Gang,
I had a good day at the local dirt market this last Sunday and picked up a few wrenches that may be of interest to some of you. Here's the short list of wrenches with some descriptives:
1. MAC CL16L, 1/2" long pattern combo wrench, condition fair but worn, ca. 1970's.
2. BONNEY 1240, 1-1/4" water pump wrench, condition very good, ca. 1947 - 1960's.
3. WHITIN 1562, 9/16" x 5/8" textile wrench, condition fair but very interesting, ca. 1926 -1930's.
Here's a quick pic of the Wrench specimens:
In my mind, all of these wrenches are worthy of ownership from a user as well as collector standpoint. But the WHITIN wrench seems the most interesting because it was a total mystery to me. At first, I thought it was an angle wrench with the heads offset at 22 degrees. But it turned out that the two heads were of different sizes. So I asked for some help from the tool hounds at the GG. A search of the WHITIN name led not to a tool company, but to the Whitin Machine Works of Whitinsville MA (founded in 1895 and, at one time, the worlds largest textile machinery producer). Another search of the Whitin name led to Alloy Artifacts and their section on Billings & Spencer tools. Sure enough, B&S not only made textile wrenches including a model 1562 but also produced similar models for the Whitin Machine works. Following is a crude photo trail of evidence:
A close up of my Whitin 1562 wrench... note-- there are no markings on the other side of the wrench.
AA photo of the Billings 1562 wrench...
AA photo of the Billings 1554 wrench with inset of Whitin Machine Wks stamping...
I am mindful that it is entirely possible that Whitin bought toolage from more than one OEM either simultaneously or sequentially, but I'm reasonably confident we have the smoking gun here.
Of course, comments, suggestions, or alternate attributrions are always welcome...
