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Chainsaws: A History (Harbour $49.95)
Uncle Ned doesn't need another hockey book about the Original Six, he can't smoke anymore, an axe is too dangerous and these days you need a goddam license to go fishing.
So what better Yuletide surprise for an old fart, or even a young one, than, at long last, a book entirely devoted to everything you wanted to know about chainsaws but never thought to ask. From 600-pounders powered by steam to diesel units to electric chainsaws powered by generators, David Lee has researched them all for Chainsaws: A History (Harbour $49.95), an illustrated, critical guide to killing trees with metal for profit. Although he's a jazz aficionado who has just written The Battle of the Five Spot: Ornette Coleman and the New York Jazz Field (Mercury Press $18.95) Lee, a bassist who co-founded the Pender Harbour Jazz Festival, has simultaneously compiled the first-ever worldwide history of the chainsaw after moving to the Sunshine Coast where he had to maintain a wood supply for his house.
From Andreas Stihl's experiments in the Black Forest to the rise and fall of Canada's Pioneer brand, we learn the following cutting edge cocktail party ephemera.
1. Ed Gein, the real-life murderer ("massacrerer?";) upon whom the movie The Texas Chainsaw Massacre was based, as well as the movies Psycho and The Silence of the Lambs, never used a chainsaw as a weapon.
2. The first chain for sawing wood was patented in 1858.
3. The first commercially produced chainsaw was the Sector, invented by A.V. Westfelt in Sweden before the First World War and driven by a flexible shaft attached to an outboard motor.
4. During WW II, Vancouver became known for producing a chainsaw called
the "Timberhog."; Powered by a motorcycle engine, it required two strong men to operate and could only be run while sitting level. If it was tilted, it stopped.
5. Marilyn Monroe got her start when she was photographed for a newspaper feature on "Women Doing War-work"; while working on a wartime project using McCulloch chainsaw parts.
6. David Conover, the US army photographer who discovered Marilyn Monroe, moved to British Columbia soon after and settled on Wallace Island near Victoria, where he wrote the bestseller, Once Upon an Island. Wallace Island is now a marine park.
7. Vancouver became a world leader in chainsaw manufacturing during WW II and held that position through the 1950s, but no longer produces any saws.
8. IEL (for Industrial Engineering Ltd.) an employee-owned company in Burnaby, was one of the world's leading chainsaw manufacturers in 1943-1956, producing the world's first one-man chainsaw and direct-drive chainsaw, among other innovations.
9. In the 1950s there were hundreds of brands worldwide. Now two European companies, Husqvarna and Stihl, have a virtual monopoly. Husqvarna, which means "house mill"; in Swedish, started as a water mill in the Middle Ages, though it didn't make its first chainsaw until 1959.
10. Stihl, the other leading chainsaw manufacturer today, was also one of the first, having marketed its first model in 1926, but it had to start over after its factory was bombed in WWII and did not become prominent again until 1959.
Chainsaws 1-55017-380-4; Ornette 1551281236
[BCBW 2006]
So what better Yuletide surprise for an old fart, or even a young one, than, at long last, a book entirely devoted to everything you wanted to know about chainsaws but never thought to ask. From 600-pounders powered by steam to diesel units to electric chainsaws powered by generators, David Lee has researched them all for Chainsaws: A History (Harbour $49.95), an illustrated, critical guide to killing trees with metal for profit. Although he's a jazz aficionado who has just written The Battle of the Five Spot: Ornette Coleman and the New York Jazz Field (Mercury Press $18.95) Lee, a bassist who co-founded the Pender Harbour Jazz Festival, has simultaneously compiled the first-ever worldwide history of the chainsaw after moving to the Sunshine Coast where he had to maintain a wood supply for his house.
From Andreas Stihl's experiments in the Black Forest to the rise and fall of Canada's Pioneer brand, we learn the following cutting edge cocktail party ephemera.
1. Ed Gein, the real-life murderer ("massacrerer?";) upon whom the movie The Texas Chainsaw Massacre was based, as well as the movies Psycho and The Silence of the Lambs, never used a chainsaw as a weapon.
2. The first chain for sawing wood was patented in 1858.
3. The first commercially produced chainsaw was the Sector, invented by A.V. Westfelt in Sweden before the First World War and driven by a flexible shaft attached to an outboard motor.
4. During WW II, Vancouver became known for producing a chainsaw called
the "Timberhog."; Powered by a motorcycle engine, it required two strong men to operate and could only be run while sitting level. If it was tilted, it stopped.
5. Marilyn Monroe got her start when she was photographed for a newspaper feature on "Women Doing War-work"; while working on a wartime project using McCulloch chainsaw parts.
6. David Conover, the US army photographer who discovered Marilyn Monroe, moved to British Columbia soon after and settled on Wallace Island near Victoria, where he wrote the bestseller, Once Upon an Island. Wallace Island is now a marine park.
7. Vancouver became a world leader in chainsaw manufacturing during WW II and held that position through the 1950s, but no longer produces any saws.
8. IEL (for Industrial Engineering Ltd.) an employee-owned company in Burnaby, was one of the world's leading chainsaw manufacturers in 1943-1956, producing the world's first one-man chainsaw and direct-drive chainsaw, among other innovations.
9. In the 1950s there were hundreds of brands worldwide. Now two European companies, Husqvarna and Stihl, have a virtual monopoly. Husqvarna, which means "house mill"; in Swedish, started as a water mill in the Middle Ages, though it didn't make its first chainsaw until 1959.
10. Stihl, the other leading chainsaw manufacturer today, was also one of the first, having marketed its first model in 1926, but it had to start over after its factory was bombed in WWII and did not become prominent again until 1959.
Chainsaws 1-55017-380-4; Ornette 1551281236
[BCBW 2006]
Submitted on November 10, 2006 in By David.
