I find my self having to apologise for not providing a Leg
Post for the month of December. You may
think that my leg enthusiasm has gone off the boil, but I promise you I am
still actively checking antique fairs and shops to see what I can find. IN FACT in this post I am actually covering a
leg which is of a category/group I have never seen before. So there is some reward for my
persistence. But I’ll come to that
later.
This time, No 41, I am covering the remainder of my
collection of Boot and Button Hooks. Of the 9 in my collection, I covered the
first in June 2021 and I have the remaining 5 to talk about now.
Just to recap, and as you will know I had to learn, a boot
hook operates by pulling a button through a button hole, and not the lace or
ribbon. I imagine this practice is completely obsolete with modern footware. Boots are more likely to be laced.
This is a photograph of the five. These were all in the private
collection that I bought in February 2017 following my using the Daily
Telegraph to try and find a collective name for a leg collector, and getting an
unexpected reply from a boot hook collector offering to sell me those in his collection
which were leg shaped. Good deal I did there!!
The largest leg at the top is quite heavy, and not the sort
of boot hook you would carry in your pocket.
The shaft and hook are made of steel, with a well shaped
right leg being in a rich brass colour.
I’m not convinced it is actually brass.
Moving to the little one on the left, this is steel with the
leg made of lead, the only example of lead that I have. No markings, it is very
rudimentary but would fit in a waistcoat pocket.
The one along the bottom is the second largest one in my
hook category and I think also of steel. But the absence of any flecks or flaws
in the handle make me suspect that the handle is in fact ivory.
This leaves the straightish one in the middle, with a well
shaped right foot and toes. Again a steel handle, but I think the leg is
bone. It has a nicely carved garter
round the top.
The last boot actually has “Steel” cut into the shaft and
the top is brass. This one has a good leg shape, with a right foot and indents on
the inside suggesting button holes.
My problem with all the boot hooks I have purchased is being
sure what the actual materials are. Some are obvious but I do what I can to get
experts to give me an opinion on doubtful items, even by taking antiques into
fairs were you are no supposed to take antiques!!
I took one questionable hook that was suspect and asked an
expert whether it was some sort of composite. The expert told me to find out by
heating a needle and try to press it into the leg in an unobtrusive place. If
it was composition, the needle would penetrate. If not it would be wood. Yet to try!!!
As I mentioned above, I have a new genre to add to
collection, a letter opener.
I bought this at a regularly visited antique fair at Exeter,
quite cheaply, last November. It is a little distorted but is black plastic.
The Notts Hosiery company was a big business in Nottingham
in the 30’s and employed over 1,000 employees. It no longer exists and I
suspect Wood St would have been the London Office.
Not sure about the printing “Paper Knife and letter opener”…
no knife that I can see.
On the reverse is a globe with “trade Mark” and a banner across the top printed “Intense
Black”. Underneath is stamped “Clean and Fast”. At the bottom by the toe is engraved “Immovable”. All inexplicable and mysterious!
I'm aiming for the next Post in February!!!! E & O.E.
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