The HORSE DRAWN Papers #12

T H E   T I N S M I T H

In 1880, Alexandria and St. Albans supported two tinsmiths.  The 1890 Federal Census was destroyed by fire.  By 1900, there were no tinsmiths listed in town.  By this time, Alexandria had Hardware dealers who could have easily ordered tin items.

First, what is tin?  In those days, tin was produced by dipping thin steel sheets into liquid tin until the desired level of coating is achieves.  The tin acted as an anti-corrosive.  At this point, I must acknowledge Karl Schmidt of Dakota Tinworks.  The tinsmith tends to work with flat metal and use bending, rolling, or soldering techniques to create three-dimensional objects.

One of these local tinsmiths is Lewis Twining, whose relationship to Charles Maranville's wife, Julia Twing, beyond a distant (fourth) cousin, is unknown. The other was John Scureman, a neighbor of Charles Maranville. Scureman was a native of New Jersey who was born in 1837, served in the Civil War, and died in 1905.  I have seen several variations on the spelling of Scureman that vary from the Anglicized to the obvious French spelling.

While tinsmiths can make a variety of objects for the home, especially for the kitchen.  By this time, Columbian Home Products of Terre Haute, Indiana, had been established to produce what my grandparents called Graniteware.  Today, we have plastic cookie cutter sets, the infamous red party cup, and a variety of kitchen gadgets and items now made of plastic.

While plastic was not even invented before 1900, I suspect that the modern hardware store was more able to accommodate the needs of the community by taking advantage of then modern factories using mass-production to provide lower cost.  The tinsmiths probably could not find enough work in Alexandria.

By this time, Alexandria had turned a corner from cottage industries and small business providing necessities to the area farmers to merchandise stores providing standard parts such as nut and bolts and perhaps finer goods than could be had locally.  Alexandria had turned the corner and would soon see the arrival of the automobile to make the transition complete.