Coldengham, New York
Store of Cadwallader Colden, Jr.
Ragstone
Colden sold 149 items at his store in Coldenham on this day, 250 years-ago. Today was the busiest day yet recorded in the DayBook. Three customers bought 'Ragstones.' They probably used these to sharpen their scythes and sickles.
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| Antique Ragstone handcut from Schist? Accessed at rover.ebay.com |
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This article is one in a series of a daily accountings of Colden Store transactions. Be sure you read the first installment for an introduction to the store. You should also read this article which appeared in the Journal of the Orange County Historical Society.
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Webster's 1828 Dictionary defined 'Ragstone' as 'A stone of the silicious kind, so named from its rough fracture. It is of a gray color, the texture obscurely laminar or rather fibrous, the lamins consisting of a congeries of grains of a quartzy appearance, coarse and rough. It effervesces with acids, and gives fire with steel. It is used for a whetstone without oil or water, for sharpening coarse cutting tools.'
Colden sold Whetstones with other names such as 'Grindstone' and 'Sandstone.' Webster defined a 'Grindstone' as 'A sandstone used for grinding or sharpening tools.' He defined 'Sandstone' as '..composed chiefly of grains of quartz united by a cement, calcarious, marly, argillaceous, or even silicious. The texture of some kinds is loose, of others close; the fracture is granular or earthy. Sandstones usually consist of the materials of older rocks, as granite, broken up and comminuted, and afterwards deposited again.'
The DayBook records eight sales of 'Ragstone' at about one shilling each, nine sales of 'Grindstone' for about ten shillings each, and two sales of 'Sandstone' for nine pence each.
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