Old-School Tools: Hatchets and Axes

To a novice like me,  not long ago all hatchets and axes looked alike. yes, I use both, as well as a maul, to split a lot of smaller logs that don't merit the hydraulic log-splitter with its 27 tons of force. All of my modern tools, as well as a 1930 Keen Kutter "Half Hatchet" inherited from my father-in-law, work wonderfully.  As I began to auction off his collection of tools, however, I found out a lot more than I ever guessed about wood-cutting technology.

There's a great deal of pre-mechanized history here.  We often think of hatchets looking something like one of the two pictured below. Axes might have one blade or, more rarely today in the States, two. There is also the famous fireman's axe, a tool unlikely to ever vanish from regular use.

In fact, a study of a 1930s tool catalog reveals specialized hatchets for shingling, for flooring, and even a "produce" hatchet whose use may be lost to time.  A favorite I no longer see as what is called a "broad axe" head.

Hammers, wrenches, and pliers, other hand tools that survived the coming of power tools, at least has several examples for sale in any modern hardware store, but modern hatchets seem to have dwindled in purpose to the sorts just pictured. So few of us split our own wood in the age of gas logs.

For those who want to know more about the terminology of axes and hatches, I found a Swedish toolmaker's site with an excellent page on the subject. You may find yourself spending more hours there than you should, when you should be out splitting wood!