Hand Tool Diaspora.......

[Admiral]

To steal from the Bard in Hamlet, when I've shuffled off this mortal coil, there's going to be one heck of a garage sale at my house, and all these, plus more (as this is an old picture, and the red tool box is chock full), will be released in the wild, likely for below market prices, and whilst that my heart would be broken if I were still alive, I'll be dead, and someone will get a bargain, just like I did!!!

[Hank Knight]

The Civil War devastated the South. The Emancipation Proclamation wiped out a majority of the capital and what was left (land) was no longer productive. - Not defending slavery by any means, but simply recounting history. - The South languished in poverty from the 1860s until after WWII, and people did what they could to scratch out a living. There was no capital to invest in industry, housing or furniture and no money to buy tools. People made do with what they had and held on to the few tools their grandaddies had owned, the ones that weren't repurposed to fill war needs. Meanwhile, the North, particularly the Northeast, was booming, at least until the Great Depression of the 1930s. The period from the 4th quarter of the 1800s until WWII is the golden age of American tool production. Tools built then are the ones we seek and collect today. They naturally went to the production areas in the North where they were used to make stuff and where people could afford buy them. They didn't go to the rural South where there was very little industry and where nobody could afford to buy them anyway.

[Jack in omaha]

I have a theory about good prospecting area in the West. I always look for river and railroad towns. It is also true that farms needed tools but survivors from farms are more weathered and used and lower quality than in industrial city and manufacturing sites. 
If you are ever near missouri Valley or Omaha visit the Bertrand Museum. A   steamboat went down and was found many years later in a cornfield. The course of the river had shifted but it is amazing what went west on the Missouri River before the railroad.


http://turnerbrigade.org/features/bertrand1/

link to story
https://www.fws.gov/refuge/Desoto/wildli...trand.html

[Downwindtracker2]

It wasn't the majority of capital, it was something like 1/3, still I think possibility of that loss was the why of the Civil War.

I live in BC. Canada was hit by the Depression much harder than the States, so tools from the that era are scarce. Canadian made Stanley from that time are better made, since they made fewer of them, though. After the war ,all the vets from the prairies moved to Vancouver creating a housing shortage that exists to this day. Thus post war carpenter tools are not uncommon, Records planes, Sandvik saws, Wm. Marple & Son and E.A. Berg chisels.

We're just back from our across Canada 150 trip, my three finds were a MillersFall #15 (2 1/4 " # 5 1/2) from Ontario, a type 13 #8 Stanley from Maine and a Shurly Deitrich 16" back saw from New Brunswick.

[Timberwolf]

It wasn't the majority of capital, it was  something like 1/3, still I think possibility of that loss was the why of the Civil War.

I live in BC. Canada was hit by the Depression much harder than the States, so tools from the that era are scarce. Canadian made Stanley from that time are better made, since they made fewer of them, though. After the war ,all the vets from the prairies moved to Vancouver creating a housing shortage that exists to this day. Thus post war carpenter tools are not uncommon, Records planes, Sandvik saws, Wm. Marple & Son and E.A. Berg chisels.

We're just back from our across Canada 150 trip, my three finds were a MillersFall #15 (2 1/4 " # 5 1/2) from Ontario, a type 13 #8 Stanley from Maine and a Shurly Deitrich 16" back saw from New Brunswick.

............................
LIL
Back in the seventies and before, Florida was an excellent area for tool hunting...Retirees from the Northern and midwestern states flocked here by the millions.. Florida's population was less than 3mil when I came with my parents from Georgia in 1938..Now it is over 20 mil. Third largest populated state in the nation now...Many of them brought tools with them and when they passed, their children came down and sold everything at estate sales, yard sales and flea markets. They had to sell them cheaply because of time restraints...Picking were excellent...Now...not so much...

[DonSlaughter]

Very interesting, and inviting, thread Admiral.  Thanks for the inspiration to reflect & postulate.  
I didn't become enthusiastic about my woodworking passion until I neared retirement 25 years ago and by that time I had migrated to San Diego.....as far from the northeastern vintage tool paradise as possible.... but ... I managed to gravitate to hand tools and realized, very soon, the value of vintage.  I found many things on eBay and from forum members like yourself but always continued to haunt the swap meets & garage sales.  I've been more successful with those swap meets & garage sales than any other source.  Last week I found, after years of searching, a panel saw like Ive always wanted.  16" toothline with 11ppi Atkins. Was caked with rust but the plate came clean and the handle is beautiful (after cleaning) and is (right now) getting a new top horn replaced.  AND 2 weeks ago I found a Fray brace (gave $2) that I've longed for for years.  Patrick Leach has had these items (although I've never found quite such a panel saw ANYWHERE) or near about but, even though his prices are very fair, I could never justify the expense for those Ive seen on his list.  So I guess my experience punctuates your theme. I joined Mid-west Tool Collectors Association several years ago...let it lapse, then rejoined a couple years ago.....but they NEVER have meetings closer than a 1000 miles from me. 20 years ago I found a garage sale where a lady was selling her house.  The garage was divided into 3 sections. Front part was her father's tools. He was a mechanic., behind that was a 12' X 20' shop of her grandfather who was an engineer.  Behind that was a a  15' X 15' woodshop full of tools from her great grandfather.  I bought many of them for a song. They became the foundation of my current shop. He was a busy man that loved his tools. I've become acquainted with his spirit and honored the tools (such as a 603 Bedrock that produces see-through shavings) that he cleaned and put away when he was done with them.  I use them to broadcast my passion to timbers that come my way then clean & oil them & put them away....  My spirit resides with them, too, now, in the hopes that others will respectfully join our hearts when I put them up after I'm done with them.  I've tried to convey my wishes to all my relatives & friends. I can only hope they inherited my aversion to rust and respect for the spirit.

[Bibliophile 13]

I've thought about a number of the tools I've helped to relocate. I've gotten a number of my tools in Indiana, where some of my family lives. Every time I visit, I hit the local antique malls and often come away with something useful at a decent price. I've also gotten several tools from Texas, and even picked up a couple right here in Alabama. I also have at least one from Alaska!

What Hank Knight said about old tools in the South makes sense. I always wondered why there weren't more old tools to be hand down here, since there had to be a lot of farms and shops that kept woodworking tools on hand. It's not just that the humidity rusts them all before they can be sold. The South was pretty impoverished during the heyday of hand tools, and there was a much smaller middle class. There were poor folks, and well-to-do folks, and not much in between. Neither of them are going to be good sources for good-quality hand tools when their belongings hit the estate sales. You can find beautiful antique furniture down here, and the residential architecture can be absolutely stunning. But finding the tools it took to build these things? Not so much.