I know there are many tool collectors out there and many have built collections of wood-working tools. Some have started collections around what I’d call “modern” tools, such as Stanley planes. An advantage for Stanley collectors is that the company created a sizing system and also there are other ways to date a particular tool. Some wooden tools are certainly works of art as well as function. I have one or two, but one plane I purchased on purpose was a spill plane. I’ve had a number of spill jars in the collection, but I hadn’t thought about how the spills were created. I didn’t figure out how it was used until I talked with a woodworker at a museum exhibit.
That’s a long way around to say I arrived on the publishing scene during major technological changes in printing. The first newspaper I purchased continued to have a “job shop” where there was still some letterpress printing going on. We were also located in the same building since before 1900, so there were many “tools of the trade” available, some of which I used in the business and prior in high school printing shop.
Today I’m happy to have “galley racks” and galleys and composing sticks, line gauges, quoins and quoin keys, various size chases, and many other representative tools from the printing industry. Not too long ago I set aside a catalogue from a nearby type foundry that supplied local printers with fonts of type cast from mostly lead as well as wooden type for ornate or large sizes often used for printing posters.
Some of the supplies have become popular on collectible sites, often mis-identified or best guess. I’m happy to have examples, and at some point I’ll probably set aside and label a selection to remember “the old days” of printing before I leave the industry (or this earth!).
As is the case with many collectors, there’s always a place to display good intentions.