MASTER CARVERS????

[WESTbury]

I posted a reply on the Rochester Rifle thread this morning relating to, what for a better phrase, what I would define as "Master Carvers" who offered their services to the gunstockers.

One of my initial points was that during very busy periods, would the stockers have seen the need to get stock carvers, other than their apprentices, to complete a rifle.

I did receive a great reply from Eric K.

I've discussed this with Bob Lienemann previously and he suggested I post the question on the ALR.

[rich pierce]

I’m thinking about it. I could see this happening in Europe where a shop may turn out utilitarian guns and highly decorated guns. In that case one master might do the finish decorative work on some guns and do little on others. Even here, Winchester and Remington had custom shops. Much later than the colonial period, there’s evidence that some J&S Hawken rifles were farmed out for engraving to Hoffman and Campbell. But I’m not sure that was done much here. There are a couple second half of the 1700s examples, like the Musician’s rifle, where engraving may have been farmed out. The patchbox engraving on that gun is unusual and seems to have copied an illustration.

[WESTbury]

Thanks for the reply Rich.

Kent

[Hungry Horse]

 I think you’ll find that in many cases the artistic work on American longrifles was the equivalent to todays business card. So, although I’m sure apprentices may have done some of the grunt work, the final artistic flourishes were added by the master.

 Hungry Horse

[WESTbury]

HUNGRY HORSE,

Well, that certainly sounds logical.

Thanks!

[spgordon]

I really doubt that eighteenth-century customers could tell one maker's carving from another--unless the carving depicted something truly distinctive such as an animal.

Our knowledge about the carving on these rifles is immeasurably more rich than theirs. We can look at 100 rifles and compare the carvings, paying close attention to details to separate out a Dickert from a Beck. But how many rifles by different makers would a typical eighteenth-century customer even have seen?--or, if seen, taken the time to carefully inspect?--and, even if a customer saw rifles from several makers, would he have distinguished differently carved C-scrolls from one another? I doubt it.

It is interesting to wonder what really mattered to eighteenth-century customers (or makers, for that matter).

In the book-making world, dustjackets never mattered: they were just that, protectors against dust on a bookshelf, and were usually discarded by users and libraries. Then the used/rare book trade began to prize dust jackets and use them to differentiate copies of old books from one another. Now dustjackets are key components to an old book, indeed they transform an "old" book into a "rare" and "collectible" one. Now we treat them as art. But did the "art" of the dustjacket matter to authors or consumers in 1900? It seems as if it didn't. And, while we can see some of the creators of these dustjackets as artists, they weren't considered so in their own day. They were unrecognized, mostly uncredited, considered more in the category of sign painters than fine artists.

So I'd just caution about assuming that what matters to us about an eighteenth-century longrifle mattered to them...

[Eric Kettenburg]

I also very much doubt that any 18th century gunmaker viewed themselves as an "artist."  After all, most of what they were doing was essentially mimicry in regard to what they had been taught, and perhaps work they had seen. 

[WESTbury]

I really doubt that eighteenth-century customers could tell one maker's carving from another--unless the carving depicted something truly distinctive such as an animal.

So I'd just caution about assuming that what matters to us about an eighteenth-century longrifle mattered to them...

Scott,

I think that you put us on the road to the crux of the matter. We are looking at these rifles under the light of 21st Century and I think perhaps a too romantic standard of what actually mattered to people in the 18th & 19th Centuries.

I really wonder how important the carving quality on these rifles was to the average purchaser of these rifles. Perhaps we put too much emphasis on the elaborate carving on some of these rifles that have survived. Logic would dictate they did survive because the original purchaser preserved them because of their output of cash to own the rifle. I would imagine that many more rifles, perhaps the majority, were made with simpler carving and embellishments or none at all.

Thanks for your your insight and perspective as a scholar.
Kent

[WESTbury]

I also very much doubt that any 18th century gunmaker viewed themselves as an "artist."  After all, most of what they were doing was essentially mimicry in regard to what they had been taught, and perhaps work they had seen.

Your point is well taken Eric. These men were business proprietors. They had an obligation to their families and what few employees they had to get product out the door at the least cost for the most profit. Volume is the only way to do that and volume requires speed. These greatly embellished were rifle were very probably the rare exception, as the labor involved required more time to produce. As we all know time is money.

What I outlined above of the need for speed is why I think from time to time they employed people on a temporary basis to perform the elaborate carving or perhaps the simpler carving. Perhaps my phrase "Master Carvers" is too strong. What about "Freelancers"?

[blienemann]

Then there's this Christian Oerter guy in a tiny shop away from any population center. For some reason customers far and wide found him and his rifles. Why did young Mennonite Martin Barr from outside Lancaster (far away) have Oerter stock a rifle for him, when fellow Mennonite John Newcomer lived close by, or with Dickert and other fine makers in Lancaster right next door? Scott wrote a great article about this letter, and what it might tell us. It is available from the Kentucky Rifle Association.

Young Oerter's work was perhaps special, and he signed at least some of his rifles. The letter he wrote to Barr shows pride in his work. I think customers then as now knew good and special work, and if that's what they wanted, they found their guy.

The design of carving on well known gunsmith's work is easy to identify, and varies by maker and location. We can see when an apprentice learns his master's style - Beck and Beyer for example, and later the apprentice sets up and takes the work in a slightly new direction. Or when H Albright or A Schweitzer move to another area, and change their design. It's certainly possible that someone in a particular shop might become a fine carver or engraver. All these masters we enjoy had to learn to draw, then carve. When talented enough they may have assisted on some work, but it does not seem likely to me that some master carver would go from shop to shop or area to area and know how to carve the local master's design. I've not seen any indication of this approach in the research to date. A young man would go on his Wanderjahre to another master, to broaden his exposure - like a journeyman. I am thinking he would learn from the new master, and turn out work that fit that location, though perhaps contribute ideas and skills.

Beyond carving, overall level of decoration and quality of design and execution counted. I agree there were plain rifles, and I have always enjoyed them. Architecture is the basis of any fine rifle, or as Allen M says, inside every great rifle is a fine schimmel.

These questions from new students, collectors and researchers keep our eyes open for new detail. Bob

[Frozen Run]

The big problem would have been walking into the master gun maker's shop and explaining to him that you are the "freelance carver" and walking out of there with same number of holes you walked in with.   

[WESTbury]

The big problem would have been walking into the master gun maker's shop and explaining to him that you are the "freelance carver" and walking out of there with same number of holes you walked in with. 

Why?

These communities were small and I would imagine most  residents knew each other at least on a passing basis. Also, they were tied together by their religious convictions so many new each other very well. So, if one or two particular people had skills that were needed by a rifle stocker or any other businessman, that would have been common local or perhaps regional knowledge.

[spgordon]

The design of carving on well known gunsmith's work is easy to identify, and varies by maker and location.

Easy for us, yes. My point was not that different makers didn't carve differently. It was that these differences would not have registered to eighteenth-century customers. Our knowledge about these differences comes from careful study. How exactly would an eighteenth-century customer gain this same knowledge that we have? 

I suspect customers would recognize the difference between carved and uncarved, of course; and within the uncarved category, customers would recognize the difference between "standard" carving (C-scroll or some other rococo design) and extraordinary carving, such as a dog or a lion or a griffin. But recognize differences (or care at all about them, if they did) between Dickert's C-scroll and another's? Highly unlikely.

It's sort of like: did you notice that, above, the word "difference" or "differently" is in a different font (Times New Roman) than the rest of the post (Georgia)?. There are real differences between Times New Roman and Georgia font, but that doesn't mean that under ordinary circumstances we recognize or care about them. It didn't matter to your reading and--probably--it didn't even register. I suspect the same thing is true of how eighteenth-century customers registered the difference between standard carvings.

I agree with what Kent says: "We are looking at these rifles under the light of 21st Century." The more we can correct for that bias, the more likely we are to arrive at accurate understandings of them. If we don't correct for that bias, we'll be more likely to produce distorted accounts of them.

[WESTbury]

Then there's this Christian Oerter guy in a tiny shop away from any population center. For some reason customers far and wide found him and his rifles. Why did young Mennonite Martin Barr from outside Lancaster (far away) have Oerter stock a rifle for him, when fellow Mennonite John Newcomer lived close by, or with Dickert and other fine makers in Lancaster right next door? Scott wrote a great article about this letter, and what it might tell us. It is available from the Kentucky Rifle Association.

Oerter's rifles are great. From having studying them in Bob L.'s second book, I've observed that, unless I missed something, all have either copper or silver wire imbedded in their incised carved design. I've not seen any that had raised carving. Why? Was Oerter under pressure to get the rifles out of the shop as quickly as possible? They all have Rev War era dates or just a year earlier so did the increased demand for arms in this period necessitate a faster was to keep decorating the rifles but get them through the shop quickly? Oerter's designs of his incised carvings look to have been influenced by his predecessors except for not being raised carved. Perhaps this raises the question as to whether or not he was not a ccomplished enough to perform raised carving.

Kent

[rich pierce]

The mystery of Oerter’s wire inlay has been fun to discuss over the years. I’ve not done wire inlay but I’m guessing it’s as time consuming as carving for one with mastery in these skills. I’m not ready to think that Oerter wasn’t a competent carver. It’s not that hard, and we’d have to reconsider who carved all the unsigned guns (Lion and Lamb, Griffon and so on) attributed to Christians Spring. Carving is not that difficult technically - though for those of us without a natural inclination to draw and design, layout can be challenging. It’s possible he just enjoyed it and it became a sort of “brand” hallmark of his work. All speculation.

[smart dog]

Hi Rich,
I find wire inlay to be much faster and easier to do than carving.  The choke point for both decorations is drawing and designing but once you have a good design on a gun, I can inlet all the wire in a day.  It takes me much longer to carve wood with any quality.  The wire designs on Oerter's guns are quite straight forward and can be done quickly.

dave

[Frozen Run]

The big problem would have been walking into the master gun maker's shop and explaining to him that you are the "freelance carver" and walking out of there with same number of holes you walked in with. 

Why?

First off, great question, it's really thought provoking, I don't want us to get off on the wrong foot here.

These gunsmiths had a tremendous amount of status in early America, and an equal or greater amount of pride. Who are you, as a freelance carver, to walk into his shop and try to take money off his table to do something that he could confidently do himself? With all the time and resources invested in a rifle and you want him to just hand if off and pay you to carve it up?

The other option is this freelance carver has his own shop where he does what? Just decorative carving? Niche people couldn't survive, ledgers indicate the gunsmith was also commonly the blacksmith, the general fixer upper, heck he probably picked turnips at night to feed his livestock in the morning before opening up his shop.

Where did he learn the trade from? He couldn't have just gone to a gun maker or furniture maker and say he just wants to learn the really advanced stuff, the stuff that the master does much of his hands on work over without years of grueling apprenticeship. So he would possess all the preliminary skills and the tools and not build guns or furniture himself? And if he did own such a shop and just used freelance carving to supplement his income then who would send him work? Not the masters from the other shops who could do the work themselves and are dependent on that work to feed their families.

Now there are exceptions to everything, depending on location and era the gun shop could have been anything from one master in the middle of the frontier applying his trade to a cottage industry of building parts with one of the masters stocking and carving them all the way up to something closer to a modern factory sans the electricity. Could it have happened? I have no doubt it did. Was it even remotely common? I strongly doubt it.       

I welcome all criticisms to my post here, I come here to learn. 

[WESTbury]

Frozen Run,

Great thoughts thanks for replying.

Relative to the German Immigrant communities in PA. I would imagine that some of them may have been cabinet makers in Germany and brought their skills with then of course. Perhaps they imparted their knowledge to some of the local gunstockers from time to time. Those same stockers could have sought out their assistance during times of high volume business. Don't forget that many of these people were in tight knit religious communities and possibly helped each other when required.

Your thoughts?

Let me explain my interest in this. I am a descendent of  Daniel Graeff, uncle of Lancaster rifle stockers John and Jacob Graeff. I am trying to get an understanding of the stocker business and their relationships.

Kent

[spgordon]

The design of carving on well known gunsmith's work is easy to identify, and varies by maker and location.

I'm home from work with access to my books now. This is what I mean. These are three carvings by three different makers:



Today we can view these next to one another and see subtle differences. (Eighteenth-century customers/users never had that opportunity.)

Today, trained eyes may even be able to assign these designs to particular makers (Zorger, Welshans, White).

But it stretches the bounds of belief (for me, at least) to imagine that eighteenth-century customers or users saw any difference between these three carvings or between these and other configurations of the rococo scrolls. I think it's very likely that they saw rococo carving, plain and simple. And the particular shape that such rococo carving took didn't register any more than the particulars of the floral pattern on one pair of sheets versus another would register for us. Sure, we would recognize the difference between a linear pattern on sheets and a floral one, but our attention to specifics would probably end there. (Specialists in sheets, however, could point out and name all sorts of differences that we users could not.)

I would think, maybe, that eighteenth-century customers cared about the difference between (a) rifles with no carving, (b) rifles with standard carving (rococo scrolls), and (c) some rifles with extraordinary carving (animals, etc.)--in that in some markets these three different items would involve different price points.

Just some late-afternoon thoughts.

[WESTbury]

Great points Scott. I think we need to attempt to look at all of this , if its even possible, through the eyes of the 18th or 19th century customer for these rifles.

I've spent a lot of time in the last five years down here in Florida going through antique malls with our neighbors, one of whom was a successful antique dealer in Connecticut. I've looked at many pieces of furniture with him trying to learn what is fake, restored, etc. I was surprised one day while looking at a cabinet he determined to be an original piece, when I remarked that carved rococo designs were very striking. He very clearly stated that it was nice but really just decoration and really did not mean too much except to dress up a blank piece of walnut.

[JTR]

The design of carving on well known gunsmith's work is easy to identify, and varies by maker and location.

I'm home from work with access to my books now. This is what I mean. These are three carvings by three different makers:



Today we can view these next to one another and see subtle differences. (Eighteenth-century customers/users never had that opportunity.)

Today, trained eyes may even be able to assign these designs to particular makers (Zorger, Welshans, White).

But it stretches the bounds of belief (for me, at least) to imagine that eighteenth-century customers or users saw any difference between these three carvings or between these and other configurations of the rococo scrolls.

Scott, that's because you're not a gun guy!

The ratio of carved to non-carved guns back then must have been at least 2 or 3 hundred to one, judging by surviving examples we see today. Obviously most guys bought a plain rifle to do the day to day work a gun back then was put too. The guys that bought these carved guns, and could Afford these carved guns, were no doubt quite savvy as to what they were buying, and were no doubt gun guys. Remember, in by-gone days target shooting was the #1 sport, up until around 1930. I'm sure bragging rights were just as important at a early Lancaster shooting match, as someone's favorite pickup truck or Ferrari might be nowadays, and the carving on these guns is what makes them special!

Just my humble opinion,

[smart dog]

Hi Guys,
What intrigues me is that long rifles are often attributed to makers based on decorative similarities considerably more subtle than the Rochester rifle and the Edward Marshall rifle.  So why are we not saying the Rochester and Marshall rifles were made by the same hand? 

dave

[spgordon]

Scott, that's because you're not a gun guy!

The ratio of carved to non-carved guns back then must have been at least 2 or 3 hundred to one, judging by surviving examples we see today. Obviously most guys bought a plain rifle to do the day to day work a gun back then was put too. The guys that bought these carved guns, and could Afford these carved guns, were no doubt quite savvy as to what they were buying, and were no doubt gun guys. Remember, in by-gone days target shooting was the #1 sport, up until around 1930. I'm sure bragging rights were just as important at a early Lancaster shooting match, as someone's favorite pickup truck or Ferrari might be nowadays, and the carving on these guns is what makes them special!

Thanks, John, for this reply--which really does help me clarify what I think about all this.

I think this is a great way to state the issue: were the users of these rifles "gun guys," similar, that is, to modern-day collectors and makers? Did the folks who purchased carved rifles do so because they appreciated the carving, as a modern-day collector or maker does?

I don't think so. Certainly could be, though. But I think most eighteenth-century users bought their rifles the way that we buy lawnmowers.

You are right that I'm not a gun guy! I do collect a lot of other things. Among other things, I'm a "postcard" guy. But it would be a major mistake for me to imagine that the individuals who made or posted these cards were "postcard guys" in the way I am. They weren't. They were taking a photo of their house and sending it to a relative. They never thought that they were producing a unique image of that particular house that somebody 100 years later would be obsessed with. (That said, there were also postcard collectors in 1907.)

All that is to say that being a gun guy, a passionate collector or builder, may make it difficult to see the historical difference between us and them. We collect these objects, treat them as art, pay $300,000 for a single rifle. This is us, though. It isn't necessarily how they understood these objects.

I appreciate the thoughts and will continue to think about them.

[spgordon]

Scott, that's because you're not a gun guy!

John--To ask a more straightforward question than my long answer above: do you believe that consumers of the three different rifles in the photo I posted above would differentiate among those carvings?

I know the three carvings are different. But that's a different matter than eighteenth-century consumers caring or noticing these differences--in the sense of preferring one over the other, making purchasing choices on the basis of the differences, or linking the style to a particular maker. (I'm honestly asking, and honestly curious, so please don't misread my tone in the question!)

Thanks in advance -- Scott

[JTR]

Scott, I have no doubt they would!
Makers that were far enough from one another, so that a buyer might not be familiar with that distant maker might be a different story. But if you take Lancaster Co, where there were several makers working, I have no doubt the guns of each maker would be recognized at arms length by prospective buyers, or owners at shooting matches.

As for the ratio of carved vs uncarved, I believe I heard that at one of the KRA meetings. True, or not, I have no positive proof. However, if you look at the number of guns for sale nowadays at the larger shows, uncarved guns vastly outnumber the carved ones. Consider that many more carved guns have likely been saved down through time, where uncarved ones were more likely to be disposed of for one reason or another, the ratio of uncarved to carved could be even higher.

Of course this is just my opinion after actively collection these things for the past 35 years or so.
John