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It was mounted at about knee height with the prongs sticking out parallel to the floor, and looked like it had been there for fifty years. The prongs are solid cast iron, completely rigid.
Anybody know what the heck it is? (Apart from the center of a bitchin' folk art Cthulhu idol, of course.)
Something for organizing garden rakes and long-handled stuff?
ReplyDeleteI thought the same thing at first glance, but it was mounted too low to do that job well, and the "tines" are too close together to let a typical handle in (and have zero flex to them).
ReplyDeleteBoot... dammit, there's a word for it - something to help you get your boots off.
ReplyDeleteBootjack. And no it ain't. ;)
ReplyDeleteKneecapjack?
ReplyDeleteIncidentally, Google Googles has no idea either.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I'm beginning to think that the design purpose what not the implemented purpose. The mounting plate suggests that it should have been mounted prongs-up.
Also, something about that design suggest "lever" or "spring" to me - the curved bits are rather securely mounted to the baseplate. Are the flat heads roughly leevel? In that case it might have been intended as some kind of "bumper" for something heavy or fast-moving (or both)
Based on its design and mounting position I'd say it was a designated bruising device.
ReplyDeleteThat my dear Elmo, is a tilling face for a garden plow. It's supposed to slot into a multitask face on the plowshare so you can till your garden. Too small for farm work, the garden plow looks like a plowshare with one or two wheels and was meant for work in a flower garden or established truck patch. This is the largest image I could find.
ReplyDeleteWhich doesn't explain why it was mounted to the wall at knee-capping height
ReplyDeleteold people do weird shit with rustic tools for aesthetic purposes. I don't get it either.
ReplyDeleteAnd that explains the base plate, since the stresses would be "upside-down" to gravity, and also the rather vigorous reinforcement of the attachment to the base.
ReplyDeleteZercool also suggested it was an earthrending attachment that had been repurposed for something inscrutable. The rock-solid joints and utter lack of flexibility make that a pretty plausible explanation.
ReplyDeleteEvery photo I've been able to find of this kind of tilling equipment shows tines with a dramatic bend* not present in this doodad, but I assume it's the kind of thing that's been made for so long in so many places with so many variations that you have to look at it pretty broadly.
Given how long it seems to have been there, I don't wanna think about how many kneecaps it's kneecapped.
[* - The tines for plow harrows usually seem to arc almost completely around like hooks, so that the mounting plate is dragging the points through the earth. This thing has only a slight upward bend.]
Are the flat heads roughly leevel? In that case it might have been intended as some kind of "bumper" for something heavy or fast-moving (or both)
ReplyDeleteLevel, yes. Bumper... Well, it has exactly zero flex to it, so only if you don't want the bumpee to survive. Maybe it was originally mounted on a Model T operated by the Citizens' Commission for the Extermination of Shambling Cadavers.