Howdy,

I've been lurking for a couple of weeks and I like the looks of this place
so it's time to poke my head up past the railing and say hello.

I'm a 31 year old software developer living in Seattle, WA.  I'm just
getting into woodworking.  I spend most of my time arranging bits so I
thought that it might be fun to build things out of atoms as well.  I am
currently taking an introductory class at the local community college; the
instructor definitely lives in the house that Norm built but I'm still
having a good time.  I'm planning to take a traditional woodworking class
this spring (i.e. handtools only).  I don't have a lot of spare time right
now and I don't have any shop space of my own so classes are the way to go
for me.

The oldtools bug has bitten me.  Partly it is practical; I don't have space
for p*w*r tools but I can comandeer the dining table or the deck for an
afternoon and work with handtools.  Mainly, though, working wood by hand
seems much more conscious and connected to the wood and to the final form.
Oh and I also like the fact that while plane irons can make a nasty cut (as
I have discovered) they are not likely to take whole fingers.

I have bought a couple of old planes: a Stanley #5, looks like a type 19 as
far as I can tell; a #90, no idea how old but it looks like it has been
around a while; and a #220, okay I know that the last one is a real piece of
cr*p but I wanted a block plane and that was all that I could find.  I have
cleaned and sharpened them, tuned the #5 a bit, and took my first shavings
last week.  Wahoo!!  It was loads of fun.

Now my question:  Where the heck can I find old tools in the Seattle area?
Of course there are lots of tools available on the net, but I'm just getting
started so it is very important for me to be able to pick things up, fiddle
with 'em, maybe try them out.  I'll go look at collector tools of course,
but I'm more interested in users.  I'm definitely not afraid of a little
rust.  I have found a couple of places: Hardwick's sells mostly new and a
little used, generally high quality stuff but not many planes; Admiralty
House Antiques looks promising but is closed for the next couple of weeks.

.seth

Seth Cousins wrote:
>

>
> Now my question:  Where the heck can I find old tools in the Seattle area?

Seth,

There aren't any.  None.  Nada.  Zilch.

Well, maybe a few.  Snohomish's antique mawls tend to have some.  There is
(was?) also a largish one up just north of Bellingham that had quite a few.
There are a couple of anitique places in Puyallup that have some.

Mostly, though, I import mine from:

Patrick Leach - The Merchant of Ashby.
Thomas Bruce - former list mom who still babysits the hardware on which the
list                runs.
(http://www.mindspring.com/~trbruce/toolhut/catalog.html)
Bob Brode - Saws, saws and more saws.
(http://modigliani.brandx.net/user/bbrode/tools_for_sale/)

and various other galoots.

Also see the tools pages on the Electronic Neanderthal
(http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~alf/en/en.html)

-Ken
Tacoma

Seth sez "Where the heck can I find old tools in the Seattle area?"

Seth,

If you want to see more tools than you can shake a stick at, join an
organization "like" Mid-West Tool Collectors Association or Early American
Industries Assn.

If you did and went to one of the area or National meetings, you would be blown
away.

Mark