#000637
Old Ways of Working Wood
Alex W. Bealer
A loving account of how wood was worked before machines took over, Old Ways of Working Wood documents the techniques and tools of the pre-industrial craftsman: the axe, adze, froe, drawknife, plane, and pit saw, and the skills of riving, hewing, joining, and finishing by hand. Alex W. Bealer, a Georgia writer and dedicated amateur craftsman, writes with the enthusiasm of a preservationist watching old knowledge slip away, explaining not just how each tool was used but why the old methods produced work of such strength and character. First published in 1972, it became a touchstone of the hand-tool revival that would later flower among woodworkers. It speaks to anyone drawn to traditional craft, self-reliance, or the history of everyday technology, and to woodworkers curious about the roots of their trade.
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The author
Alex W. Bealer (1921-1980) was an Atlanta advertising man, writer, and blacksmith-woodworker who devoted himself to documenting vanishing American crafts. He wrote well-regarded books on blacksmithing and on Cherokee history, and worked as a hands-on practitioner rather than an academic historian.
The book
Old Ways of Working Wood (Barre Publishers, 1972) surveys the hand tools and techniques of the pre-industrial woodworker, from felling and riving timber to hewing, planing, joinery, and finishing. Part history, part manual, it explains both the mechanics of each tool and the craft logic behind methods that predate powered machinery.
How it has aged
It has aged into a minor classic. Written just before the hand-tool and traditional-craft revival gathered momentum, it helped a generation of woodworkers rediscover skills that industrialization had nearly erased, and its core content, being about human-powered tools, does not date. Modern readers have far more resources now, and a few historical details have been refined by later scholarship, but as an affectionate, practical introduction to the old ways it remains valued and frequently recommended.
For more context
Pair it with Bealer's The Art of Blacksmithing and with Roy Underhill's The Woodwright's Shop for the living tradition.
Sources - Internet Archive record - Open Library record
- Type
- Book
- Author / Maker
- Alex W. Bealer
- Publisher
- Barre Publishers
- Place of publication
- Barre, Massachusetts
- Year
- 1972
- ISBN
- None
- Shelf
- Craft & How-to
- Location
- Colorado