[mitchmaine]

hey carl, in your photos, does nthe grey horse have a split rear tug as well? i zoomed way in on it and where the belly strap hooks in it almost looks like another ring hiding beneath the sidestrap. as well as two belly bands? i can’t tell.

anyway, i got a phonecall from a very nice lady at the maine state museum. i called a day or two ago with our question about d-ring. and she said (she is the photography curator) that she searched d-ring harness and said she came up with state prison catalogs from 1896, 1886, and 1881 with price lists on d-ring. there was also a mention or something in the 1868 caqtalog pertaining to d-ring. but she didn’t pull up anything, and we haven’t seen anything yet so all bets are holding for the moment. she gave me an appointment for next tues. afternoon. we’ll see what she can show us. she also has 24000 photos related to harness. we are still looking for the origin, true? the photos are always great and if she comes up with an earlier true d-ring i’ll see if i can download some. and maybe there is an explanation to the mystery square d harness we have been running in to. the state prison made all kinds of harness and shipped out one or two set per week. their true or later d-ring was leather, naturally, and very heavy, as i recall. bio and nylon are half the weight. i still have my grand dads d-ring hanging in the cellar over the freezer. more later, mitch

[mitchmaine]

your theory seems to make sense carl. we SEEM to have one very distinctive set of harness show up clear across northern new england with no historical record or documentation of any kind. we could be missing important clues, and probably are, but they(the missing clues) just may prove your argument. historical societys here all seem to close up for the winter making the job difficult and its nearly impossible to get into the state prison(that is probably a good thing), but the old state prison, along with the harness shop and all its history are gone forever, along with, saddly, most of the oldtimers who could simplify our job greatly. still at it, mitch

[mitchmaine]

hey carl, we’ve seen a lot of nphotos of wheel teams without saddles. to many to be an exception. there must have been an idea there. perhaps the leaders took a strain and held the pole up for the wheelers, eliminating the need, and the wheelers had the breeching to hold the load, where the leaders had no yoke and didn’t need the breeching, but did need the jack saddle to keep all in place? then when a thoughtful teamster with just a pair of horses, combined all the parts to make one.

i have been looking at so much harness, i have been neglecting the teamsters. started looking at their faces today, and realized i was seeing a man who was in the middle of his 16 hour day, who got up behind in his work and will go to bed probably just as far behind. and may not care what style of harness he was using as much as the condition of the harness, and might get around to that broken strap when he could. i ran a timberjack, with a leaking steering cylinder and a leaking rear main seal. and running out the main cable was like grabbing ahold of a porcupine, i was always gonna get to those projects as soon as i had a moment. so i’m really starting to look at their faces now a little different. heading for the state prison to see what they got. good hunting, mitch

[mitchmaine]

hi cameron, i just got my card for the spring sale ande tues. the 6th is equipment day, weds. is crossbreds, spots, clydes etc, thurs. is belgian day, halflingers and pulling horses, and friday is percherons and then uncataloged horses and saturday the 10th is buggy horse day. hope that helps

[mitchmaine]

found it, bill. 1875 on the printed one i found out of the library of congress. the ring is there for sure, and even tho the yoke is held to the breast straps, the text says the breeching straps extend to become pole straps, sounds like it may be our guy. sounds like custom, and expensive harness, but again no history. thanks………..great reading

[mitchmaine]

hey bill, sure would like to see that drawing. do you think it is original in the 1839 book? or maybe an update in the later printings? i only just figyred out the posting picture thing so its like the blind old guy leading the blind old guy, but….i think… if you scan the page on your printer it puts it into your documents all by itself so its in the computer, then you click the image button on the reply page, and hit uploader and then browse, then find it in your documents and upload it and ta-da, just like magic, it does it. don’t ask me how, it just does.
the ring as opposed to the square d is the secret, i’m thinking. all of a sudden possabilities occured leading to our harness. there may be other secrets hidden in there we don’t even know about that the inventor took with him and his identity to the grave.
this search has linked me up with some serious oldtimers. i sure wish we all had had a conference call the other night. what a hoot. hope you are well, mitch

[mitchmaine]

hey carl, couldn’t open your link but can understand your descirption. maybe its like the hundredth monkey, and independantly all over, harness makers were trying to solve the same problem with different ideas.

i Just got off the phone with a delightful fellow named Charlie Putnam from mapleton, just south of new Sweden, and he” drove big hosses” since the fifties, never knew of anyone to use the d-ring, and he saw a set of d-ring harness in a mans garage and wouldn’t take them. So Aroostook county may not be the place to look for d-ring harness. i can see that mine is not an indepth study but My next stop is further south at the patten logging museum in patten, me. Down by Houlton. Charlie seemed to think they used it a lot down by bangor, but its still along way from patten south to bangor. d-ring was THE harness in central maine but probably because of the prison influence. can’t see where this is going, More later.

[mitchmaine]

I would just hazard a guess about marks forged rings being the prototype and the drilled ring being the improvement. A handy fellow could always forge his own ring after the fact confusing the issue, but I had a forged set in tugs and they were a piece of work.

I also think the d ring to good a piece of work to be created without the notion of its features and the a-ha later on. Looking at the photos, I can believe lots of teamsters didn’t realize the design of their own harness. But it wasn’t lost on the locals around here. I was advised years ago about hooking the harness with a peavey, and tuning it to f-sharp. But it alsp requires the saddle for that purpose, and wonder why its missing in so many photos.

Just got off the phone with a horse logger from new Sweden. I was directed to him by the historical folks up there. New Sweden has a tidy history. 140 years. With some old folk still alive whos grandparents settled the area. The younger ones have moved away for jobs, and the pop. Of each town seems to run around 2-400. Small communities who know each otherwell. First off, he knows about d-ring, and watched les barden on rural heritage tv, but he hasn’t used it and doesn’t know of anyone around that does. Not a ringing endorsement from a small rural area that a few generations ago might have created the d-ring harness. So I’m cool to the Swedish connection for the time being. Randy clark is his name and he is going to go through photos at the historical society for us, but if that town did bring over the d-ring harness to the usa, everyone in town would know it, and they would have a d-ring festival every august. We know about joseph peavey, and Alvin Lombard and even silas taber. It is starting not to make sense anymore. But I haven’t completely given up on northern maine, just not expecting my own a-ha moment.

one mention about the shape of the d-ring is of course the angle of the front tug to the hames and as the force turned the tug could swing in a small arc aquare to the ring.

[mitchmaine]

It seems that some writers in rural heritage have already made the Scandinavian connection to d-ring harness leap. But I think there is still, for me, a missing link.
We can probably say that within a few years around at least 1890 all across northern new England, and even new york or Massachusetts for all we know, a similar harness appeared, apparently from one parent somewhere, wwith strong enough genes that in 125 years, the harness hasn’t seemed to change in the least bit. I’m good with that. But the current Swedish and norwaegan harness is quite different. Similar, but different enough for me to question it. it may have developed over there in to its current self from what we know as d-ring, but I need to see an 1890’s version of Scandinavian harness similar enough to d-ring to make the connection for myself. I can’t seem to find any website containing photographs of scand. Harness or working horses from the 1890. Or any history site with old harness clips. And I haven’t heard back from the new Sweden historical folks yet. Waiting…………..

[mitchmaine]

hey carl, this one is for you. snubbing down pogy mountain in the teens, single bobsled.

[mitchmaine]

another one. penobscot county (bangor area) 1900 plus or minus

[mitchmaine]

simon, can you find some photographs of what the swedish harness looked like in 1870. that is when the first settlers arrived here in maine.

i don’t think the state prison can tell us anything about origin, except that it was an outlet for mass producing lots of harness with a cheap workforce that could generate alot of product out there. they had a harness shop that burnt in the 20’s so it could have been made then, but as andy points out their own cart was set up with different harness. so it tells us nothing.

carls photos show photos from the turn of the century in both n.h. and vermont, and tho maines photos may be ten years earlier, means that the harness spread quickly, but from where? the new sweden idea is clean, and has a history or reason to it. the fact that some around were misusing it or at least not up to its potential, might mean the harness spread faster than its capabilities. but from where did it spring? all posabilities are or should still be open.

the square rings interest me carl. could be local blacksmiths trying to recreate the idea from what they had. or did the original look that way and the ring become a separate refinement later? i have a friend up in stockholm which is close to new sweden and part of the settlement and i am trying to get ahold of him and put him on the project

[mitchmaine]

I found an article in the bangor industrial journal dated m,ay 5, 1893.
It seems that a teamster named plain david jones drove his truck team to cowan’s team wagon shop and ordered the proprietor to hang the body of his cart no more than 6-8 inches off the ground. Dave resolved to try his experiment , ridicule or no, and stakes were ordered to be put into the outside sills to receive the hind axle, while around them and over the axle a chain was wrapped. The front end of the body was simply hung by a single chain from the front axle. “jiggers” as they were soon called in ridicule, soon became the prevailing vehicle on the wharfs of bangor. In 1850, mr. joseph wharf, forged the first drop axle, making the wagon eminently more successful. He made the successful forging, the writer having the honor of being his only assistant (j.w. penney mechanic falls). “this I believe to be the the first drop axle made in maine….portland, rejoising in her monstrocity, the dray, the most unholy vehicle a horse was ever harnessed to—a long inclined plane balanced on twotrucks which the poor horse had to draw and guide over round pacing stones.

I have paraphrased of course but that’s the gist of it. So silas tabers improvement to the jigger wagon would have to wait for fifty years.

[mitchmaine]

hey andy,
that photo is in march, and as stated above, the day of a big sale of potatos. the locals are all there at the railhead and sold 4000 bu. potatos for $6000. big day, seeing the rest of the country in a recession.

i like your sweden/new sweden harness connection. maybe the clue is in scandanavia?
however it caught on, the maine state prison in thomaston started making d-ring harness, and lots of it, and it may have been cheap, and abundant, therefore the popularity not counting the benefits of the harness. there could be a clue at the prison archives that i might rundown. or maybe the new sweden historical society??????? a few more leads to follow up.

[mitchmaine]

hope the photo made it. it is a portion of the original pic. the team above the grey horse is in d-ring, i beleive. the date of the photo is mar.10, 1894

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