Bull Dog Wrench Co 10A, unique adjustable wrench

[NoahG]

There is so little information available about this wrench, or its company, that I registered just to post about it!

I picked up this 10" adjustable wrench Sunday at an antique store in Elk Rapids, MI for $8. Ive never seen any wrench like it or heard of this company before. One side of the handle says "BULL DOG WRENCH CO PAT PEND. BENTON HARBOR MICH." and the other side says "10A-BULL-DOG-GRIPS-NEVER-SLIPS". The jaw is serrated with a spring loaded pad that I assume is meant to maintain constant engagement on a fastener. Some Googling has turned up a patent application and one old auction entry, but little else. It might be from the 20's?

[NoahG]

There are two patented variations, both from 1925 and separate by only a few months. I own the earlier example. 

http://www.datamp.org/patents/displayPatent.php?number=1,551,763&type=
http://www.datamp.org/patents/displayPatent.php?pn=1557864&id=33190

[mikeswrenches]

Hi Noah, Welcome to our little corner of the wrench world.
 
Nice find on the wrench, certainly not a common variation of the " Crescent wrench". It was probably made between February of 1924 and September of 1925.

The picture of one of the wrenchs in the DATAMP entry is marked Patented 1925, so it would have been later than yours. Other than that, I’m no help.

Mike

[mvwcnews]

This BULL DOG helped  me sort out  a couple of patent entries for DATAMP.  Not knowing Michigan geography, I had to look up Benton Harbor, Holland & Kalamazoo in a road atlas.   Not real close to each other.   But a patent (Mull #1,557,864)  & manufacturer both in Benton Harbor strongly suggests those go together. Especially since the design in patent #1,557,864 looks like the BULL DOG wrench.   That leaves  HOLLAND STEEL wrench & Morris patent #1,551,763 as contemporary &  possibly otherwise not related.  It would not be the first time two independent inventor / manufacturer sets were developing nearly identical products at the same time.

I'd had an example of the BULL DOG in the MVWC Newsletter years ago  (pg. 11, Dec. 2003 -- one had sold on eBay back then) but never looked closely at it in comparison to the HOLLAND STEEL until now.
 
Since Disney got Congress to re-write copyright law to generate a "perpetual" copyright starting with works "published" in 1923,  anything more recent than that is harder to research using google book search because Google does not want to get sued for copyright infringement & so blocks access  (except for "snippet view" and a very few publications which have signed "free to view" agreements -- like POPULAR MECHANICS & POPULAR  SCIENCE

[NoahG]

@mvwcnews, you actually just helped me realize an important detail. While my wrench is marked for the Bull Dog Co, the design of the jaw pad matches the Morris patent #1,551,763.