Cute pipe wrenches

[Bill Houghton]

I picked up a cute little pipe wrench at a sale lately and thought I'd post it, together with the cuter littler one I've had for years.

The angled-jaw wrench is the new one.  It's marked "Lawson/Ushco Mfg. Co. Inc./Buffalo, NY, USA" on one side, and "Drop Forged Steel" on the other, and is about 8" long with the jaw closed.

The wood-handled wrench has lived in my general-purpose-but-especially-cars toolbox for years, and is, really, a reminder of when I owned cars* that used pipe thread on some of the components.  7" long with the jaw closed, is a Walworth Mfg. Co. wrench, so marked in a couple of spots, with "Stillson/Registered Trade Mark" in a diamond-shaped logo in others.  I didn't know until looking it up just now that Walworth originated the Stillson pipe wrench design.

*1949 Studebaker truck, 1973 Volvo, maybe some others.

[Papaw]

The Stillson is a keeper, and a good user. Looks like early design, which hasn't really been improved on to this day.

[rusty]

USHCO aka US Hame Co ...
Also used the name US Body & Forging, under which they made Truck and car bodies in the early part of the century for Dodge, Plymouth, Willys erc..

Gottfrid Lawson's wrench patent was almost an afterthought, ;P

Nice article about the auto side of the company here:  http://www.coachbuilt.com/bui/u/us_body/us_body.htm

(Caution! The above site will distract you for hours)