At 9:59 AM -0900 10/28/03, Charles Adkins wrote:
>Ned,  just a comment.  Most shops, up until the advent of coal and oil
>heat, would have burned the scraps you mention.  Even with coal burning
>stoves, the wood scraps would have been valuable as fire starters and fuel
>on cool mornings when a coal fire wasn't needed.  Does this information add
>to your analysis as to when the well might have been filled in?

This is exactly the problem. The wood shavings were pretty good for
animal bedding, as well as kindling. Heck, they even packed
mattresses with such stuff. And they were packed, literally rammed,
into the well. We thought it was a floor before we had the well
dewatered enough to get out the shavings.

In another well, on another site, we found many twigs that I guessed
might have been leftover from some kind of brewing, which was used
for medicinal teas and dyes. But these are shavings, exactly what you
would expect to sweep off the floor of a joiner's or cooper's shop.

Ron May brings up an interesting issue, too. The well is quite
narrow, and would have been a real bear to use with a bucket. They
may have chosen this casing because the local soil is so saturated
with water that it is like soup below four feet. Ask the three guys
who lifted the tube!

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