﻿44 BULLETIN 12, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGBlCULTUBE. 



laundry, including washing machines, wringers, mangles, towel 

 racks, ironing boards, sleeve boards, wash benches, washboards, 

 clothes racks, and clothespins. In the same class belong cigar boards, 

 where the tobacco leaves are cut and rolled, and lapboards on which 

 the cobbler, saddler, and harnessmaker trim leather and fashion it. 

 The clamps for holding articles while working on them are frequently 

 of sugar maple. 



MISCELLANEOUS. 



The miscellaneous uses of sugar maple are so many that little more 

 in the way of enumeration can be attempted than to indicate the in- 

 dustries where they are found, and even this outline must be in- 

 complete. 



"Wherever the maple grows in commercial quantities it is made into 

 shaping boxes and crates, but it is seldom specially sought after for 

 this purpose. It is heavy and adds to the freight item, but it is strong 

 and stands hard usage. The shippers of tin plate place it among the 

 best woods in their business, and in that instance special effort is 

 made to get it. Furniture factories use large quantities of low-grade 

 maple for crating. They like it, not only because it is strong and de- 

 pendable, but also because it holds nails well. Large numbers of very 

 light boxes of veneer are made for shippers of berries, small fruits, 

 and for some kinds of garden truck, such as string beans, celery, 

 young onions, and spinach. Maple boxes are not often used for ship- 

 ping bulky merchandise. Veneer boxes, but with ends and center 

 partition of thicker wood, are exported as shooks to Sicily for ship- 

 ping lemons. 



Many built-up butcher blocks are of sugar maple. The old-style 

 block, all in one piece, was objectionable on account of season checks 

 which provided lodging places for impurities. Formerly most of the 

 blocks were of sycamore, all in one piece, but maple now seems to be 

 more largely used. However, in the two States of Illinois and Michi- 

 gan the annual demand for butcher blocks is 1,600,000 feet of syca- 

 more, 1,300,000 feet of maple, and 1,300,000 feet of beech. Maple 

 skewers are nearly everywhere listed in butcher supplies, and veneer 

 sausage trays of the same wood are used by retailers. 



Printers and bookbinders are large purchasers of sugar-maple 

 products. Type cases, and often the stands and cabinets where they 

 are kept, are of this wood, as are mallets, furniture (small quad- 

 rangular pieces), planes, and wooden type. Preparation of the 

 wood for type is very careful, often including boiling in water, air 

 diving many months, then kiln-drying, and finally oiling. Base 

 1 (locks for mounting stereotype and electrotype plates and halftone 

 and zinc engravings are frequently of this wood. It is also a liberal 

 contributor to artists' material. It is made into easels, maulsticks, 



