The Chapman

Well, at least I don't look as insane as I did in the pictures from Addison. Say, that is a fine coat on me, Rats. Did somebody make that? (Can't thank you enough. But thanks again, anyway.)

A quite good primer on sharpening techniques for the hand sawyer: http://www.vintagesaws.com/library/primer/sharp.html

http://www.bruzelius.info/nautica/Shipbuil...717b)_p185.html

Summary of the above, disregarding 'rightness' of anybody, I hope: Literacy in the GAOP can reasonably be assumed to consist of the ability to read letters and words, phonetically or by word recognition, no matter how laboriously or slowly. Spelling as a measure of literacy is not an issue, obviously. The skill of making sense out of cyphers is the measure. (I personally will argue that the ability to write legibly is a separate skill from functional reading. Even now, by tradition in the US, it's the Three 'R's, of which Readin' and Ritin' are described, separated skills. ) I maintain the ability to scribe a 'legible' signature does not mean, on an individual basis, that that person is at all literate. I don't buy it. The ownership of a book or books means nothing. Many soldiers/sailors obviously carried around letters, books, or written keepsakes, etc. that they couldn't read themselves. Why did they carry them? Who knows? Why do people own anything, other than the necessities of existence? Part of my statement here is my personal knowledge of illiterate people owning books, which were often in evidence in their homes, which I know they couldn't read. Why were those books there? Was it the modern expectation that everyone is literate, therefore no books=illiteracy, a face-saving gesture? A sailor may own a book of psalms or the bible so that someone can speak over his body. The books, which at sea, may have been hard to come by and save, may have been used as notebooks, with numbers, notations, etc. May be thin-sheaved books were gentle on the anus and were a handy source of bumfodder! But for real, through history many illiterate folk have carried books with them for various personal reasons. Any number of reasons. I quote a completely blind couple whose apartment I went into, who had PICTURES ON THE WALLS. When I asked them why they had pictures, they said, "For company". This does bring up Foxes' description of percentages of article-signers. I find the quoted levels of illiteracy to be pretty high for the period; that number of folk unable to even scribble a legible signature is a measure of a level of low skill I find surprising. Thanks, Foxe. Cool stuff, as always. However, I do have to ask, What was the point of SIGNING an 'X'? Think about it. Oh; and joke of the day: If you put a guy on the list, and he signs an X, and later you want him off the list, well... ...how do you cross him off?

Looks interesting. I'll pore over that later. I was going to post a little piece on using hand saws, with pictures, and some issues about sharpening, accuracy, use, cut styles, etc. but now I don't have time this evening to set up. Later. Well, it's not like the tools are going anywhere.

out

out

Waffles. A sign at a cemetery that read, "Closed Dusk 'Til Dawn". Apparently that's when the Aztec vampires come out and attack truck drivers. Pete the HVAC guy, who I really like. Ed Foxe, because the guy made me think while I was driving around, and it compelled me to call my professor friend Alan.

I made a phone call today to one of my annoying friends who's always right about things. In the course of the conversation I mentioned this idea. Now, I routinely drop-ship pallets to Beloit College. Imagine my embarrassment at taking handwritten invoices into Tanya made out to: 'Bulliot Collag' in magic marker. Now, Alan pointed out to me that this kind of phonetic spelling was considered literacy at the time. He's right. So it answers certain questions I have about 'literacy'. The book thing... well, it depends on the book. What is it? The Bible? Seen semi-literates study The Bible. I would be curious to know what the books in probate were. What subjects, per se. Books in themselves were relatively rare and expensive. Wonder about that. God, I'm tired. Goodnight. I gotta check up on Gunboards about Sea Service pistols.

"...it must be noted that the ability to sign one's own name is a far more important thing now than it was three centuries ago..." "I am compelled to disagree. The functional illiterates and tradesmen and biker mechanics I've known put great store and emphasis on their 'mark/signature' being specifically 'theirs'." I misunderstood your statement, I think. Sorry about that. You're right; making an X on massive numbers of papers in the modern day is simply not practical. A 'signature' is a necessity. I was thinking in terms of how important literacy is or was to the individual, rather than how important some degree of literacy may have been to the society or culture around him/her.

I'm working a kit for steam bending, and with the proper planes and shaves I see no reason I can't make buckets, etc. The big problem is finding decent enough wood to be worth working with. Kiln-dried modern lumber is crap. One of the reasons the hand tools are so efficient is because the wood used is properly dried and of sufficient hardness to allow precision. A high moisture content results in endless binding and frustration. Also, I found that quick-kiln-dried lumber is somewhat brittle. I no like. Although, up north of me by Juneau is a lumber-yard sawmill that has had signs out for air-dried ash. Ash... oh yeah. that is nice stuff.

I was down at Macktown with Rats and a couple others of the Archangel and there was a 'carpenter' set up in a tent. I wanted to kick his ass. He knew nothing at all about how to use the tools. It was obscene. He had the stuff he'd bought at farm auctions, and none of it was sharp, or tuned, or straightened, or even usable in any way, shape, or form. It pissed me off. I saw him later in the day with a cheap, pulpwood 1X from Menards, clamped into a bench vise with the shallow edge up, trying to saw through it with a dull hand saw. Unbelievable. In the above picture, notice the blade configuration is a WEDGE. Make it WORK FOR YOU. Properly kerfed and sharpened, minimal pressure with the top heel of the hand, on a handle worn or shaped to the user, will result in a clean, discrete, repeatable rocking motion, creating consistent cuts. And that's what people now don't get: REPEATABILITY. Nowadays, machines do everything; but we forget that previously, trained humans were the machines. Proper training, with the proper tools, creates consistency. Every cut with my saws, with my kit, was the same. And man, I was PROUD of that. So much more proud than hacking through bullshit wood with an electric saw, that had to have power, because the wood was trash that no self-respecting carpenter of even fifty years ago would have put in a house. I'll be quiet for now, but there will be projects. Talk later.

This is a picture of the decent enough ripsaw I picked up today. This new thread is about to feature my replenishing my hand tool collection that I used to use when I was a teenager. I was a victim of what you more normal folks might call a 'cult', and spent a good share of my childhood/adolescence using candles, lamps, woodstoves, and most importantly here, hand tools. The saw and why I picked it: My old saw was a standard blade configuration, i.e. it looked like a normal saw, tall through the body. But the teeth were kerfed a little more aggressively, and the chisel angle was 90 degrees. Now this new saw is deadly dull, and the blade is warped; but the blade is fixable either by some torch or stove work, or possibly some assiduous heat work by my newfound blacksmith Ken (the brilliant man that he is). The teeth are eminently fixable with some file work, with only one broken and the crowns even, and despite some abject piece of shit attempting to convert the teeth to a crosscut configuration by overly aggressive filing (changing the attack angle to more shallow than 90 degrees), it's totally salvageable due to the purity of the design. The blade makes me happy. It's elegant. It's simple. It is what carpentry is all about. It's beautiful. Just look at it. The reason I picked this little machine is because: 1) The blade is short, i.e. it isn't 'tall', and therefore won't bind nearly as much in wet wood; and therefore won't require as much screwing around with wedges in a long rip. Properly sharpened, I can rip cut 2" thick oak almost as fast as a circular saw. I love hand tools, saws especially. More to come.

I was told, "Dad, I have sand in my butt". Therefore, the clothes came off, and the silks went on while the bath was drawing. While Dad drank rum out a Curious George glass because well, Dad's not too good at doing dishes.

Focaccia bread and olive oil. A gallon jar of pickles dressed in a pair of women's panties in the grocery aisle at the Wal-Mart. A very nice girl at the ice cream shop. My old friend George. I wonder if he's still alive.

Well, I'm working on actual 'drawings' to actually woodcut on, with gouges. It's kind of important to me. But for right now, these will have to do; you realize that the actual print size for broadsheets is so small as to be postage-stampy size, therefore I do them large. I've been invited to do some costuming technical illustration by an online acquaintance, and I'll post that when I get my act together about that. It looks to be fun. The last tech illustrations I did were for the machines in a dentist's office, at least ten years ago. I'm looking forward to it. Agh, Hester, I don't have a good silent film still for you today. I'll work on it.

I don't doubt it, given intent, and based on the maneuverability of the larger vessel.

Pipe tobacco (by accident). I've decided to quit smoking (cigarettes), and since I have this new clay pipe, sent to me by a thoughtful friend, I've been smoking that. I enjoy it immensely. A dairy cow running. Unless you live in WI, you don't know how weird that is. Rats. The manager of the grocery store by my old house (circa 20 years ago). I went into Supermercado El Potosi looking for rye bread to make a Rueben sandwich. I was told by the manager (I was the only white person for blocks around), "We don' have et'nic food here".

Of course they can't! The vessels being used are small, heavily armed, almost impossible to detect by either radar or lanthorn, and fit the classic pattern of any kind of 'piracy'. They are little, big-gunned locals who know the lay of the coast, who wait until someone is dumb enough to enter into their zone of action (known to inner-city cops as "the alligator on a chain") and then looting, Etc. That's how the original New World Pirates worked. You can take over a supertanker with one dedicated guy with an AK. Or a POS shotgun from Sears. either one. That's what it's about. It's late, I'm going to bed.

Thank you so much, Red Cat Jenny. You know, I think I like the 'broadside' type woodcuts when it comes to ships, otherwise you end up spending unbelievable amounts of boring, boring time drawing rope, rigging, more rope, more rigging, and then, yet more rope and rigging. Unless you really, really, like drawing anal retentive technical illustrations of rope, rigging, and then rigging and rope, maritime illustration is not for you. Although, let's fact it kids, unless you have some clue as to what all that rope and rigging does, you can't draw the sails right. Damn, thought I'd wriggled out of doing all that rope and rigging and rigging and rope. Next time? I don't know, cannons or something...

Oh, those are COOL!!

Another 'woodcut' try... Ship this time.

The sullen lad was sitting on the dock, where they had left him. Billy was somewhat astonished to find him still present. He felt sure the little rat-tailed scut would have taken his coin and wandered off to spend same in some hole. Character was indeed a funny thing. He wandered up the short docking, the boards, loosened and degraded by salt and wind, shuddering under his tread. The small square toppers of poorly made nails caught on the splitting leather of his worn-out shoes. Shoes, he thought idly, soon to be replaced with a finer pair, perhaps dogskin, the better to go upon the town in which to dance; people did so talk up the dog shoe. He’d dwell on that later. The boy-scut rose at his approach. “Wot you here? Where’s ya master, blackamoor?” Billy stopped, taken aback; it hadn’t occurred to him someone, anyone, might think him a servant or slave. Byrd had warned him, and he had forgotten just that quickly. Annoyed at both the boy’s ‘greeting’ and at his own inexcusable carelessness, he shoved his momentum forward again. The boy spoke a second time. “Ya master said he’d folla with another bit a coin, blackamoor. You ain’t got a collar for a silver pay, so where at’s ma coin?” Billy flung his knee and leg up straight, and impacting the breastbone, hit the boy square in the chest with his full weigh, thumping him. The boy whooshed out his air, stumbled back, and went off the crackling, creaking boards into the waiting ocean, living ink-black with filth, ballast, and stinking offal. He cried weakly as he hit the sludge and sploshed as though stricken with palsy. Billy walked to the piles and began loosening the boat. The boy squeeched. “Hep. Hep, A can’t SWIM!” Billy muttered, “Y’shoulda thought, y’little pullet”, and as the second tie loosened, he hopped winglike onto the floor, gracefully popping one oar, then the other, into the stocks with light scraping sounds, and seamlessly rowed away. The boy gurgled, oathed, and then Billy saw two men run down the dock and reach down for the sodden lump of plonk with a hook, rescuing him from drowned ending. Billy felt vaguely disappointed.

Period Literacy Now, lately I’ve been reading some statements around in various places, one of which is a thread on a related forum, about ‘literacy’ of the GAOP period. One of the statements I’ve seen several times uses the ability to sign one’s name as an indicator of literacy. I don’t buy that. I’ve known, in the present day, a number of people who could sign their names but were otherwise illiterate, and couldn’t read or write. One example: My acquaintance Jaybird, who works at a salvage yard. He is illiterate, but can sign his name. I’ve talked to him about his illiteracy at some length; how he functions, ‘writes’, etc (This came up, and he confided in me, due to his inability to work the new satellite jukebox at the bar; it requires you to read the song titles rather than merely knowing the ‘call number’ of your selection). Firstly, writing his name is like drawing a sketch or doodle. The letters are there, he knows it is the ‘icon’ for his name (legal name, not ‘Jaybird’), but he cannot sound it out or make greater meaning out of the letters. On work orders, to ensure legitimacy, he has all his superiors or operators sign their names in a small spiral notebook, and when a WO comes in he compares the signature to the one recorded in his book. He therefore knows who authorized the part removal or release, and then writes down the WO number connected with that signature, thereby covering his ass. Jaybird does use alphabet letters, but only as mnemonic devices with no deeper meaning, like tying a thread around your finger to remember something. He does have, let me tell you, an absolutely phenomenal memory. He has to. He can use numbers and, I think, has above average math skills, and easily tells time by either digital or analog clocks; he simply does not know how to read or write, and never learned. Jaybird is about 50 years old (he doesn’t actually know himself, for sure). So; based on this related knowledge, I don’t believe for a moment that signing your name means you’re literate; but it does have other effects. For instance, a ‘signature’ takes on great importance if it’s the only thing you can write. It will be unique, and essentially not something that can be faked. Putting your mark on something would have significance beyond just ‘writing a word’. Also related, there are, let me tell you, differing degrees of ‘literacy’. I had one co-worker tell me once, “I’ve never been much of a reader”, as if ‘reading’ were a pastime, or a sport, like synchronized swimming. He just didn’t read, and I think had about a third-grade literacy level, and had no interest in anything further. In the case of the (to me) shocking numbers of broadsides being printed, well, an ability to functionally read doesn’t mean you can WRITE effectively. Anyway, I don’t believe signing a name is any kind of indicator of any kind of literacy. So what is? It’s impossible to tell; but on land, anyway, and judging by the popularity of newspapers and broadsheets in urban centers, literacy in those places, like today, was probably fairly high, if not to a modern graduate-degree standard (What’s that now, about fifth grade?). My extrapolation is that persons who had an interest or necessity in reading and writing, did, and those who had no pressing need or desire for literacy, depended on others to provide them with the assistance when those skills were needed. Hell, there were total illiterates serving in the US military during Vietnam. I bet a lot of them could sign their name or make their mark, and that’s with the common availability of basic schooling for the mass population! Anyway. Anybody got any actual information, or is it all pretty much speculation? What was the benchmark of literacy at the time, really? Because signing your name does not, I repeat, mean anything. Not to me, at least.

I still haven't even started the book everyone else is reading, and now forgot to take it out while at the library earlier today. I'll get it later on in the week and read it. Promise.