The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 50, July 1946 - April, 1947 Page: 248
582 p. : ill. (some col.), maps ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Southwestern Historical Quarterly
Warren Axe and Tool Company of Warren, Pennsylvania, where
further changes in design were worked out and the finished
axe produced. The Hartwell Company of Memphis is chiefly
an axe-handle and hammer-handle manufacturing company
which makes its fine products from the second-growth hickory
of Tennessee and surrounding areas. Their axes and hammers
are especially made for them by the Warren Axe and Tool
Company, while the handles are made and fitted at Memphis,
Tennessee.14
Almost immediately the new cedar axe, called surprisingly the
"Grey Gorge Axe," was found satisfactory, not only for
cedar work but also for campers and hunters. The In-
dustrial Revolution had been brought to a product of Texan
handicraft. The axe is now used almost exclusively in
the cedar region of Texas. According to Frank Caldwell, the
factory representative for the Hartwell Company, the first ship-
ment of cedar axes in the United States was received by the
Charles Schreiner Company at Kerrville, Texas. Throughout
the years the Schreiner store has probably sold two or three
times more of them than any other concern.1" The Hartwell
Company is unable to furnish the exact number of cedar axes
that they have sold in the past sixteen years, but it is estimated
to be approximately eighty thousand. These axes were not
made during the war, but production is again under way.
During the past five or six years other companies have started
manufacturing a cedar axe similar in design to the "Grey Gorge
Axe." The best known of these competitive brands are Kelly's
"Flint Edge," Collins' "Cedar Axe," and Plumb's "Cedar Axe."
The Hartwell Company now makes a double-bladed cedar axe
and is the only company, incidentally, that does. The double-
bladed axe now outsells the single-bladed one, two to one, for
cedar-cutting purposes. The two types of axes range in weight
from one and three-quarter pounds to three and one-half pounds.
The lighter weights (single-blade) are used mostly by campers
and hunters, while the medium weights (both single and double)
are used for cedar and brush work; the heavier weights are
used for general chopping. The two and one-half pound single-
14The account of the part Lee Judd played in regard to the story of
the cedar axe was given in a letter to Gene Hollon from the Hartwell
Company, September 3, 1945.
l5This comment was made in a letter from Frank Caldwell to Gene
Hollon, December 22, 1944.248
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 50, July 1946 - April, 1947, periodical, 1947; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101117/m1/294/: accessed April 19, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.