Age of a Pie Safe?

[KC]

Divine timing TOT7S.....great timing to get period materials!

[talesofthesevenseas]

Oh man, what a lunch hour I had today! I met my friend out at her Victorian and OMG... you guys would have fainted. She's doing extensive remodeling and took me through her house, carriage house, outside TB sick house and basement. The out-buildings were  loaded with salvaged 1890's building materials! Sitting in her basement is the most incredible wooden wash sink, salvaged from an old San Jose business. It's all wood and about 8' long. I SO wish I had a place to put it! As much as I was dying to back my car up to her front door and start shoveling things in, my little cottage-y house could never hold it all.

What I did come away with was a nice board that was one of the original 1890 pantry shelves. It will make a nice two-piece back for the pie safe. I started telling her about my plans to redo my kitchen counter with an antique sink and wooden drain boards, and the next thing I knew we were loading the old cast iron porcelain-coated 1909 patented kitchen sink into my car. It's in great shape, just needs a good cleaning, no chips in the porcelain. We were also looking at some big slab-like boards that are about 20' long that were counter tops from one of the old downtown businesses that I think will be great, period countertops with lots of history.

My friend, being the sweetheart that she is and wanting to get stuff out of her way, declined my offer to pay her for them. So I'm going home to measure my counters tonight. I think there is a big project just around the corner!!! I'll post the sink/counters on a separate project topic and will post some photos of how the pie safe turns out.

P.S. I'd never seen anything quite like the tuberculosis sick house. It was a tiny cottage the size of a child's playhouse, with just enough room for a single bed and a chair. It had screen windows, because people believed that you needed to be out in the fresh air to try to cure the TB. The father of the original owners lived out there in the back yard!

[hosman321]

I think one word sums up your lunch hour: JEALOUS! That's awesome tales. Have fun!

[KC]

You so deserve great days like this!!!!  You have had a eventful year....now on to fun eventful things!!!!

Thanks for sharing all your adventures!

Wow, that TB house....really puts the "harder days" to reality.

[wendy177]

AMAZING Tales can't wait to see the wonderful things you do with all this!!!! I know it will be beautiful!!!!

[talesofthesevenseas]

Thanks guys! It's been a good weekend. Yesterday I made it through a whole sail this time without ending up asleep in the V-berth, so I'm getting stronger. YAY!! We sailed from our berth in the Oakland Estuary, out to Angel Island for a barbecue. Not much wind so we had to keep the motor going to help our little Clorox bottle along, but it was a fun day out on the water and I'm really happy that I was able to make it through a whole day of sailing. I came home and slept from 7:30pm until 7:30am the next morning, LOL!

Today has been a productive day on the pie safe project:

Here is the 1890's pantry shelf before it was repurposed into the back of the pie safe:



Here is the pie safe outside with the back removed:



Looking in from the front with the replacement boards installed.



Back in the house I gave the whole thing a good wipe-down with mineral oil:



I need to touch up a couple of spots of paint on the old pantry boards, looks like I missed a spot with the mineral oil too...



From the outside, all nicely oiled:



And now that I have a camera again, here are the hardware close-ups:

Up-close on the keyhole latch. Just for fun I tried a skeleton key I had sitting in a hardware drawer and... CLICK!! It was a perfect fit and the latch works perfectly now! I still need to glue and clamp the crack. You can see it pretty well in this photo. I just have to borrow a clamp from my neighbor.



Up-close on the cast iron swing-latch:

[sapphire]

OMG tales! What a transformation!  But then again, when it's you doing the work that should be no surprise  It looks perfect along side the hoosier and the 'new' boards look as though they were always there.

Awesome work and great results!!

[waywardangler]

Yes, GREAT job on the back boards and oiling, Tales!  Looks real nice next to the Hoosier.

[talesofthesevenseas]

Thanks, I am happy with how it is shaping up. Good ol' mineral oil is doing a good job of bringing out the color of the wood and blending in the scars.

After pulling off the back, I got a good look at the nails, since I had to pull the old nails out with pliers before the pantry board went on. They were definitely square cut nails and they were all different lengths and sizes. Not uniform at all. Some were so badly rusted that the heads would pull right off. You can see the square cut nail heads in the two photos of the latches above. However, it would not surprise me at all if the nails pre-date the pie safe. Looking at the screen I keep thinking 1900 is probably the date it was made, although the two latches look like they could be older to me, I think this was cobbled together from older parts. Does this fit with what you guys are seeing age-wise?

[cogar]

I was pretty sure it wasn’t a pie safe, but not knowing exactly what it was I just kept my mouth shut …… until now. The following picture was scanned from my kitchen collectibles book. Then a Google “Image” search found this great picture and comments. To wit: 

http://bowerbirdz.wordpress.com/2009/02/19/vintage-thingies-thursday-vintage-meat-safe/

[sapphire]

Following up on cogar's lead I came across this....

http://artantiquesmichigan.com/furniture/country-primitive-meat-safe-wall-cupboard/

How about a compromise?  Steak and kidney pie, rabbit pie, mince meat pie !!   

[marcylove]

very cool! 

[talesofthesevenseas]

Ah! That one right above sure does look like mine!! Does the source it came from say how old it is? Looks like I've got a meat safe! Whaddaya know!

[talesofthesevenseas]

The one in the add is dated 1880. Wonder if mine could be that approximately that old after all? Now that I'm searching for them as a meat safe I'm seeing similar ones dated between 1880 and 1900 so I guess mine will fall into that range. Cool to know what it really is! Many thanks for this one Cogar!!