Lid lifter/pliers/hammer contraption?

[Plyerman]

Okay, here's another old multi-purpose device that I need some help with. There is a plier, the lower jaw of which is "split" so it can be used to pull nails. And there is a hammer. And there is what I take to be a stove lid lifter or maybe hot kettle lifter? Not exactly sure about that though.






The plier pivot is a through-the-center design, which seems like it would be more difficult to make than the usual side-by-side plier pivot. Unfortunately the designer seems to have forgotten about the stove lifter hook, which gets in the way of the plier jaw and limits how far the pliers can be opened.








The entire unit is about 9 inches long. But dang, there are no stampings or markings on it.





Anybody got any thoughts on who made it or how old it is?

[Wrenchmensch]

Yes, I have one of these on display.  The handle is stamped "Pat. Oct. 23, 66".  The Patent Number is 59131, and it is identified as "J. C. Longshore." "Lid Lifter."   J. C. Longshore is identified in the patent as being of Mansfield, Ohio.

[HeelSpur]

I see pliers, a hammer head, nail puller, and 2 curly que's.
Where does the lid lifter come in and are you talking stove lid?

[rusty]

From the patent:
  Improved Combined Stove-Lid Lifter, Pinchers, Pan, Pot,
  Sad-Iron,.&c., Lifter and Hammer, and Tack-Puller ;

The drawing figures say
 (F)  (The hook by the pliers)   is for lifting bread pans and pudding dishes, the opposite plier head used in reverse to hold the pan against the back of the hook..
 - when used on the inside, it's a plain pot lifter /sad iron hook

(D) (The claw part ) is the stove lifter proper....

Strangely, the only reference to (G) , the hook behind the hammer head, is to note that it is less curved than the other hook (*duh*), doesn't say why it is there....

[amertrac]

Boy do I know a kitchen wall that this would fit on nicely    lol  bob w.

[Plyerman]

Yahoo! Thanks for the identification Wrenchmensch! Yep, that's it exactly. Odd that yours has the patent date so distinctly cast in the handle, but there's no trace of any marks on mine...?


But anyhow, armed with the inventor's name and a patent number, here's what I was able to google up. From the Scientific American, Volume 16:


 

[Wrenchmensch]

The patent info is stamped on the plier handle. 

[Branson]

Really cool! 

[scottg]

Its still hard to tell what the maker really had in mind for this.
 In 66 you would still have some people cooking on the hearth, with its crane and accessories.
 This tool almost looks to be made for that. Reaching near an open fire and various pulling and pushing.
 
 But maybe by this time you would have a majority people using cast iron stoves.
  A parlor stove in the parlor and cookstove in the kitchen.
 Whether coal or wood fired would be all about geographic location.

  The lid lifter part of the "sales pitch" has to be about the round "stove eyes".   These are totally flat recessed when looking at the stove top, with nothing but a square hole showing. You need a tool to get them out (so you can place the skillet directly over the fire).
  The topline wood cookstoves often had 6 of these eyes, and sometimes each single eye would be separated into three different eyes so you could expose just exactly as much open flame as you liked.
  Stoves always came with a tool for this but you know how humans are.
 Those damn lid lifters come with legs!!
 Lid lifters got incorporated into everything!

  This tool also had to serve as a grate shaker somehow or other.  If burning coal, the grates had to be kept pretty clean so air could come up from below. Coal requires a lot more air than wood to burn.   The other end of many lid lifters had a grate shaker, usually a 5/8" square hole, more or less.
  Since the lid lifter was presumably misplaced again, the grate shaker would be missing too and,.......... where is my coffee???  I'm gonna die here.

 Parlor stoves often had stove eyes too, but sometimes the entire lid of the stove could rotate from one end and open you so you could shovel coal or drop logs in from the top.
  Substantial cast iron is moved in this process and if you use an insufficient rag or tool to do it,
bad things happen.

 I am sure our inventor lost his lid lifter for the cookstove, then got burned filling the parlor stove one morning. 

  Maybe foolishly tried to lift a Mrs Potts sad iron, because the handle, (you got one handle in a set of 6 irons),  is detachable, and subject to misplacement.
   If you drop a hot iron on cloth of any kind, rugs included, you better get it off there right now and you better have a way to do that. 
 There is nothing to grab about a Mrs Potts without its handle, except burn.

 No telling how many other things he was trying to do with this tool. But these jobs would be universal.
In my life I have desperately needed all these jobs taken care of, just as our inventor intended.

 How close his final product was to his idea of expert efficiency at these jobs, is anyone guess.
  yours Scott

[Billman49]

Looking at the tool itself, and the description in the Scientific American, the pliers part is to grasp stove covers, the hooks are used for pot lids - for recessed holes on lids the lower jaw of the pliers would work... I guess even at this time, many homes still had open fires with a pot or kettle hook - and from looking at Western movies all camp cooking was done on open fires using large cast iron pots... They would be invaluable for camp use...

FYI lid and pan lifters are still found new in many European countries - often a plier type with the jaws at right angles to the handles...

For more patent stove/pan lid lifters see: http://www.datamp.org/patents/search/xrefType.php?cat=390&type=0&class=50000

and http://www.datamp.org/patents/search/xrefClass.php?class=7&subclass=109

[Plyerman]

Great information guys, thanks! I guess once you start imagining what folks had to deal with back then, this tool doesn't seem so far fetched.



Hey, speaking of Datamp.org, they have a little write-up on this tool:
http://www.datamp.org/patents/search/advance.php?pn=59131&id=13754&set=3



And one of their images is of an old advertisement:

[Branson]

Like a lot of multi purpose tools, I think this one gets a little excessive in its purposes.  But that said, when one has done even a few living history gigs, one becomes fascinated by lid lifters.  Whether you are cooking over an open fire, over an open hearth, or dealing with old brick ovens, a lid lifter is going to be your best friend.   I've had to make some at reenactments when the cooks were pulling out their hair trying to reach over hot coals to see how the food was coming along or adding more stuff to stews and such -- it's not a pot-holder job.

Lots of people were in fact cooking over hearths.  Think of all the posnets, legged and covered skillets, and Dutch ovens (the kind with the dished lids so that you could pile hot coals on them).   You don't want the lid to be just dangling and spilling ash and coal into the dinner.  That hammer head will go a long way toward stabilizing a heavy cast iron lid.  And you've got a long reach with the wooden handle so that your fingernails don't curl with the heat while you're trying to seize and lift that lid. 

No wonder two hundred sold in Iowa in a few days at the State Fair.