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Pipe Wrench Handles. Saw Handles. 



Basswood. Red gum. 



Sweet birch. 

 Plastering Trowel Handles. Applewood. 



Basswood. Beech. 



Pole Brush Handles. tipade Handles. 



Basswood. White ash. 



White ash. Black ash. 

 Shortleaf pine. 



Rake Handles. vud Handles. 



Ash. 



Saddler's Tool Handles. titomper Handles. 



Black walnut. Hornbeam. 



Hickory. 

 Sad Iron Handles. 



Red gum. Street Brooms. 



Beech. 



Sand Rammer Handles. Sugar maple. 



Hickory. Hickory. 



Hornbeam. 



Track Tool Handles. 



Saw Frames. White oak. 



Red Oak. Hickory. 



Birch. Sugar maple. 



Sugar maple. White ash. 



Hickory is unquestionably the best wood used for long-handle tools, includ- 

 ing the maul, axe, striking hammer, sledge, and track tools used on rail- 

 roads for construction work and for maintenance of way. Besides exceptional 

 strength, this wood possesses other important qualities for handle material, 

 weight, stiffness, shock-resisting ability, and susceptibility to wear smooth 

 by use. Manufacturers of this class of handles usually specialize in this line, 

 since the processes of manufacture and the machinery required are distinct 

 from those employed in making other classes. Hickory is becoming scarcer 

 each year, and this fact has induced a number of northern handle makers 

 to move southward nearer to the source of the largest supply. Not a few 

 firms, however, continue to maintain factories in the north and to ship 

 billets, bolts, and rough-turned handle stock from the south to the north as 

 far as Connecticut and New Hampshire. 



It is interesting to note from the following table that the Pennsylvania 

 hickory handle manufacturers procure 66 per cent, of their raw material from 

 the State. It would be well for farmers and timber owners in Pennsylvania 

 who own stands of hickory to understand the increasing demand for the wood 

 for handles and that second-growth hickory is preferred. This tree is not a 

 rapid grower but it is not so slow as many other trees and it will soon prove 

 a good investment to preserve stands of second-growth hickory to aid their 

 development, and to cut the timber only as it becomes large enough for handle 

 bolts. The list given below shows the kinds of wood which are being tried as 

 substitutes for hickory in handle making, white oak, cow oak, swamp oak, 

 sugar maple, hornbeam, and ash being the principal ones. For coal-pick 

 handles these woods are suitable and most largely used, there being less 

 strain as to strength and shock-resisting than if used for the more strenuous 

 work of the pick, axe, and maul. 



