I guess my quest for Hilary Klein miniatures is well known to the group. At the recent MVWC meeting an auction I had a rare chance to obtain some Hilary Klein history about his wrench making. The following is an explanation and summary of the information I was able to obtain.
Hilary Klein Miniature Wrench Sales 1990 - 1996
During the weekend of the April 13th & 14th 2018 MVWC meeting and auction in York Nebraska I was fortunate to be able to meet Hilary Klein’s son and daughter-in-law. Conversations on and off during the weekend I discovered that Hilary’s son had brought along Hilary’s wrench diary. The diary mostly contained dates that he purchased many of the wrenches in his collection along with dates that he sold some of the wrenches he had collected. My main interest was the pages that contained information on the sales of his miniature wrenches. These pages contained information from 1990 through 1996. Obvious this is only a portion of Hilary’s miniature making years but it gives us a better understanding on the chronological order of when he made some of his 76 wrenches and it gives us an idea of how many he made of some of them. 23 different wrenches are covered in the pages of Hilary’s book.
In compiling the information, I made several assumptions, the first year a wrench was listed is the year I have assigned that wrench to have been made and the quantity of each wrench type is attributed to the year of manufacture even if sales were recorded in following years. A total of 143 miniature wrenches were sold over this 6-year period.
I am using my booklet number in conjunction with the wrench patentee name or wrench name, for patent dates refer to the booklet list or the alphabetical listing.
1990 (18 Total for the Year)
#43 H. King Rack Wrench, 6 listed as sold
#39 King & Hough Wrench, 5 listed as sold
#42 Columbian Adjustable Wrench, 4 listed as sold
#29 Cincinnati Tool Wrench, 3 listed as sold
1991 (20 Total for the Year)
#17 Jordan & Smith Wrench, 5 listed as sold
#26 H. W. Hewett 1840 Double Screw Wrench, 4 listed as sold
#13 H. W. Hewett 1864 Double Screw Wrench, 6 listed as sold
#6 Bemis & Call Wrench, 5 listed as sold
1992 (31 Total for the Year)
#37 J. Tower Wrench, 4 listed as sold
#25 E. S. Scripture as Patented Wrench, 5 listed as sold
#32 B. F. Stockford Wrench, 5 listed as sold
#2 A. G. Coes Double Screw Wrench, 17 listed as sold
1993 (33 Total for the Year)
#38 E. S. Scripture as Made Wrench, 15 listed as sold
#4 R. Davis Wrench, 11 listed as sold
#41 Coes Key Wrench, 7 listed as sold
1994 (33 Total for the Year)
#1 A. W. Peterson Wrench, 13 listed as sold
#8 H. W. Atwater Utility Wrench, 7 listed as sold
#7 Unmarked Quick Adjust, 4 listed as sold
#3 S. Kane & T. & J. Keane Wrench, 6 listed as sold
#24 D. P. Foster Wrench, 3 listed as sold
1995 (7 Total for the Year)
#11 B. F. Joslyn Wrench, 3 listed as sold
#9 G. B. Phillips Wrench, 4 listed as sold
1996 (1 Total for the Year)
#23 T. F. Vandegrift, 1 listed as sold
43 different buyers are listed in the 6-year period. One single buyer purchased 17 of the 23 different wrenches listed, the next highest was another buyer purchased 10.
