seen them before? No idea what they are? Curious? Interested? Intrigued?

I’m sure you are! After all, these haven’t been made in about 100 years! But what are they? Earrings? Brooches? Hairclips?

Not even close!

What we’ve got here is a pair of Straits Chinese or ‘Peranakan’ keyholders! I wouldn’t be surprised if you’ve never heard of, or seen them before – most people haven’t. Even those of us who are into antiques! So how do they work? What do you do with them? Why do they even exist??

Peranakan Keyholders – What are they?

Keyholders like these were made by Peranakan ‘baba’ silversmiths and goldsmiths for the Peranakan communities of southeast Asia – specifically those living in Singapore, Malaya and the Dutch East Indies. The Peranakan were famous for their desire to decorate and ornament everything that they owned – even their keyrings!

Keyholders like these are made up of a repousse frontpiece, a flat backpiece, a free-hanging keyring, and a long, flat fastening hook or clasp on the back, used to attach the keyholder to one’s clothing.

How do they work?

Keys were fitted onto the ring at the bottom of the holder. The long metal clip on the back of the holder was slipped onto a person’s belt, or the hem of their trousers, if they were men, or skirts – usually a sarong – if they were women. Here, the keyholder would remain until it was needed. Obviously holders like these could only hold a few keys at a time, but as with most things Peranakan – form tended to come before function. How pretty an item appeared was just as, or even more important, than what it actually did!

The keyholders clipped to my grandmother’s nyonya belt. This is how such accessories or pieces of jewelry would’ve been worn by the Peranakan, back at the turn of the last century.

How old are they?

Keyholders like these became redundant with the increasing embracement by the Peranakan, of European-style clothing. Trousers and shorts with pockets, and different styles of dressing made such accessories and trinkets as decorative keyholders unnecessary, and by the second quarter of the 20th century, only Peranakan men or women who still retained more traditional dress-styles would’ve been able to wear such keyholders with their outfits.

This being the case, Peranakan keyholders like these would’ve dated from the late 19th century up to around 1910 or 1920. Hallmarked silver Peranakan keyholders which I’ve seen online have been dated back to the 1890s. Keyholders were unlikely to have been made beyond the start of the 1930s – the Great Depression hit many Peranakan fortunes hard, and it would’ve been hard to justify spending so much money on a keyholder!

What are they made of?

These specific keyholders are made of copper or brass, but Peranakan keyholders were also made of silver – sometimes gilt (plated in gold) to make them more attractive. Many keyholders included intricate repousse designs to their fronts, and elaborate decorations to the fasteners or hooks behind them. Holders made of silver would’ve been manufactured in the Peranakan enclaves of Singapore, Penang and Malacca. They usually had Chinese-style hallmarks stamped onto the clasps at the back, generally composed of the fineness mark denoting purity of silver, and the silversmith’s maker’s mark in Chinese characters.

Although you could buy, or have commissioned just one keyholder, they also seemed to have been sold in sets. The ones I have are a matched pair. That said, most of the others which I’ve seen online appear to be singles, each one of a unique and individual design, made of either gold, silver or copper. The sheer variety of styles in which something as simple as a key-hook could come in just shows the incredible levels of artistry to which Peranakan silversmiths and jewelers could reach.

Closing Remarks

Anyway. There we have it! Peranakan keyholders! So, are these things rare? Special? Unique? Why am I writing about them?

I’m writing about them because my grandmother and her family were all Peranakan, and their culture has fascinated me ever since I was made aware of this fact. Peranakan antiques are getting incredibly rare these days, and I really wanted to try and collect and preserve all that I can find.

Peranakan porcelain, silverware, clothing and jewelry are all pretty rare, but even if they are rare, some items are still better-known than others. Slippers, kebaya, sarong, belts, kerongsang (sets of three brooches on a chain) and tiffin-carriers are pretty well-known Peranakan antiques – keyholders on the other hand?? Not so much! That’s why I felt that they were deserving of their own post! I hope you enjoyed this and that you’ll return again soon! I’m always looking for new things to write about and post.

26/09/2016 by Scheong

Tarnished Treasures of the Orient – Antique Brass Tiffin Carrier!

As I write this, I’m sweltering and suffering under the obscene heat and humidity of the South Pacific. And no, I’m not talking about a certain 1950s musical created by Messrs Rodgers & Hammerstein, but rather, the oppressive climate of Malaysia and Singapore, where I’ve been seconded to light duties – AKA – on vacation!! :p

I’m actually here visiting relatives and taking in the sights – some of which I’ve seen loads of times before, but which are always worthwhile taking in again – for any number of reasons, which I won’t elaborate on – not in this posting, anyway!!

No! No, the reason for this posting is because of what happened a few days ago. I was lucky enough in my first few days in Malaysia to visit the Amcorp Mall sunday flea-market in Kuala Lumpur. For those of you who love old nicknacks, antiques and bric-a-brac, the Amcorp Mall flea market really is a lovely place – for one thing – it’s indoors, and it’s air-conditioned – even if, as my cousin said – it’s really a place where one should look and not intend to purchase!

Whatever!! My cousins and I went there and had a thoroughly enjoyable time, perusing the antiques and bric-a-brac, toys, computer-games, DVDs, brassware, watches, and other things which the dozens of sellers had, spread over many tables over three floors of the Amcorp Mall department store. And after spending about two hours there, I came away with this:

Antique brass tiffin carrier. Ca. 1900.

A very friendly and well-spoken elderly Indian gentleman sold this to me. He had a table loaded with all kinds of antique brassware and enamelware, including about half a dozen antique tiffin carriers of different sizes and styles.

My eyes were jumping back and forth between a big brass one, and a rather worn-out, sky-blue enamel affair with obvious links to the Straits Chinese community of Malaysia and Singapore – a subculture which I’ve long had an interest in, because of my own family history. They say a fool’s born every minute, but apparently this guy was born between fools, because he wasn’t stupid enough to not know what it was – and how valuable it was! He had a whopping price on it which was probbly justified, given its rarty, and I knew I’d never be able to get it, despite the deepest yearnings of my heart.

Heart-yearnings aside, I decided that I had to come back down off of my cloud and face reality back here on earth. I knew I couldn’t reasonably afford the Straits Chinese one, as much as I desired it, and my heart, mind and eyes turned towards the next best thing – an enormous, four-tiered antique brass affair!

There was no denying it – this tiffin carrier was pretty awesome as a runner-up. It contained four large, stacked bowls, and a lid with a built-in cup – originally for pickles – but which could be used for any condiment – chili paste, raw chili, garlic, etc. The insides of each compartment were lined in tin, and the exterior was solid brass, as was the frame, and the handle.

Although in need of some TLC, some polishing, reshaping and dent-removal, I could see potential in this piece – as well as being a good bargain. Using my nearby relations to my advantage, I was able to weedle down the price, and the seller eventually relented, agreeing to our offer. He was very gracious about the whole affair, and thanked us for our patronage.

I’ve been after a quality, working antique tiffin carrier for many years now. The problem is that they’re very hard to find in good condition – all too often the brass ones are cracked, dented, warped, broken, missing pieces, or have MASSIVE prices on them. The enamel ones are either cracked, rusted through, broken, or – like the brass ones – have enormous prices on them! It makes it difficult to find good ones at good prices. This one however – was a good one at a good price – I simply couldn’t let it get away!

So, what is tiffin…?

‘Tiffin’ is an old Anglo-Indian word meaning ‘light snack’ or ‘nibbles’, but over time, the word ‘tiffin’ evoled to mean ‘luncheon’, whereby ‘tiffin time’ meant the time for a light, refreshing midday meal. It would consist of cakes and scones, curries, rice, noodles, and local snacks common to Malaysia, Singapore, India, and many other places in southeast Asia.

…right…so what’s a ‘tiffin carrier’?

Well, if tiffin is your midday meal, then your tiffin carrier is the container you carry it around in! But tiffin carriers are not thermoses, and they are not lunchboxes – not in the conventional way, anyway.

The modern tiffin carrier, of the kind used since the 1800s, and which is still made today – evolved from an older form of device comprised of bowls stacked up and held together with a supporting framework. The idea is that each bowl or compartment held a different component of the whole meal – rice, curry, vegetables, sauces, soup, or buns, rolls, tarts and cakes – it all depends on what the food is.

My four-tier brass tiffin carrier, with condiment-container on the lid. The brass frame keeps everything braced and firm when it’s being transported.

Tiffin carriers were traditioinally made of a variety of materials – wood and porcelain were popular for domestic models – but for ones designed to be carried around (as most of them are), the usual materials were tin or nickel-plated brass, or enameled steel. Plain steel would rust far too readily in the tropics, so it was coated in enamel paint and then fired in a kiln to harden it, to create a thick, protective layer over the steel to prevent damage, wear, and contamination of food.

Modern tiffin carriers are still made of enameled steel, and brass, but you can also find them in plastic, and stainless steel as well.

Where were tiffin carriers made?

Tiffin carriers are most commonly associated these days, with India, where they are definitely still made (as well as Thailand), but they were made all over Asia – and indeed, a number of them were actually made in Europe, and shipped out to Asia!

How were tiffin carriers used?

The securing clamp was released from the top or sides of the tiffin carrier. The lid was removed, and then the individual bowls were lifted out – this could be tricky, as they’re meant to be sealed really tight! Once the bowls are separated, they’re filled with their respective foods or condiments – and then they’re re-stacked in the correct order, then they’re clamped back down to hold everything in place – some carriers have holes in the securing clamps to put bolts or locks through, to stop things accidentally springing open during transport!

Usually, foods like noodles and rice go down the bottom – components like meat, veggies or curry go in the middle, and soup, sauces and condiments go up the top – this is so that during carriage, the wet components don’t slosh and slop around so much, since they’re closer to the handle and further away from the base – which will move much more significantly if the carrier sways back and forth during transport.

packing and transporting food like this has a few advantages over the lunchbox and the thermos, which is why it’s remained popular for so long – and why they’re still made today!

For one – the various food components are kept separate – rather than mixing and mingling and contaminating each other with their flavours, like in a lunchbox or thermos – this allows you to carry a wider range of foods.

For another thing, the fact that each compartment becomes its own individual bowl means that you can eat out of a tiffin carrier in a much more comfortable way than a thermos, not having to pour things out or dig down a steel pipe to get your food out!

For a third thing – having the food compartmentalised like this means that you can share food amongst family or friends (with as many bowls as your tiffin carrier has – some have as few as two, most have three or four, some of the really big ones have five and up!), without fear of cross-contamination between the servings.

Closing Remarks

I’m so thrilled to be able to add this piece to my collection. Once I get home, I can’t wait to fix it, clean it and put it on display. When that happens, I’ll surely have a follow-up posting to this one! So keep an eye out for something showing up around mid-October!

22/09/2016 by Scheong

Flipping Antiques – Buying Low to Sell High

It’s been twelve months now, since I started selling antiques online as a hobby and a small sideline to make myself some money. The image of the struggling artist or writer might look very romantic, but it’s not very practical! Fed up with not having any serious money coming in, I embarked on this as a way to keep myself busy and make something on the side at the same time. So how did I get into this? And how can you? And what sort of things do you need to be mindful of when buying things to resell, and selling antiques and vintage things online?

I’ve already done an article on the actual process of listing and selling items, so if you’re looking for that, click here.

if not, then read on, and hopefully you’ll pick up something from the insights gained after a year of flogging antiques and bric-a-brac.

Buying Low to Sell High

Buying low to sell high (or higher, at least) is how people have been making money on almost anything and everything since the dawn of civilisation. So, where and how do you, as a picker and flipper of antiques, get in on all this?

In order to be at least moderately successful in flipping antiques, you need to be able to spot a bargain. You need to be aware of what prices items usually sell for, and how much you can reasonably expect to make from something. You also need to be able to gauge what sorts of things people will be chasing after online, and how to market your things towards this group of people.

Visit places like flea-markets, garage sales, charity or thrift-shops, and similar places to find good bargains. Search online, visit antiques shops and websites like eBay, to gauge prices and see how much something might generally sell for, and the prices that people ask for their items. This will give you a good idea of what prices are considered bargains, what you might reasonably expect to sell something for, and what prices might be considered a ripoff!

What & What Not to Buy

When trying to flip antiques and make money on them, it’s extremely important to know what, and what not to buy. This will be determined by factors such as price, rarity, condition, size, age and various other things. You need to be aware of what things are selling, and what aren’t, why, and why not.

It’s my experience that the successful sale of antiques works best if you confine yourself to three or four broad areas of interest, and that venturing out of these areas is done at your own risk! So, what are these areas?

When selling antiques, you should look for items which are useful, unusual or interesting, or cheap. Anything outside of these categories can be risky to sell, and you purchase these items for resale at your own risk!

So, what am I talking about? Let’s go through them in detail.

Selling Things Which are Useful

When selling antiques, it’s best to sell antiques which people are likely to find useful. It’s no use selling something which a person can only stare at, and appreciate from afar, or from behind a glass panel. Some people might like stuff like this, and yes you can sell stuff like that, but the fact that you can’t use an item limits who you can sell it to. Most items are expensive enough without also having to pay for them to be serviced. This is one reason why things like antique pocket watches are often huge money-pits.

Antiques which are useful and which can be used on a regular basis are ones which are likely to sell, because people can see them, appreciate them, and also put them to good use. They’re not just cute decorative objects which do nothing but take up space and collect dust. Antique clocks, sewing machine, cigarette lighters, and various types of metalware generally fall into this category. Hard-wearing objects designed to look nice, but also take a significant daily beating.

Selling Things which are Unusual or Interesting

Along with antiques which are useful or functional, another broad area where antiques tend to sell well, are ones which are either unusual, odd or interesting. People like owning something which is out-of-the-ordinary, whacky, weird, or otherwise unusual. These thhings draw attention, and are also great conversation-pieces! That said, these things will only sell if people can appreciate their unusual nature, or if the seller (you!) knows what the item is, what its purpose is, and how it works.

Weird and unusual things either sell pretty quickly, because people love how whacky they are, or they can sit for ages, because nobody knows what they are! It’s sort of a double-edged sword, so approach this area of buying for resale with caution. You might end up with loads of extremely interesting things which nobody is interested in!

Selling Things which are Cheap!

This one is tricky. What is ‘cheap’ from one person to another is highly relative, and one person’s ‘cheap’ could be another person’s ‘expensive’. Buying things cheaply to sell them at a healthy profit requires a lot of knowledge and experience, though. You need to be able to spot a bargain and know that something being sold for a low price could, if you play your cards right, be flipped for a high price. It’s not always easy, but it can be done. Just don’t get too greedy!

For example, if you buy something for $5.00 and you know it’s probably worth $150, then instead of trying to reach that high, try $100, or $70, or $50 instead. This will allow the potential buyer to get something which might be extremely expensive, at a relatively cheap price, while also giving you a healthy profit. It’s when you get too greedy and try to milk more out of the cow than it can give, that you’re liable to get stuck with merchandise you can’t move!

To Restore or Not to Restore?

Whether or not you restore something before you sell it can be a highly contentious issue in the antiques world. My gut-feeling is that one should follow what the experts do, and most antiques flippers and dealers who do this for more than a hobby tend to restore their antiques (if necessary or possible), prior to selling them.

“Doesn’t restoring antiques destroy their value?” I hear you ask.

Well yeah. If you have no idea what you’re doing, and you completely screw it up! But, if you’re a competent, careful and sympathetic restorer, then an antique in working condition can fetch a lot of money! And people will be more willing to pay a higher price on an antique if they know that it not only works, but that it’s been carefully cleaned, repaired, tested and put back together. Some people like buying things knowing that all the hard work has already been done for them. I flipped a $20 antique fire extinguisher for $100 all because I cleaned it and got it working again! Such things can happen if you know how to spot a bargain, and have a knack for fixing things.

Selling ‘Luxury’ Stuff

One of the hardest things to try and sell are ‘luxury antiques’. The really fancy, pretty, rare, fragile, old or expensive stuff. The problem with that is that most people don’t have buckets of money to blow on things that they don’t need. And if they are going to spend their money on antiques, then it has to be something useful, really weird or interesting, or it has to be pretty damn cheap!

There’s nothing wrong in getting a few luxury things like silver or jewelry or clocks or watches and trying to sell them, but don’t expect them to move fast, or make large profits – not unless you’re really lucky! Silver can move slowly depending on what it is, and watches and clocks can take ages! If you have a background or make a hobby of watch or clock-repair, you might be able to make a decent profit by fixing the timepiece yourself and selling it on, but if you have to pay someone else to do it – there goes all your profit!

Things like watches…even pocket watches…are extremely common. They might sell fast, but most people will not want to spend a great deal of money on them. One reason is the cost of repairs. The other reason is that because watches are so common, unless there’s something really special about them (a gold or silver case, a rare model, a really high-end piece, etc), there really isn’t the scarcity to make them worth more. Even in the antiques world, supply-and-demand still rules supreme!

Turning a Profit in Antiques

Flipping antiques for a profit can be a fun, if tricky game to play, for a number of reasons.

When you do decide to flip antiques for a profit, the important thing to consider is how you’re going to do it, what you can reasonably expect in return. As I’ve already explained, antiques can be hard to flip, for any number of reasons. Because of this, you need to be very careful in what you buy, how much you buy it for, and what you try and sell it for. Unless the price you’re asking is pretty darn cheap, more often than not, you won’t get what you actually asked for, since people will want to haggle and bargain with you.

If you’re comfortable with this (and it’s better if you are) then you can get a line of happy, satisfied, repeat customers. Being overly rigid on your prices and negotiations can and will make your stock sit…for weeks, and months, and sometimes even years!

Bought this three-piece silver condiment set at a local auction house and flipped it for five times what I paid for it. If you’re a savvy flipper, you can make pretty decent profits on your antiques.

Because of this, you should never waste the opportunity to make a good sale, but at the same time, don’t pester people to buy your stuff. Let them make their own decisions. The only time this might be a problem, however, is when you have more than one person interested in a particular item.

It can be extremely frustrating watching two people umm-and-aah over something, trying to make up their mind, and then trying to figure out who has first-dibs on it! In instances like this, I really encourage people to either make up their mind really fast, ask me to officially reserve it for them while they make up their mind, or pass. Because leaving things hanging can lead to ugly confrontations later on. Unless it’s on eBay or something, a lot of online sales are done on the basis of a gentleman’s agreement, and if the other party doesn’t like acting like one…then you’ve got real problems!

Pricing Your Antiques

One of the harder things to do with selling antiques is knowing what to price them at. This can be pretty tricky since the values and the prices on antiques vary WILDLY depending on age, condition, manufacture, condition, geographical location, condition, materials, condition, rarity and of course…condition!

The longer you shop around, visit antiques shops, bargain, haggle and stick your nose in all over the place, the sooner you’ll learn what a bargain is, and what a reasonable price might be to charge for your antiques. Part of it is up to you, and part of it is determined by what other people sell their items for. The more you look around, the more you’ll learn what a reasonable price is.

That’s not to say that what other people sell their antiques for is the correct price, and that’s not to say that what you sell your antiques for is correct, either. It’s a matter of each seller’s personal circumstances, and the nature of the item being sold.

The most important thing with flipping your antiques is making sure you can do it for a decent percentage of the purchase-price. Anywhere from 125-200% thereof. Anything less really isn’t worth it, unless the item is really hard to sell, or if you’ve had it for ages and just want to have a fire-sale to get rid of everything!

Making a Sale

I’ve already written a post about selling antiques online in general, so I won’t cover too much here in my last segment, except to say that when you do make a sale online, you should always try and tempt the buyer with whatever other stock you have for sale. Don’t just close the deal, take the money and run – take a few minutes to find out what your customer likes, what he or she collects, what they find interesting – and tempt them with similar items that you might have. For all you know, you might land two or three sales for the price of one, move loads of stock and get fat profits in the process!

Knowing how to sell and how to tempt and interest your customers is part of being able to move your things fast and make healthy profits on the things you buy. Being stubborn and pernickity will cause sales to stall, for people to lose interest, and for you to start losing money! So be patient when you have to be, and fast-thinking when you need to be, to find good bargains and make good sales.

09/09/2016 by Scheong

Back to School: A History Lesson at the Archives

A few weeks ago, I wrote a blog-entry about an old 1930s cigarette-lighter I found at my local flea-market. Although it was rather worse for wear, I was able to pull it apart, clean it, put it back together and with a bit of cotton-wadding, a fresh wick, a new flint and a squirt of lighter-fluid, was able to get it working again.

I recently got a chance to head back to my old school, and while I was there, I got the chance to visit the archives. Many thanks to Paul, the school archivist, for giving me such a detailed tour of the archives and the various record rooms filled with all kinds of historical papers and records from the school’s past.

I fully admit that the main purpose in heading to the archives was to get a better idea about the history and context of the lighter that I’d found:

It had my school’s coat of arms on it, and I wanted to know why. In going to the archives, I wanted to find out more about it, and the sort of world it came from.

The school’s museum didn’t provide a direct answer, but it did show me that old school-branded merchandise was not nearly as rare as I had first supposed. I was surprised to see that there quite a lot of school branded objects on display, including crockery, napkin-rings, an ashtray, cigarette cases, books and educational equipment, and various other pieces of bric-a-brac donated to the school over the course of many years.

Modesty forbid, but while I had known that Scotch has long had a reputation for being a rather prestigious private school, and rather an old one, I’d never realised the extent to which it went, when it came to merchandising! Nor how far back this merchandising went.

A selection of 1930s cigarette lighters, bearing the school’s coat of arms. My lighter is bottom right.

One of the things I saw was a selection of antique cigarette lighters, most similar in one way or another, to my own. None of them were in working condition, but I was surprised about the extent to which the school went in selling branded products to its students, parents, and presumably – schoolmasters, back in the 1920s and 30s.

In walking through the archives, I saw all kinds of tantalising hints of the school’s history, and the sort of institution it started out as. Most of the artefacts dated to around 1916-1926, the ten-year period during which the school moved to its current campus in Hawthorn, in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne. It never really dawned on me until now, just how much Australian schools tried to model themselves on the old ‘public schools’ of England, like Eton, Harrow and St. Peter’s. They even had the boater hats!

Old Scotch College boaters. The badges on the hat-band could be removed and changed. A whole system of badges used to exist, reflecting the different student-rankings.

Paul said these classic icons of summertime headwear came and went over the decades, finally dying out after the Second World War. Apparently, some students still wear these during specific sporting events (rowing races, and so-forth), but it’s been many decades since they were a regular part of the school uniform.

Talking of things which didn’t stand the test of time, here’s another one: the school dressing gown! Bright red with decorative piping on the cuffs…wow!!

School dressing-gowns! These were worn by the boarders who resided in the school’s boarding-houses up on The Hill, at the far end of the campus.

That’s something you definitely don’t see every day!

Here’s some of the other school tobacconalia that I found:

Here we’ve got a tobacco jar, with its airtight lid, an ashtray, a matchbox holder, and a school-badged bottle-opener, which I thought was pretty neat. In the corner you can also see a cigarette case. One thing that Paul said they got a lot of was crockery and china, which you can actually see quite a lot of:

I’d like to imagine that these things were used up in the boarding houses, or in the staff-room or the headmaster’s residence, back in the 1910s and 1920s. Most of the stuff is from the 20s or 30s, easily dated by the school coat of arms, some is a bit older, again, dated by the coat of arms.

One thing which the school doesn’t really have anymore, and which I’ve never seen anyone wear, apart from junior-school students, are the school caps or hats. Personally I think this is a bit of a shame – it can get surprisingly nippy in Melbourne in winter, and blazing hot in the summer! I still remember the bloody ugly grey floppy bucket-hats we had to wear when I was in Year One! The school badges were stuck on with some sort of sloppy glue, and it peeled right off if the hat got wet.

One of the more interesting things on display at the archives was this amazing contraption:

This beast of a thing looks more at home in a machinist’s shop than a school classroom! And it’s a pretty impressive bit of kit, even if you’ve no idea what it even does!

So uh…w-what is it?

It’s a dual-purpose mechanical apple-peeler and corer! You stick the apple on the end of the spike, crank this puppy at high speed, and watch the blades peel the skin off, and drill through the middle of the apple at the same time, removing the core and seeds! I’m guessing this was used back in the days when tardy students paid for their lateness or truancy with apples for the teacher. There must’ve been quite a lot of tardy students if they needed an industrial apple-peeler to handle all the peace-offerings!

Right?

Nah! Actually this was used in the boarding-houses up on the Hill, the boarding-house area of the campus. It was used to process the hundreds of apples eaten by the boarders every day.

In looking through the archives, I was amazed to see the extent to which the school had gone to in preserving its history – and the type of history it preserved, as well! Not just uniforms and hats and badges, bags and badged paraphernalia, but also all kinds of documents.

There were two huge steel fireproof safes in the archives, loaded with old account books of school fees and admissions, record books loaded with the names, ages, addresses, and parents of students, going all the way back to the 1850s, including that of a certain…John Monash…aged 12!

After being given a truly comprehensive and impressive tour of the archives, which also included a glimpse into all the stuff they had put away in storage, it made me feel a little sad that all these items were all vying for space in such a tiny museum, made up of just two small rooms and four specially-built display towers.

While the layout and organisation of the archives and museum have certainly changed (and in my mind – improved!) since last I was there – which was a bloody long time ago!…I feel that there’s still a fair way to go. There’s so many amazing things which the students and past students, and parents could see…but can’t, because there’s nowhere to put it, nowhere to show it, and as the archivist told me himself – no chance to see it, even if there was somewhere to show it – purely because the curriculum at the school is so packed. Even in the history classes, which would be the ones most likely to make use of the archives.

Indeed, when I was in Scotch…which was over ten years ago, now…I remember visiting the archives exactly…ONCE. In thirteen years.

Rather sad, isn’t it? Hopefully in the years to come, things will change, and more students, and past students will become aware of the archive and museum, and perhaps take a bit more interest in it, although even those who want to don’t often get the chance – even when they’re at school, which I think is a shame.

06/09/2016 by Scheong

Sterling Silver Geo. V pillbox by Deakin & Francis (1913).

I picked this up today after attending an appointment across town this morning. I had some time to kill and I found it in one of the local charity shops.

It’s an adorable little sterling silver pillbox, made in Birmingham in 1913 (or at least it was assayed in Birmingham in 1913). I think it’s just adorable. The bordering on the lid, the engraving, and the curly ‘R.W’ initials on the lid just scream the Edwardian era – a truly stylish and glamorous period of history!

Dent-Removal on Antique Silverware

The box was rather badly damaged when I got it – there were two or three nasty dings on the edge of the lid, and one very sharp dent on the side, near the bottom of the box. Fortunately, careful pressing, rolling and a modicum of hammering with a suitably-shaped, suitably-sized object managed to beat out the worst of the dents, so that it looks almost as good as new! There are a couple of microscopic dimples still there, but the end result I achieved is good enough!

Removing dents on antique silverware can be challenging, and for a number of reasons. How easily a dent can be removed generally depends on where the dent is located, and how bad it is. Generally speaking, dents on edges, corners and bases are tricky – and anything which is overly angled or curved is a real pickle!

The good news about removing dents on antique silver is that silver is a soft metal.

The bad news about removing dents on antique silver is that silver is a soft metal.

That means that dents – provided you can get a tool in there and work on it properly – are usually easy to remove, pop out and smooth over. The problem is that because silver is a soft metal, deforming it, over-pressing, cracking, or even ripping a hole right through the silver, is a real danger! Especially if the silver used is of an especially thin gauge!

I’ve removed the dents on a fair few pieces of antique silver in my time, and I’ve generally been successful. I’ve never destroyed a piece, but removing dents is something which is relative. Unless you’re a professional, it’s unlikely that you’ll ever remove the dent entirely – but it is possible to greatly lessen the impression of a dent, almost to the point of invisibility, if you work on it with patience and care.

Generally speaking, to remove dents in silver it’s not actually necessary to ‘hammer out’ a dent. More often than not, the generally accepted procedure is to ‘press out’ a dent – put something hard and of the right size and shape on the underside of the dent – and using ordinary pressure – simply smooth and force the dent out by hand. In most cases, this is sufficient to pop or smooth the dent out and improve the appearance of a piece of silverware significantly.

Only apply actual hammering or whacking if simple pressing really really doesn’t work! At any rate, the end result is extremely pleasing, and it’s the perfect little place to put my peppermints in!

Who Made It?

The maker’s mark of (D)&(F) (Deakin & Francis) was clear and easily read. Apparently they were quite prolific silversmiths, and appear to have made a wide range of items, dating back to the 1780s. According to this website, they’re still around today! All I can say is, they seem to make beautiful things, if this little pillbox is anything to go by!

30/08/2016 by Scheong

Using Your Antiques – Having Fun with History

One question I do occasionally get asked from people, when I tell them that my main hobby is collecting antiques, is:

“Why?”

Or more precisely:

“What do you do with them!?”

Well, to answer that publicly: It depends!

A discussion held with the mother of a longtime friend prompted this posting, and it made me think about my antiques, and what I do, or don’t do with them. And I decided it’d be interesting to examine the issue and share the answer in detail. So, what is the answer?

In short, the answer is that unless the antique is particularly fragile, small or breakable, the overwhelming chances are that I’ll probably just…use it! – as an everyday object, which I admit, I do with a lot of my antiques on a regular basis.

At least 2-3 times a week, I shave with my antique razor, from the 1880s…

I sharpen the blade, I strop the edge, and I put cold steel to my neck at least every 2-3 days, and I don’t just go through the motions – it really does shave!

On top of that, I write with my antique and vintage fountain pens from the 1910s and 1920s, 30s and 40s when I work or when I have to write out drafts or take notes. When I go to the theatre or out to some big, public event, I bring along a pair of opera glasses or binoculars from my collection of antiques, dating back as far as the 1880s…

If I’m going to see something particularly far away, then it might be my pocket telescope, from the 1890s…

If I need to tell the time, I keep a watch in my pocket, secured by a chain…

…this silver beauty is from 1925; and I have another gold-filled railroad chronometer from 1950 which I use every day.

Of course, antiques aren’t always the cute pretty things, they’re also the useful, serviceable things that we like to buy and use and decorate our homes and rooms with. Just last night, I smashed up some chili, ginger, garlic, salt, pepper and tomatoes in this antique Dutch brass mortar and pestle, while I was cooking dinner. Yes, it’s 200 years old, but these were made for regular pounding and grinding – my using it was never going to damage it if centuries of use haven’t done so already! And apart from anything else, using this instead of a food-processor is just so much more fun to do!!

That said, I don’t use all my antiques. Some are just too large, too small, too old or fragile to use on a daily, or even infrequent basis. These are ones which I collect mainly to enjoy, to photograph, to use for demonstrative purposes, or to protect and restore for future generations (what? That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it!!).

Is it Safe to use Antiques?

Provided that you use your antiques for the purposes for which they were intended, and don’t overtax their abilities, for the most part, it’s perfectly safe to use your antiques. of course, some things hold up better than others. Antique metalware, silverware, mechanical antiques, brassware, furniture, musical or scientific instruments, tools, domestic appliances and pieces of specialist equipment tend to hold up better, as they were intended to be used on a regular basis, anyway. So long as you store them properly, look after them, maintain them and clean them, they’ll be in no danger of damage.

Other pieces should be treated with more care. Books, newspapers, textiles and fabrics, glassware and porcelain can still be used, but are best kept for occasional use, or for special occasions. That’s not to say that you can’t use it, but it’s best to keep it for instances where you really want to show them off.

Items made of natural products (ivory, bone, leather, etc) can decay or deteriorate over time. Depending on what these items are, they should be used sparingly, or not at all. Antique leather, especially, is prone to drying out, cracking, ripping and tearing. Unless you moisturize it regularly with appropriate leather-treatment ointments and creams, it can deteriorate very quickly from improper or heavy use.

So, is it safe to use and enjoy the antiques that you have in your collection? Or do you have to keep them locked up in safes, behind glass, and in protective steel cages?

In general – yes, it is safe, provided the item isn’t obviously fragile or prone to damage, and provided you use it in a manner, and for the purpose with which it was intended.

That said, it is entirely up to you whether you use something or not. There’s no law saying that you have to use your antiques, and there’s no rule that says you can’t use them; just keep in mind that future generations will likely look upon you with scorn or smirking, if you used something recklessly and smashed it, or kept something perfectly useful up on some sort of pedestal out of a misplaced fear of damaging it!

21/08/2016 by Scheong

Old School Lift-Arm Lighter. Ca. 1932

I woke up this morning to soggy grey clouds, blustery winds and rain dribbling down in fat, wobbly round droplets, all apparently determined to ruin my day in one way or another.

Deciding that I wasn’t going to stay at home all day, I rugged up and headed out into the cold and damp to go bargain hunting, which is my usual Sunday habit. Some people go to church on Sundays. I go to market.

I spent the morning wandering around the local antiques shops and the usual Sunday market. The rain had driven most people away. There were fewer people at the market, and fewer stallholders as well, so I didn’t really expect to find much. Until I stumbled across a grubby little metallic object on a table. It didn’t look like much, but I picked it up and decided to have a look at it anyway. It didn’t cost much, and in the end, I decided to take a gamble, and bought it.

And this is what I bought:

What we have here is an old-fashioned ‘lift-arm’ cigarette lighter, of the kind that was popular from the 1900s to the 1930s. It’s made of brass, and is plated in nickel and manufactured in Germany. Research tells me that it was retailed by a local tobacconists’s shop, probably back in the 1920s or 1930s. But that isn’t what makes it special to me and that isn’t why I bought it.

I purchased it because of the big blue crest or coat of arms that you see affixed to the front of it. I purchased it because of the big blue coat of arms for two reasons.

It’s the coat of arms of my old highschool, which I attended for many years.
WHY does a cigarette lighter (and such an old one!) have my school’s coat of arms on it?

These were the reasons I bought the lighter. It just seemed so out-of-the-ordinary and strange! I’d never seen anything like it before, and I probably never will again. I’d be amazed if there were half a dozen lighters like this in the world!

So what’s the significance of the crest?

The crest or the coat of arms on the front of the lighter is for Scotch College, the oldest continuously operating private school in the Australian state of Victoria. It was also the school I went to for thirteen years. So when I saw the lighter, all kinds of nostalgia came back to me, and for sentimental reasons, I decided I just had to have it!

After examining the lighter thoroughly, by pulling it apart and checking all the moving components, I decided it was worth the risk to see whether it worked, and bought it.

What Type of Lighter Is It?

The first practical portable cigarette lighters which didn’t explode in your pocket if you jumped on the spot too often, were created in the early 1900s. Prior to this point, most people used matches to light their cigars, pipes and cigarettes, or anything else that required lighting, such as candles, gas-lamps, oil lamps and sealing wax.

What we have here is called a ‘lift-arm’ lighter. It was one of the earliest commercially-available lighters ever produced and could be found from the 1910s right up to the 1930s and 40s, by which time the more easily-operated, and more compact press-button friction-lighters were becoming more popular.

Lift-arm lighters get their name because of the spring-loaded arm that lifts up at the top of the lighter:

The lighter is held in the right hand, and the thumb flicks the arm up to expose the wick that sticks out of a hole at the top of the lighter. The wick exposed, the user’s thumb now flicks the striker-wheel next to the wick to scrape against the small piece of flint inside the flint-tube next to the lift-arm. This creates sparks which, under ideal conditions, lights the fuel-vapours wafting off of the wick, causing the lighter to light up.

To extinguish the flames, the lift-arm is simply flicked back down again. The spring inside the arm allows it to snap down smartly on top of the wick, snuffing out the light in an instant.

Fixing the Lighter

The lighter was non-operational when I got it. Any fuel inside it would’ve long since evaporated, and the lighter itself was in a pretty grubby state. I took it home and cleaned off the majority of the grime with cotton-buds and lighter fluid, and then I pulled the lighter apart.

I unscrewed the nut that held in the spring which compressed the flint inside the flint-tube. This caused the flint-spring to come shooting out. I whacked the lighter on the desk and the original flint came tumbling out after it, along with a significant amount of dust and grit. I put all this aside.

Then I pulled the lighter apart. Inside the lighter was the wick and the cotton balls which soak up the fuel. In many respects, it works exactly the same as your standard ZIPPO lighter. Using tweezers, I yanked out the wick and the cotton balls, and then I threw the lighter into my ultrasonic cleaning machine to blast out all the microscopic gunk that might be trapped inside. I then dried the whole thing thoroughly and put it back together.

I saved the original flint and put in a fresh one, a spare I had from my ZIPPO lighter. Lighter flints have hardly changed in a hundred years, so they’re still really, really easy to find. Any good smoke-shop will have them. I dropped in the new flint, popped in the spring, screwed it all down and then flipped the lighter upside-down to fill up the insides.

The first step was to shove the wick back in. This took a lot of twisting, wriggling and poking with a needle, and tugging with a pair of pliers, but I got it in there in the end. The next step was to put in fresh cotton wool to soak up the fuel. The final step was to juice the thing up with fresh lighter-fluid, and then pop the bottom back on.

It’s a temperamental old thing…and so would you be, if you were, at a guess, eighty or ninety years old!…but I did get the lighter to light! Here’s the end result:

What Do I Know about the Lighter?

Admittedly? Not a great deal. I know a bit, but not much. How old is it? Where did it come from? Who made it? Some of this, I’ve been able to find out, some is still a mystery. Here is the course which my investigation took:

It has the school coat of arms on it. That suggests it was made for, or commissioned by the school. This would’ve been after 1926, when the school moved to its current location in Hawthorn.

It’s a lift-arm lighter, so it’s pretty old. Most likely pre-WWII.

It’s marked: “DAMMAN’S – MELBOURNE” on the bottom. Damman’s was a tobacconist’s shop in Collins Street, established in 1854, and which was in operation for at least 100 years.

It’s marked: “(K.W.) Made in Germany”. K.W. is Karl Wieden, a German manufacturer of cigarette lighters. This dates it to around 1925-1939.

Researching Karl Wieden has revealed the lighter to be Model 620/11, which dates it to ca. 1930-1933.

And that’s really all I know, until I hear back from the school archivist, who may or may not know more than I do! All I can do is wait and see. I still can’t imagine why this lighter has the crest of a school on it, prestigious or not! Did it belong to a student? A former student? A schoolmaster? Who knows!

Here’s one last shot of the lighter…

07/08/2016 by Scheong

Repairing My Victorian Telescope – A Lesson in Persistence…and patience!

“It’s broken. I can’t get it to work…”

I hear this a lot in flea-markets, antiques fairs, and antiques shops. Or something like it. “It jams”, “It’s very stiff”, “It won’t turn”, “It rattles”, “This thing won’t stay still”, “It doesn’t move like it’s supposed to, see?”

Because of this, a lot of antiques are sold as being ‘broken’, or in ‘original condition’, which is a euphemistic way of saying: “It’s stuffed and I can’t be arsed fixing it because I don’t know how!”

Both online and in real life, I’ve heard loads of people howl and bitch and whine and cry about heathens like myself, who go around cleaning, restoring and breathing new life into an object, erroneously claiming that doing so ‘destroys the originality’ of a piece and therefore ‘makes it worthless’!

That said, restoring antiques is the only way that they ever survive. Repairing them, cleaning them, and overhauling them is how we ensure that they’ll exist in a working state, well into the future, and that they won’t be damaged beyond repair by someone who didn’t know any better, because they tried to force something to work that can’t, for any number of reasons.

Such was the case with the massive, brass telescope I bought for my birthday. When I got my hands on it, although it was cosmetically in great condition, its actual operation left MUCH to be desired. The lenses were filthy, the draw-tubes were clogged with so much grime they wouldn’t even open properly, and the threads on one of the coupling-rings were worn down, meaning that they wouldn’t screw in properly…and if something doesn’t screw, then it doesn’t hold, which means the whole thing can fall apart at a moment’s notice!

Not fun!

Disassembling the Telescope

Having decided that the telescope was something with which I stood a reasonable amount of success in restoring, I haggled down the price and bought it.

The first step was to clean the lenses. As far as restoring this telescope went, that was the easy part!

To clean the lenses properly, the telescope has to be pulled apart. There’s simply no other way to do it. The objective lens housing at the front of the barrel has to be screwed off, and entirely disassembled. The relay lenses in the middle of the draw-tubes has to be removed and entirely disassembled, and the eyepiece lens also has to be removed and disassembled.

Pulling apart my telescope. From left to right is one of the brass collars, the objective lens and its housing, the eyepiece shutter, the eyepiece lens, the two relay-lenses and their housing, and one of the draw-tubes.

Although all the components of the telescope look like they screw in nice and neat and tight and flush, the reality is that an impossible amount of dust and grit does manage to find its way inside the telescope, through the microscopic gaps between the draw-tubes. Over the course of several decades, this dust and grit builds up to intolerable levels, and it eventually dries and crusts over, and even though it’s barely a milimeter thick, it’s enough to jam the telescope – and any attempts to operate it will likely cause irreparable damage. All this accumulated grit also makes it impossible to focus the telescope, or see anything through the lenses, hence the absolute necessity for cleaning.

The achromatic (two-part) objective lens in its housing. It is actually possible to unscrew the lens-frame entirely, and for the glass lenses to drop out of their frame by removing the retaining ring. This allows for really good cleaning and dust-removal…Just don’t cut your fingers on the edge of the glass!

Unscrewing the lenses can be really easy, or it can be really hard. Fortunately for me, most of my restorations of this kind have been pretty easy – a firm grip and the right sort of pressure will unscrew most lenses with minimal problems. Just make sure that you wash out the threads (both sets of threads!) with oil, before you screw the components back together – because…y’know…dust, which causes threads to jam. Yes, it even gets in there!

Once the majority of the grime was removed from the lenses, and I was able to see that the telescope would be capable of functionality once it was working, I moved onto the next step: Cleaning.

Cleaning the Telescope

Cleaning this telescope was a real lesson in patience. Oh God, was it ever a lesson in patience!

As I said before, massive amounts of dust and grit get inside the telescope, through the joints between the draw-tubes. This causes a buildup of friction between the sliding parts, and this causes jamming. If you get a bit too enthusiastic trying to open the telescope tor viewing, it results in dents, warping, jamming, and if you’re really energetic – complete destruction of the connecting-rings between the draw-tubes… not fun.

The two relay-lenses and the tube they screw into.

To clean out 150 years’ worth of grime, I used WD-40, sewing machine oil, and enough tissues to fill a bathtub! Cleaning out loads of grime came down to spraying or dripping oil liberally over the draw-tubes, and snapping them shut, twisting them around, and opening and closing them hundreds and thousands of times, to flush out all the gunk, grime and grit trapped inside. This had to be done countless times to loosen up and wash out all the crud trapped within. It wasn’t pleasant!

“Why can’t you just put oil on it, lubricate it and leave it like that?” I might hear you ask.

Well…You could! You could just coat it in oil, and that would make the telescope easier to open and close…but it would also make it impossible to hold from how greasy it is! It would also turn your hands black from the grime. Oiling the telescope doesn’t remove the problem, it only masks it, and once the oil dries up, you’re left right back where you’re started…and probably even worse! Because oil attracts dust!

Eyepiece lens and the shutter that screws over the top to prevent dust and damage.

Nope! The only way was persistence, flushing, oil, lubrication, and just working the oil through the telescope, over and over again, to loosen up and wash out as much crud as possible. And this was a process which took a week of almost nonstop, daily cleaning…hey, it is 150 years’ worth of gunk, after all. It was never going to be done in a hurry!

Repairing the Telescope

While I cleaned the telescope, I became acutely aware of another one of its flaws. It wasn’t just grimy and dusty and jammed with filth, it was also broken! The thread which screwed the largest coupling-ring into the barrel, and connected the draw-tubes to the front of the telescope was completely worn down. Or at least partially so.

No amount of tightening and screwing and cleaning would induce the thread to bite, and hold the telescope together. All it took was one good, firm pull (which was necessary because of how stiff everything was!) to completely pull the telescope in half!

Taping the threads to stop them coming apart.

After extensive cleaning, I fixed this problem using ordinary, white masking tape. Once around the threads, and pressing it in with my fingers, and then screwing the components back together fixed the problem. The tape built up the layer of thickness which was necessary for the threads to grip and bite, and now all the components screw in and out, and hold, as they should!

Polishing the Brass

The final step in cleaning the telescope, after cleaning and tightening the lenses, washing out loads of grit and grime with loads of oil and WD-40, and taping up the threads to make them grip properly, was the polishing of the brass!

Before Polishing

From what I’ve seen on a lot of antiques websites, polishing up brass telescopes is an accepted and acceptable practice. And since I like polishing brass anyway, who am I to argue with the experts? Out came the Brasso, and I started polishing away furiously! It took a whole day to do it, but I did get it done in the end.

After polishing!

Polishing the brass does a number of things: One, it makes the telescope look SO much nicer!…Two, it makes it look much more cleaner, and three, it removes even MORE of the grime that was on the draw-tubes, which means that it will operate even better!

One thing about brass is that it never stays ultra-shiny for long. It only takes a small amount of handling for brass to start tarnishing again (which is why polishing brass was such a preoccupation back in the Victorian era, when this telescope was made), but this property suits me just fine, since it gives the telescope a clean, but aged look, all at the same time. This way, it doesn’t look entirely brand-new, and it doesn’t look like I dug it out of the ground this morning.

All up, a very satisfying little birthday project for myself 🙂

01/08/2016 by Scheong

Mid-Victorian Mahogany-Sleeved Naval Telescope. Ca. 1860.

“Cap’n! Presents off the larboard bow!”
“I see ’em! Ready the launch! You there – come about into the wind! We’ll not let them escape us now! Bring up the harpoons!”

The greatest thing about collecting antiques is that you always find the best birthday presents for yourself, if you search hard enough! I picked up this stunning beauty for my birthday! Yes, I’m officially…29. Oh, the horror, shame, and disgrace of it all…!

Up Close and Personal!

Aaaaanyway…

What we have here is an old-fashioned nautical telescope, as was used on the sailing-ships of old. And boy is it ever a monster! It’s 11in. closed, extends to 39in drawn out, and weighs a substantial 1lb 10oz (approx 750g)! A lightweight, it ain’t!

Features of Construction

This stunning antique features entirely brass construction, with the exception of the wooden sleeve around the barrel, and of course, the glass in the lenses. It is possessed of four, brass draw-tubes, as you can see in the photograph below:

All Drawn Out…

A four-tube telescope means that it has four tubular extensions which collapse into each other, and which then all slide into the main barrel at the front of the telescope.

I’m not sure how old this telescope is, to be honest. It’s of a style that was widely manufactured from the 1700s right up to the 1900s, but the fellow I got it from believed it to be from around 1850 or 1860. For something roughly 150 years old — after extensive cleaning — it does work pretty well! The threaded brass coupling-rings hold well (or they do, after a minor adjustment), and the tubes slide in and out smoothly, if a bit more firmly than I’m used to!

The telescope has a two-piece achromatic lens at the front, a two-lens relay system inside the smallest draw-tube, and an eyepiece lens at the far end – so four (or five, depending on how you count it), lenses in all!

Here it is, next to my solid brass, pocket telescope from the 1890s. As you can see, there’s a huge size difference!

As one would probably expect from something like this, it’s got a GREAT range, and surprisingly clear optics for a piece that’s obviously seen quite a hard life. There’s one small blemish on an interior lens which, try as I might, I couldn’t remove, but other than that – the clarity is impressive.

Using the Telescope

Since it is 150 years old, I expected the telescope to be dirty. I didn’t expect it to be THIS dirty! It required EXTENSIVE cleaning to get it to function even halfway decent! And I’m still cleaning it! But despite that, it’s beginning to show signs of the smoothness of function it once had.

To draw the telescope, I’ve found it’s best to hold it at the near end of the barrel (away from the lens) and to pull firmly, but smoothly, to get the draw tubes out, and to hold the barrel in the middle, when snapping the tubes shut again.

As I said, this telescope is quite chunky, so using it can be a bit of a challenge. I generally hold the largest, or second-largest draw-tube in order to balance this beast, and then adjust the focus by sliding the smallest draw-tube in and out, until clarity is achieved.

The good thing is that this is done relatively easily. The bad thing is that it’s surprisingly tiring on the arms! A telescope that weighs about a pound and a half doesn’t sound like much to carry around (and it isn’t), but when you’ve held it up in one hand for any length of time while trying to look through it, the weight does start to pull on your shoulders a bit! One wonders how the sailors of old ever managed to use this thing on the rocking, rolling deck of a sailing ship!

Cleaning the Telescope

The one saving grace about this telescope – and most telescopes of this design – is that they’re extraordinarily easy to clean. All the draw-tubes, lenses and coupling-rings screw together. All you need is a box of tissues, some oil, and a firm grip to screw and unscrew, and you can pull apart the entire telescope to clean it. There aren’t that many parts, and there’s no way you can confuse one part for another, so they’re very easy to put back together again.

You don’t need any special tools or equipment – just a few basic cleaning supplies and a spare afternoon. I think it’s amazing how something which is so easily assembled is at the same time, so incredibly powerful, and yet, so simply constructed. Even a child could do this. I love the thoughtfulness of the design in that the manufacturer imagined that the owner might want to disassemble his own telescope for cleaning and maintenance. I don’t know many consumer products today which are this user-friendly!

Repairing the Telescope

As much fun as this telescope is to use and to clean and polish, when I bought it, the telescope also had one significant flaw – It wouldn’t stay together.

As I said above, the telescope’s components quite literally just screw, one-into-the-other, in a set sequence of construction. Easily followed and impossible to screw up. A few good twists would be all that’d be needed to pull the thing apart, clean it, and reassemble it. Unfortunately, this wasn’t the case with this telescope.

Probably due to overzealous cleaning in the past, or possibly a manufacturing fault, or simply just 150-years’ worth of wear and tear, the thread that held in the largest draw-tube (the one which connects to the barrel) was not gripping properly. It simply refused to hold. After screwing it in as hard as possible, it’d simply pop right out again after one good pull! Hardly ideal!

I pulled the telescope apart and cleaned the threads, and then to fix this problem, I wrapped ordinary paper masking-tape around the threads on the coupling-ring. Just once.

Group Shot! My big telescope, my small telescope, and my field glasses all together. All brass, all antique. What a pretty trio they make.

I trimmed off the excess tape with a pocket-knife, and then screwed the two components back together. No oil, no graphite powder, nothing. Just a simple layer of sticky tape. It cost me literally nothing! and yet…the repair worked!

Just one layer of tape was all I needed to build up the necessary thickness, friction and ‘bite’ necessary for the threads to screw in smoothly, and for the connection to hold! it took me less than five minutes to repair. Don’t be daunted by broken antiques – sometimes all it takes is a bit of creativity to return them to full functionality.

Video

Last but not least, here’s a short video I made about the telescope:

28/07/2016 by Scheong

The Sound of History: Antique Whistles

For hundreds of years, noisemakers of all kinds have been used for all kinds of purposes. In this posting, I’m looking at the history and the impact of antique whistles, specifically those made from the 1700s and 1800s, up to the mid-1900s.

Whistles have been made out of innumerable materials for hundreds of years. Bone, ivory, wood, silver, steel, brass, and plastic, but it wasn’t until the 1700s that the first industrially-produced whistles started being manufactured.

For much of history, whistles had been made by hand – usually out of natural materials like wood, bone, or ivory. Except for in a few specialised industries and professions, whistles were generally regarded as toys or musical instruments, their practicality as a noisemaker unrealised, or at least unappreciated, for much of history.

Boatswain’s Pipes

One of the first industries to see a practical use for whistles beyond being playthings was the navy. Long, thin pipes with spherical bowls or balls at the end were carried by boatswains (or ‘bosuns’), and these were used by the boatswain and his assistants (boatswain’s mates) to pass orders on the crowded, noisy decks of early sailing ships. As it was impossible to hear shouted commands from one end of a ship to the other, and over the noise of the wind, waves and creaking timbers, boatswain’s pipes were used instead.

The extremely high-pitched sound of the pipes could easily be heard over even the most intense of storms, and over time, short tunes and series of pitches were used to signal various commands such as All Hands on Deck – Weigh Anchor – Boats Away, and so-on. Boatswain’s pipes are still used in the navy today, although they’re more for ceremonial use, rather than for passing orders.

Police Whistles

Organised, official, state-run police-forces started becoming a reality in the early 1800s, starting in Scotland, then spreading to London, then the rest of Britain, and eventually around the world.

Early police constables and patrolmen manned their beats and called for help using heavy, wooden rattles. Rattles were easily broken, were uncomfortable to use, were heavy, and could be taken from the officer and used as a weapon. They were also not very loud, and in a busy street, a rattle was indistinguishable from the clatter of horseshoes – rendering it virtually useless.

Metropolitan Police Whistle from the 1930s. Made by J. Hudson & Co.

Whistles had been used on and off throughout the history of policing, but it wasn’t until the 1870s and 1880s that rattles were finally phased out entirely, and replaced with whistles. Whistles were louder, smaller, lighter and easier to use. They started replacing rattles on the London Metropolitan Police force (Scotland Yard) in 1883-1884, where they were famously supplied by Joseph Hudson & Co.

Joseph Hudson made his fortune when his dual-chamber pipe whistle was presented to Scotland Yard. He won the coveted contract to supply whistles to the London police force and his company, J. Hudson & Co (today, the Acme Whistle Company) grew by leaps and bounds, to become one of the largest, and most famous whistle-companies in the world!

What Were Whistles Used For?

Once it was found out how to manufacture large amounts of whistles, people suddenly realised that they needed whistles for a lot of different reasons! Joseph Hudson & Co alone, sold whistles to the police, to the army, to the fire-department, to sporting referees, to train guards, to naval officers and sailors, to railway conductors, cyclists, the boy scouts, the girl guides, and to the general public, as well!

The Acme BOY SCOUT whistle, from about 1920.

Over time, specific shapes and styles of whistles were used for different organisations, and today, whistles with markings on them which link them to specific institutions or organisations, such as hospitals, prisons, specific police-forces, fire-departments or army units are highly collectible.

Whistles on a whole, started dying out as a practical form of communication in the last quarter of the 20th century. Walkie-talkies, portable radios and mobile-phones meant that it was no longer necessary for so many people to carry whistles anymore. Organisations that had once carried whistles for decades, such as the police, fire services, the army and the navy started giving them up.

J. Hudson & Co. General-Service Whistle issued to the British Army during WWI. Dated to 1915.

Today, whistles are still used for sporting matches, or for safety and survival, but beyond this market, their use has dropped significantly. Some people still buy them for personal safety, for training dogs, for cycling and for emergency situations, but apart from exceptional circumstances, most other organisations or people don’t use them.

My Whistles Video

To close off this posting, here’s a video I uploaded a few days ago, displaying my own whistle collection:

Throughout History

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