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Post by armando on May 23, 2021 15:58:55 GMT -7
So I just finished making this for the wife’s 18th century camp cook kit. I know it’s not pretty or fancy but it special because I made it. Could any of your guys to share your spoons? Share your favorite wood to work from?
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Spoons
May 23, 2021 17:59:02 GMT -7
via mobile
armando likes this
Post by brokennock on May 23, 2021 17:59:02 GMT -7
Looks pretty darn good to me.
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Keith
City-dweller
Bushfire close but safe now. Getting some good rain.
Posts: 990
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Post by Keith on May 24, 2021 0:48:48 GMT -7
This spoon was made for me by my youngest son, I think he said it was cherry wood. This was not a copy of an original 18th century spoon, but I found the following period spoons which are very similar. Keith. Armando, good work on the spoon mate, well done. Far superior to the first & only spoon I tried to make with my axe & clasp knife!
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Post by hawkeyes on Jun 20, 2021 6:39:31 GMT -7
I'm late but wanted to party anyways... First poplar spoon I did, followed by a black walnut spoon and a small wooden dish I made from sycamore.
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Post by Black Hand on Jun 24, 2021 17:43:12 GMT -7
I've carved a number of spoons, most of them lately from Cottonwood. I have an Ash(?) spoon I carved nearly 20 years ago I use regularly in my kitchen - it cracked, but I still use it. I'll post some pictures when I'm near my spoons again...
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Post by artificer on Jul 23, 2021 19:02:00 GMT -7
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Post by artificer on Jul 23, 2021 19:18:24 GMT -7
Welsh spoon makers traditionally used Sycamore wood to make their spoons, as the wood did not impart a taste to the food and they thought it had medical benefits.
Gus
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Post by artificer on Jul 24, 2021 2:25:36 GMT -7
I got to thinking about the possible fact that while the Welsh had/have a very strong tradition of carving and using wooden spoons and other kitchen implements from ancient times that continues right up to the present day, was it something that while period correct, was not historically correct in colonial America to any real degree?
The reason I wondered about this was my Paternal Grandmother's family going all the way back were WELSH and not English as it had come to be taken for granted in more modern generations. That had been lost in family tradition until my sister began doing extensive genealogical research. That family line did not come here until the late 1820's when they began to extract "hard" coal in Eastern Pennsylvania and I wasn't aware of earlier Welsh immigration.
It seems the emigration of thousands of people from Wales to Pennsylvania began between 1680 and 1720. Commonly called the “Welsh Tract,” the location comprised 40,000 acres of land and was given to help Welsh Quakers fleeing religious persecution in their homeland. They came by arrangement with William Penn in 1681, arriving in Pennsylvania even before he did. Also called the “Welsh Barony,” it covered the land north of Philadelphia and west of the Schuylkill River. The tract encompassed nearly 12 townships in the Pennsylvania counties of Delaware, Chester and Montgomery. An additional 30,000 acres was granted to Welsh immigrants in 1701 in what is modern-day Delaware. Prior to this, in 1667, a congregation of Baptists from South Wales had founded Swansea on the Plymouth-Rhode Island border. Initially these communities intended to maintain their language and culture in the New World.
So with that kind of early and somewhat geographically spread out initial colonization, I suggest there is plenty of cultural tradition for historically correct interpretation in using Welsh spoons in our time period.
BTW, funny story when my Paternal Grandmother's family first arrived in Philadelphia in the late 1820's. They arrived after the Immigration Office had closed for the evening at 7:00 PM. So a Junior Agent was sent to inform them the Immigration Tax would be collected the next morning. However, after he left, local Welsh contacts came to meet them and guide them beyond the City and the Tax Collectors' reach. The family story has long been that they "absconded in the dead of night, so as not to have to pay the tax."
When my Sister and I discussed this after she had found there were almost 150 Adults and Children in that group of Welsh Immigrants, it is her belief that "they MUST have bribed someone, so not to have paid the full tax the next morning." This because "How could that many adults and small children (including some infants) not made so much noise that it would not have awakened a good part of the city?" I laughed and said, "Does it matter whether they bribed someone or just snuck away? What does matter is that it seems we have another blood line that didn't like paying taxes."
Gus
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