I found a saw that I just could not pass up. It has an etch of a deer with the quote “I can cut through the woods”. I have not been able to find any information about its origins though. All I know is it is split nut (so probable pre 1870’s ish) and has an eagle warranted Superior medallion (so probably an American maker). Any information/ideas are welcome!
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Can you show us the handle?
For sure. Thanks in advance!
I a not familiar with that maker.
I do love old hand saws! I built my house without electricity so got to know hand saws very well. I became friends with an old semi-retired finish carpenter who sharpened hand saws, who taught me how. Not that I am as practiced as he was...
The broken handle is probably cherry, in case you decide to repair it.
One tip: I learned from experience that some of the old saws were tempered harder than modern ones. The result was that I broke off a tooth or two before I realized that I could only set the very tip of the tooth, not the whole tooth.
The saws can be very fast; I put a seasoned oak 2x4 in a vise, and cut it with 7 strokes with a freshly sharpened 7 point saw, counting the starting stroke. Dull saws are of course a bit slower (or a lot...)
If you are interested in repairing the handle and don't have a similar vintage saw for reference, I might have one with a similar handle that I could send a picture of. Let me know.
If you have a handy picture I would love to take a look. This would be my first bottom part of a handle repair (aside from a lower horn).
Through a little detective work, I may have discovered some useful information for you.
At the Online Reference of Disston Saws there is a page dedicated to the various medallions found on Disstons over the years.
URL:
http://www.disstonianinstitute.com/medv2.html#:~:text=It%20has%20a%20different%20medallion,this%20saw%20to%201847%2D48.
Turns out that there's enough variation in medallions over time to potentially indicate the age of a saw based on the medallion.
At the very bottom of that page is a photograph of a saw bearing a "Warranted Superior" medallion similar to the one on your saw. According to the description, such medallions were used by Disston on the saws they made for the secondary market, through hardware stores, etc. On these apparently lesser-quality saws, the medallions did not bear the Disston name.
I also spied two saws for sale on Etsy or Ebay with that medallion; one had an asking price of $95, the other $67.
All FWIW.
Bad Axe Toolworks might have an insight.
http://badaxetoolworks.com/
Disston used their name on the saw nuts, but they made runs of saws with a special etch for anyone who bought a batch large enough. They used the Warranted Superior medallions on those saws. I've seen hardware store names etched on countless saws, but all were made by Disston.
That looks like a Disston handle, too, rather than a handle typical of one of Disston's big competitors.
These are my guesses.
We look at these etchings and medallion logos from a historical perspective. Do you think Disston manufactured their saws with that in mind? Do you think they were thinking in 1870 that maybe someone 150 years from now will want to know when the saw was made? Their medallions went from Disston to Disston and Son to Disston and Sons when the son and sons entered the company but do you think they tossed whatever medallions were left over or do you think maybe they used them? If a old box of medallions turned up later in inventory do you think they used them? I have a couple of Keystones that were supposed to be a lesser grade so as to not confuse them with a real Disston according to that article but mine have Disston medallions. I have a whole little stack of Disston saws , the newest all collected by me from 40 to 50 years ago and they were very old then. I never thought of trying to date them. The article was really interesting. The best and really fancy ones and the backsaws I take good care of and use regularly. A couple of mine seem to have been manufactured in the 30s but the rest from what I can tell sometime around 1900. I don't have any really,really, old ones..
When I saw the article from this thread I pulled them all out to compare my saws. The saws in the way back never get used so this has now caused me a bunch of trouble. They need attention and now I have hours and hours of work in front of me cleaning them up ,setting the teeth, resharpening. Then they'll end up in the back of the stack and never get used! I guess this is a classic case of too much of a good thing!
I just went through that with planes. There's a video series by Rollie Johnson about restoring Stanley planes. He does a thing with setting the frog using valve grinding compound. Humm, I never thought of that! So as a result I pulled down all the Stanley planes. I have nearly a complete set of bench planes and a few doubles. Several block planes, rabbit planes etc. I did them all, top to bottom! I had them in pretty good shape prior and had previously
flattened them but a couple needed flattened again.. I guess that can happen. Became my night work and took forever!
Thanks to everyone for the detective work! Gives me some significant leads - and potentially all I am going to find is what you all put in here. I am going to keep digging to see if anything comes up. Chances are it was a Disston custom etch as many people have suggested - but it would be cool to find out what the etch was for. Hand saw history is such an interesting topic. Thanks again
Are you on Instagram? There are a bunch of people on there that know tons about old saws. And occasionally have a step by step handle repair for issues like yours.
I am on instagram. Do you know anyone in particular? I’m following spring green saws who had a few great resto projects and I’m also following the saw wright.
Those are good. Timplavan is great, and bobpage6565, jimthesawman, petter_appelgreen. There are other saw people, but I see those most often.
I might post whole bunch of pictures of your saw on Instagram, and tag all those folks so they'll see it.
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