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Page 20 The Antique Shoppe December, 2017 work to make usable again. While taking apart a couple of dressers I have
Questions & refinished, I have discovered that the nails used to build them are square.

Can you give me any information on the history of square nails, such as
Common Sense Answers when they were first used and when the switch to round nails was made?
Thanks for any information you have.
—Ron M.
Ron - You may be confusing “square” nails with rectangular cut
with Fred Taylor A. nails. Square nails were made by heating and pounding square
iron rods called nail stock. The blacksmith or “nailer” created a tapered
square peg with a sharp point. Then the stock was placed in a type of
I read your column regularly and was wondering if you might shed clamp on the anvil called a swage block. A series of sharp blows to the
Q. some light on a subject. I attend a lot of auctions and sometimes top of the stock created the head of the nail - the “rosehead” effect. Nails
pick up old pieces of furniture to repair and refinish as a hobby during the were made one at a time like this from the mid 17th century to the end of
cold winter months in Western New York. The pieces I buy are usually the 18th century. Thomas Jefferson financed his new home at Monticello
covered with several coats of paint, smell like they were in the barn the by running a very profitable nail making industry.
last 50 years, and were rejected by the local dump, so they require a lot of By the end of the 18th century several pieces of machinery had been invented
that could produce nails in vast quantities without all the physical labor. One
of these machines was introduced as early as 1768 by Ebeneezer Reed, another
LPGA Blvd Daytona New
I-95 in 1775 and a patent was issued for one to Jacob Perkins in 1794. All of these
265 Mason Ave machines produced nails by cutting slivers of iron from a thin iron plate or
Dunn Ave Int’l Speedway Blvd N Beach St Peninsula sheet. Unlike hand wrought nails which had four tapered sides, these “cut” nails
92 483 RidgewoodAve had only two tapered sides and two parallel sides giving the nails a rectangular
Beville Rd Smyrna
261 shape at the neck. They are easily identified by the rectangular shaped hole left
400
260 132 when they are removed from the wood. Hand wrought nails leave a square hole,
Beach
US1
A1A
Clyde Morris
421 reflecting the shape of the original piece of nail stock. Most nails produced in the
256 S Atlantic Ave 19th century were cut nails that have a flat head rather than the rosehead found
5 on handwrought nails.
Int’l Speedway Blvd US1 Round wire nails were produced late in the 19th century. The machinery
for that nail was invented in 1851 and demonstrated at the 1876 Centennial
92 600 I-4 New Smyrna
Peninsula
Ridgewood Ave
92 Pioneer Trail NorthCswy Flagler Beach Exposition in Philadelphia. The round wire nail went into common use
17
New York Ave 44 I-95 1 44 around 1880.
600 249 44 Canal Edgewater
15 Riverside Dr 3 A good history of furniture fasteners such as nails and screws is included
10th St A1A
W Park Ave in my book “HOW TO BE A FURNITURE DETECTIVE”.
Indian River Blvd
442
NSB ANTIQUE MALL
Quality Vintage & Mid-Century Furniture
Art - Vintage Toys - Estate Jewelry
From New Smyrna’s Oldest Antique Shop
419 Canal Street • 386-426-7825
www.newsmyrnaantiquemall.com • skd43@cfl.rr.com
Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun 12-5pm

Spend a day shopping
in New Smyrna Bch.
7 Area Antique Shops This illustration shows the three main types of nails encountered
+Many Fine Restaurants.
Sure to be an adventure! in American furniture. The shaded area to the right of each nail
represents the shape of the hole it creates in the wood.
1

My daughter gave me an old roll-top desk which she claims was
Coronado Antiques Q. made in 1890. It has a metal clasp on the roll top (states France,

& Collectibles Mall Bureau L D, Paris, where you insert the key). It is dark and dirty gummy. I
would so like to clean it but could you tell me how and what I should buy
Over 7,000 sq.ft. of Home Decor, Antiques, Mid-Century Modern, to clean it. Thank you so very much. —Mrs. G.M.
Nautical & Coastal Furnishings and Much More! You may have two subjects to deal with. If the desk was in
1433 South Dixie Freeway A. fact made in 1890 the original finish is probably shellac. That
accounts for the “dark” part because as shellac ages it often turns dark,
New Smyrna Shopping Center - (US 1 South) almost black. That part is difficult to deal with and I’ll come back to that.
New Smyrna Beach, FL The first thing you need to do is clean it with mineral spirits (paint thinner)

386-428-3331 or Vulpex, a spirit based soap. It won’t hurt the existing finish - different

OPEN Mon-Sat 10am-6pm, Sun 12-5pm chemistry - but it will remove the gummy feeling and the surface layer of
dirt and grime.
3 Continued >