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Teacher note: A number of students contributed to these pages on Colonial times. Each contributed diffferent information or a different perspective. You may find that each article adds to your understanding and research base.
GO TO ARTICLE # 2
The cooper is a woodcarver who makes and repairs barrels, tubs, casks, buckets, and other containers made of wood. To make a barrel, you first cut a tree. Then you remove the sap from it and quarter it. Quartering is when you cut the tree into smaller pieces. Then, the wood is carves into a thinner piece of wood. After that, the wood is dipped into boiling water. This helps the wood to bend so it can be made into a barrel kind of shape. Then, the wood is put together into a barrel shape with round strips of wood.
The cooper works at a cooperage. It is a combination of a workstation and a home for the cooper. To be a cooper, you need to be skilled in lots of different ways. First of all, this job would have had to be passed down from your family. Also, you would need to be strong so you can pick up the wood and tools to make his craft. And the third thing is the most important thing, you need to be is a good wood carver. You need to be a good wood carver because a cooper makes the wood pieces without using any measuring tools.
The tools that the cooper uses are very simple. The one important tool is the axes or the cutting tools. Some tools were the iron wedges, a bucksaw, chisels, and other tools. The cooper does not use any measuring tools. The human body is his basis for most of the measurements when cutting things. Most of the tools are just for cutting the wood and smoothing it out.
The people in the colonies needed to the cooper to live because there was no other way to store food. Because the cooper made barrels and containers, the people had enough food to eat during the cold seasons <like in the winter>. Also, buckets were needed so the people could get water out of wells and drink them. This craft was used by all classes. However, the higher classes got barrels with special and fancier designs.
Today, plastic container companies such as Tupperware replace coopers. Barrels and things that coopers made out of wood are not used anymore. Now, instead of wood, most containers and buckets and things are made of plastic. Plastic is more easy to use and it is made more simply. There are some places where people still use barrels and things that coopers produce, but it is mostly in the countryside.
Our technology grew an enormous amount during the colonial period and now, it is so much more different and life is more simple than before. I am glad I live in this time period where life is simple. If I was living in the colonial period and was doing this work, I probably wouldn't have survived. Being a cooper was a lot of hard work. The cooper held a great amount of responsibility for the people in his town.
. A cooper is one that makes or repairs wooden barrels and tubs He is a person who carves wood into shapes that can be made into barrels. Barrels are made in many different sizes for storage containers for many different types of things. Wooden barrels are first made by carving woods to a certain shape. Then, they dip it into boiling water so it is able to bend. Then they bend the wood so that they all go together.
Tools that are used for the cooper are axes and adzes, splitting
tools, handling tools, holding tools, drawknives and shaves, saws, chisels,
gouges, and mallets, planes, boring tools, and sharpening tools, Axes and
Adzes are “impact” tools. Them long handle allows the user to
give velocity to the cutting edge, which then servers the fibers of the wood.
Splitting tools, Iron wedges driven by a sledgehammer are the most common
splitting tools. Their functions are combined in the heavy splitting maul. Handling
tools, the raw material of woodworking can be plenty heavy. Once a tree
is down, the real work of moving it begins. Holding tools, with the shaving
horse, a foot-operated vise, both hands are left free to work the wood. A quick
release of foot pressure permits rapid readjustment of the work piece. Saws,
it can be grouped according to the direction of the grain they are intended
to cut. Acting like a row of tiny knives, crosscut saws sever the cross grain
of the wood. Drawknives and shaves, it comes in varied forms for different
jobs. Almost all of them are pulled toward the user with two hands and have
a single-beveled cutting edge. Chisels, Gouges, and mallets, chisels
may be pushed with the hand or driven mallet. Paring chisels are for light work.
Gouges also vary according to the roughness of the work for which they are intended.
They can also be classed according to whether the bevel
is on the inside of the curve (in-cannel) or the outside (out-cannel); the latter
is most common and useful for the two. Planes, although we think of old
planes as being all wood with a metal blade, the ancient Romans had metal-bodies
ones. In the late nineteenth century, many planes were made with metal-bodies
and metal adjustment mechanisms. Boring tools, the cutting end of a boring
tool acts like a small rotary chisel. A central lead screw feeds this cutting
edge into the work on most regular twist augers. Sharpening tools are
used to sharpen the edges of other tools that have become dull with a lot of
use. A tool that has a blunt or rough cutting edge that will not break the fibers
of the wood easily and will obviously require more effort to use. However, a
keen edge is only one aspect of sharpness. Measuring and Marking are not considered
as tools, because the human body is the basis for most measurements.
The cooper works at a cooperage, which is a shop and he basically lives there. The cooperage would more be in a town than out in the country, because hometown residents would need this kind of material, than the countryside residents would.
The cooper's skills are very simple and not complicated. Coopers need to be educated in wood skills and have to be able to use and take care of their tools. They also have to be approximate when carving and shaping the wood (coopers need to be strong to be able to lift up the wood and the tools).
The people needed the cooper, because they needed barrels for food storage and coopers also made buckets for paint, and other liquids (like water). Coopers might like doing this job, because they want to improve there skills to get better, and will be able to make stuff easier, make fancier barrels, and buckets.
A cooper is a type of wood carver that carves wood into shapes
that are able to be made into barrels.
First they make barrels
by carving woods to a certain shape. Then they dip it into boiling water so
it is able to bend. Then they bend the wood so that they all go together.This site is created and maintained by Holly
Geddes.
Last updated on
July 22, 2003