Pitch Forks

by | Feb 16, 2019 | 3 comments

Curtis Buchanan called last week.  We talked of our class schedules, springpole lathes (we are both building one)  and the book Curtis is reading Craeft: An Inquiry into the Origins and True Meaning of Traditional Crafts.  Curtis is persuasive; I have bought the book and am now on the third chapter about haymaking.

Seems we would all still be hunter-gatherers if it weren’t for hay and we all know you can’t have hay without a scythe and a pitch fork.  Pitchforks!  I love making pitchforks. 

The author mentions visiting a region of France that has been making pitchforks since the twelfth century. I found this video of the Conservatory of the Fork, where they still make coppice-grown French pitch forks, steam bent over a fire and dried over the same fire.  Tell him to sharpen his drawknife!

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5 years ago

Thanks for sharing the video. Very interesting how they grow the pitch forks. My only regret was not learning more French from my grandfather.

5 years ago

I wish I spoke French! 🙂

Hey, “TraditionallySpeaking”, any chance you remember that blog? I’d love to read it and would appreciate if you shared the name of that other book.

My local library has a copy of the book, so I’ve requested it and am looking forward to reading it.

Thanks for sharing, Elia.

TraditionallySpeaking
5 years ago

I read about this book on a blog last week and purchased it straight away. I haven’t yet started to read it because another older book was mentioned to read first so I ordered that one used and it won’t be in from the UK for a couple of weeks maybe. I am very excited now to read about pitchforks of all things!

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