Daniel,
There are no occurances of ornate coffin hardware
in the burial which contains the window. The only
other hardware material collected were two glaziers
points in association wiht the window, lining tacks,
square cut nails, and a couple standard flat head wood
screws. If anyone can give me sources on the
manufacture of wood screws that would be great. Also,
I have had a hard time trying to date the nails due to
the build up of rust, and I was wondering how best to
go about cleaning the nails.
thanks,
Jeremy Pye
--- "Davis, Daniel (KYTC)" <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:
> Got any coffin hardware or other diagnostics?
>
> Daniel B. Davis
> Archaeologist Coordinator
> Kentucky Transportation Cabinet
> Division of Environmental Analysis
> 200 Mero Street
> Frankfort, KY 40622
> (502) 564-7250
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jeremy Pye [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: Thursday, June 09, 2005 10:35 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: coffin window glass
>
>
> James,
>
> Thanks for the email about the glass. I received
> several other excellent replies. I would appreciate
> those sources for the general information on the
> viewing windows. I was pleased that you actually
> went
> into detail about the nature of the dating debate
> with
> this material, and that you included the Moir
> formula
> as well. You have stated that a problem arises due
> to
> the glass being double thick, that could include
> glass
> from 5mm and higher. I was wondering what the
> thickness for single thick was, and what are the
> distinctions made there. The piece of glass that I
> am
> working with ranges from 1.72mm at one end to 2.01mm
> at the other end. I used the formula that you sent
> and got a mean date of 1869 for this piece of glass.
> The high and low ends flushed out to be 1857 and
> 1881.
> I know from documentary evidence that the cemetery
> could have have been used before 1860, so the
> extreme
> low is out. It was used between 1860 and 1900.
> What
> do you think of the date range that I got on the
> glass? It is believed that this land was used as a
> poor farm, and that many of these individuals were
> indigents. Is it possible that the glass could have
> originated as intended for a window, and simply was
> included as a part of the coffin? I appreciate all
> of
> your input. Thanks.
>
> Jeremy
>
> --- [log in to unmask] wrote:
>
> > Hi Jeremy,
> >
> > Are you inquiring about manufacturing techniques
> for
> > chronometric purposes?
> > I can give you other references and info on
> viewing
> > window glass generally,
> > but actually there are a lot of potential problems
> > that you can encounter when
> > attempting to apply flat glass dating techniques
> to
> > viewing windows in burial
> > containers. My experience for this comes from a
> > number of cemetery
> > excavations, most notably the Freedman's Cemetery
> > Project.
> >
> > As you know, the total Freedman's data set on this
> > is huge. At the close of
> > excavations at Freedman's Cemetery in 1994 we had
> > archaeologically excavated
> > and analyzed 1,150 burials containing 1,157
> > individuals (on about an acre of the
> > 4 acre cemetery). Of this number, 369 (or about 1
> > in 3) were associated with
> > coffins or caskets containing viewing windows.
> >
> > Back in 1993, I sat down with Randy Moir in my
> > office at Freedman's Cemetery,
> > and discussed this matter specifically. Randy was
> > there to get my advise on
> > an isolated late 19th century burial he had just
> > excavated on a contract job,
> > and we discussed the flat glass dating technique
> at
> > length. I pointed out my
> > measurements thus far collected, and I told him
> that
> > the formula just didn't
> > work. He agreed, and identified at least one
> reason
> > why; that window glass in
> > commercial coffins and caskets are almost always
> > double thick glass, not
> > single thickness, which is what windows in houses
> > are made of.
> >
> > Rather, it appears that the glass was more often
> > than not specialty glass;
> > glass panes or lights could be commonly purchased
> in
> > standard single thickness,
> > or in double thickness. For example, in the 1883
> > George N. Lee & Company
> > Catalogue (of Chicago, Illinois), panes of
> picture
> > glass were sold in "single
> > thickness" or "double thickness" varieties (George
> > N. Lee & Co 1883:88). Double
> > thick glass was often used in furniture
> manufacture,
> > such as china and curio
> > cabinets, as well as coffins.
> >
> > Double thick glass was available for purchase
> since
> > the mid 19th century at
> > least, and probably earlier. All of the various
> > formula and dating curves
> > (Moir's, Roenke's curve for the Pacific Northwest,
> > et al.) don't take this
> > specialty glass into account. These formulae are
> > made for single thickness, not
> > double thickness, and they cannot be integrated
> into
> > the mix just as easily as
> > punching in the numbers.
> >
> > There are additional problems with dating viewing
> > window glass. A lot of the
> > glass in coffins was specifically described as
> > "imported glass," often
> > referred to as "French glass." Although this
> might
> > seem a bit odd, I stumbled
> > across this fact while mining information from my
> > large collection of 19th century
> > coffin and casket catalogues, for the Ft. Smith
> > Cemeteries report. For
> > example, in the early 1880s from more than one
> > wholesale coffin manufacturer, the
> > customer had the choice of purchasing either
> > "American or French Glass." Some
> > 19th century coffin catalogues specifically state
> > that all of the glass used in
> > their viewing windows is "French Glass" (e.g,
> > Columbus Coffin Company
> > 1882:4-8; Hamilton, Lemmon, Arnold & Company
> 1884:4;
> > Warfield & Rohr circa 1890:3).
> >
> > Because they used different manufacturing
> > techniques, at different times,
> > this import glass likely does not mesh with any
> flat
> > glass dating curve created
> > for American glass.
> >
> >
> > Some windows were even thicker than double thick
> > glass. In metallic burial
> > containers with viewing windows, the glass panes
> are
> > often extremely thick.
> > For example, Burial 312 at Freedman's Cemetery in
> > Dallas (Davidson 1999), was
> > interred in a cast iron and sheet metal octagonal
> > casket , with a glass
> > thickness that averaged 10.75 mm. The viewing
> > window glass associated with the cast
> > iron coffin of Colonel William Crawford (who died
> in
> > 1874 and buried in Benton,
> > Arkansas) was also very thick, at 5 mm (Davidson
> and
> > Black n.d.). Both of
> > these would blow the top off of any flat glass
> > curve. In period catalogues, the
> > viewing windows associated with metallic caskets
> are
> > occasionally referred to
> > as "Heavy Plate Glass" (e.g., Harrisburg Burial
> Case
> > Company circa 1890:13).
> >
> > Here's a example of how dating viewing windows
> > works out: At two rural
> > cemeteries near Fort Smith, Arkansas, dug by the
> > Arkansas Archeological Survey, 5
> > burials had viewing windows. To see if viewing
>
=== message truncated ===
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