"Turner's Ware" Dough Bowl?

[talesofthesevenseas]

I know absolutely nothing about how to identify old wooden dough bowls, but this one "called out to me" when I was looking at some other items on a Craigslist sale, and of course I couldn't say no to it. When I bought it I told the seller honestly that I couldn't tell if the bowl was antique, or 1960's. But after getting it out in the light and doing a bit of online research, I'm thinking it may be "Turnersware", woodenware that was machine turned on a lathe and dates from the 1890's to the early 1900's.

It is big, deep and quite thick. I'm guessing about 18" diameter, 6" depth and the thickness of the wood is easily half an inch, which is consistant throughout the bowl (I'll post accurate measurements shortly). It does not get thin at the bottom.

It is definitely machined, but the machining is not consistent with modern machining. There are distinct grooves, as if it were turned, but never really sanded to a polished finish.

It has no finish on it at all and definitely it never has. The wood is solid, no splits, but it is quite dry. It looks very much like the wood of my Hoosier did before mineral oil and I suspect that that is all that has ever been used on this.

It is unmarked and except for the outer rim on the exterior of the bowl, it has no marks or decoration at all.

There is a good amount of wear on the edges, some fine chopping marks in the bottom of the bowl and several paint scuffs. It also has some nice dark patina, very much like my 1900's rolling pin, which is making me think this might date to about the same era.

It was in a box of old kitchen items that include the 1930-ish chopper and what looks to be a quite old juicer (note the irregular juice holes) which also came home with me today. (See picture) and a lot of other kitchen gadgets that look like they dated to about the same era. Their original owner was in her eighties, downsizing and moving into assisted living.

So what do you think, have I got an oldie? Whatever it is I can't have gone too wrong for five bucks. I will take some detail photos tonight that show what look to be possible signs of age tonight.

[sapphire]

tales, at first I read it as Tupperware 

Awesome, homey find........you certainly have a gift for sniffing out the good stuff.  Look like real oldies to me!

[talesofthesevenseas]

LOL Tupperware!! HA!!

From what I'm seeing, the hallmark in identifying "turners ware" is concentric circles from where they were turned on the lathe and this one has VERY distinct concentric circles all over the whole thing, inside and out, very close together, maybe 1/16" apart. You can actually feel them. These are like ridges in the bowl.

Very different from anything I've really looked at before. I wish I'd looked at some known examples before, but sometimes that is half the fun to find something and then see if your "antiques nose" has taken you in the right direction!!

[waywardangler]

Talesof, I do not think that one can positively identify an unmarked wooden bowl just by the fact there are concentric rings.  Just about any machine turned bowl that is not sanded smooth may exhibit those rings.  JMO. We have some wooden bowls marked "Munsing" and some unmarked ones.  I always thought that Munsing bowls came from Germany but it turns out they were made in Michigan.  I have not paid more than $5 for any of them and most were $2-$3.  $5 is a good buy for a nice large bowl like that.  My wife uses them for decorating and has buttons in one, fake fruit in another,old milling spools in another, etc. and at Christmas some hold antique/old tree ornaments.

[talesofthesevenseas]

Yeah I just have no way to tell. I guess what I need to do is to locate some known examples that I can see in person to try to get sense of the age, or to find a person who deals in these. I saw another comment online saying it was nearly impossible to tell how old some of these bowls really are and there are tons on Ebay. It's definitely post-1880's but that's about all I can say for sure. The values listed for old wooden bowls are all over the place too, so I think this may take some time to sort out. I was going to put some mineral oil on it since the wood looks very dry, but I think I'll hold off until I've found someone who knows these and whose arm I can twist to look at it in person.

...and old or not it will look awesome on the possum belly Hoosier, so I'm pleased with it either way. 

[CuriousCollector]

I have several wooden bowls like that, and all but two are marked "Woodcroftery".  The unmarked ones, however, look exactly the same as the marked ones!  I think these date from the 50s or 60s.  But like you say, you can't go wrong for $5!  Polished up and set on a table with green apples or lemons, it will look gorgeous!

Love the chopper!  Could it be a dough scraper?

[cogar]

Tales, when I read your 1st post about those "concentric circles" on the inside of your bowl I figured they were caused by the wood drying out and the difference in the lesser shrinkage of the tangential rays in the grain of the wood.

I can't image one not sanding smooth the inside of a bowl if they were planning for it to be used for food preparation.    

And I can't image if it was used very much for food preparation that very many of those "concentric circles" from where they were turned on the lathe would still be there. Unless one only used their fingers for stirring, mixing and scraping the food items processed therein.

And ps, Tales, your old juicer is a Lemon Squeezer, to wit:
http://countryjoes.blogspot.com/2008/08/antique-lemon-squeezer-iwantu-iron.html

[talesofthesevenseas]

Thanks for that lemon squeezer! The patent dated one you provided sure looks very similar. Mine looks to be unmarked, but I'll look it over better tonight. Very cool that it might date to the same era!

Good point about the wood shrinkage on the bowl. I hadn't taken that into account. The circles are more smoothed out on the inside than on the outside, where you can really feel them standing out. You can still feel them on the inside, but not as much. Also they do seem to be machined, as they aren't flowing along the grain of the wood, but are following the shape of the bowl. I tried to get some pics of this. Would we see some shrinkage along machined grooves?

The measurements are interesting- 15-1/4" in one direction 14-1/8" in the other. Also the top is not even and level. Cogar, this could be some wood shrinkage too, but I think it's always been slightly oblong since we've got an inch difference in the major and minor diameters. I think we're probably looking at both shrinkage and irregular original construction, but I can't say for sure which is which. (I'm too much of a rookie!) I emailed the seller and asked if we could ask the lady who owned it and went into assisted living if she knows the approximate age.

Here's detail pics:

With and without the flash, trying to show the patina/darkening here




Rings n' ridges- What do you think, machined or shrinkage?!!


Rings inside the bowl:


Chopping marks on the inside in the bottom of the bowl:


Outside of the bowl:


Up close on the rim:

[talesofthesevenseas]

I wanted to add that I don't think this is going to turn out to be one of those mega-valuable wooden bowls. The hand-carved 18th century ones seem to be the ones with substantial value. But I do think this has some age. I sure wish I could get photos that show the patina a little better. I could be wrong, but I do think this bowl probably consistant with the age of the other items that were in the box from the same kitchen, 1930's and earlier.

[KC]

Do believe it is at least from the early 1900's from look/patina.  Like Wayward stated...it is too hard to tell and concentric circles are on so many older ones.  Need to have someone "really-in-the-know" have a hands-on.  Believe weights and feel makes a big difference.

Your lemon squeezer is an excellent one.

Your Pastry cutter/scraper is truly a great find.  We use then all of the time!  Bet it really has gone hand-in-hand with the bowl

[talesofthesevenseas]

The seller said she would try to get a hold of the senior lady who owned these to get a date on the bowl for me, but that it might take a while. It will be nice if I can get an approximate date that way. Then I'll use mineral oil on it to put a little moisture back into the dry wood.

I think I'm going to go back over to this seller for another look in the kitchen gadget box. She had some little old iron footed melting pots that don't look to be terribly valuable, but would look neat crouching in a kitchen corner.

Thanks on the lemon squeezer and chopper KC! I like these choppers too and was planning to clean this one and use it. A lot of them I see in antique stores are loose and wiggly or thin and cheaply made, but this one was nice, tight and sturdy and still sharp. I agree, it's kind of neat to have pieces that are "old friends" from the same long-ago kitchen.

I knew I wanted that lemon squeezer right away. It was the first thing I grabbed out of the box! Love old kitchen gadgetry!

[cogar]

I concede, Tales, those are "cut" grooves, but for them to be that even & consistant that bowl would have had to have been made on an "automatic" bowl cutting lathe, ...... aka "machine made".

 Its measurements of 15-1/4" in one direction by 14-1/8" in the other is due to "warpage" as a result of either the wood drying out or "stress" in the wood that took effect when the center was cut out.

Some pieces of wood have extremely strong "stress points" in them that are not visible to the eye and one doesn't know they are there until they "cut into or through" them.

I have ripped boards that literally "clamped" the saw blade so tight it stalled the saw motor. And sometimes one can "rip" a perfectly straight board into 2 pieces and end up with 1 or both pieces that would make a good rocking chair rocker. 

I either read or was told by someone that an "expert" cabinetmaker would never use a board that was wider than 5" to 6" (or watever it was) because of that "stress" factor.

[talesofthesevenseas]

I agree, it looks machine-driven to me too. The grooves are very uniform and precisely spaced. But the overall shape and form of the bowl has inconsistency like it was made one at a time and not on an assembly line. I'm guessing machine production but not mass production. Different than we'd see made today.

[talesofthesevenseas]

Here's an update on the bowl. The Craigslist seller was able to contact the lady who owned this bowl. However, she did not know the date on it. She collected antique wooden bowls though and this was one of her collection. So I do know that it was purchased as an antique.

My own feeling is that I'm pretty confident that it will date to 1900-ish. It's that look and feel thing that is hard to get across in photos but it just has the same feel to is as my other old kitchen things from the same time period.

I'm also thinking that it being out of round by a small amount may be due to wood shrinkage, etc as mentioned previously, as it would have been difficult to marchine an oblong bowl on a lathe versus a round one.

I've been looking at what similar bowls are going for on Ebay and they seem to do pretty well, and the auctions look pretty active.

http://shop.ebay.com/?_from=R40&_trksid=p3907.m570.l1311&_nkw=dough+bowl&_sacat=See-All-Categories

Sooner or later I'll find someone to give this a hands-on inspection and will post an update then. Until then, it's been living very happily on the hoosier with it's old friend "Chopper".

[talesofthesevenseas]

Made a little progress in dating the bowl today. I found one that looks a bit newer than mine but was clearly made using the same techniques, (Concentric circles from machining) and old enough to be a little out of round. The patina looked similar, but again a little later, I think than my bowl is. This one was marked. Looking up the company, "Munising", they made woodenware bowls in Munising MI from 1911 until 1950, with the one I looked at having been made in about the 20's or 30's, judging by the type style. It's not much to go on, but its a start! The retail price on this bowl was $95, so I'm feeling pretty pleased with my $5 gamble.