The Adze has been found in so many cultures that surely after the axe it is one of the oldest hand tools invented by man.

  The Adze is a tool with a blade at right angles to the handle and has many variations.

  The most common form of adze seen in collections or musuems, is the 'uptown' or carpenters adze. It is a fairly heavy, long handled tool, meant to be swung in a downward motion usually between the legs, hence the sometimes description, foot adze. The blade has a stout poll opposite the cutting edge and the handle is of a different shape than the shipwrights adze. In the hands of a well trained craftsman it is very good at finishing heavy timbers in house, barn or bridge construction.

  The marks left by the adze on house timbers have been mistakenly referred to as left by a broad axe. Not so, the adze leaves a fine almost planed finish with a bit of a scalloped look to most timbers with no evidence of the scoring marks of the broad axe. It can be quite dangerous in the hands of a beginner and it was not uncommon for apprentices to wear pieces of stove pipe to protect their shins from errant blows or from the blade skipping off knots.

  I am going to focus on the North American Shipwright's Adze but first I would like to describe some of the variations of the adze that I have seen or used in my time in the boat yards.

  There is the Portugese hand adze called the 'enshaw', that is the English pronunciation. It is a single handed tool with an enclosed grip and a fairly heavy and wide blade. The blades I have seen come from France the Lion Brand of woodworking tools. In the hands of a skilled craftsman it is very effective in 'backing out' planks and trimming rabbets.

The next is the Maltese variation. It is a short handled tool, about as long as a hammer with a correspondingly narrow blade more for delicate work than heavy stock removal. The Yugoslavian shipwrights too have an adze similar to the Maltese.

Then we come to what I consider as the most elegant example of the adze, the North American Shipwright's Adze. This adze is lighter than the carpenters adze by a large degree with a carpenters adze weighing between five and seven pounds and the shipwrights about three to four pounds tops. The blade is either lipped or straight. Lipped blades have the outside vertical edges turned inwards toward the user. These is very effective in cross grain work as the lips prevent the cutting edge from digging in and lifting out a big divot of a chip. The blade is any where from five to eight inches overall in length and the end opposite the cutting edge terminates in a spike like projection. This spike is used for, setting bolt heads or nails so that the cutting edge is saved from being dinged or chipped. It is also very handy for holding the blade in a good position for sharpening or touching up the edge. As I mentioned the handle is of a different configuration than the carpenters adze too. It is of a gooseneck shape with a curve that begins at the eye and gradually comes down to be at the same plane as the cutting edge. This allows trimming timbers that may be partially obscured by another. It also helps with the efficient use of the adze in overhead work. For you see, the shipwright uses the adze all through the construction of a hull and must be able to get at the work. If the handle were the same as the carpenters adze this would be very difficult if not impossible. The head of an adze, regardless whether it is a carpenters or shipwrights must be 'hung' correctly for the man using it. A tall craftsman will have his adze hung to take into account his height and the shorter person will fit his for his height. The hang of a head is critical for the cutting edge to be able to bite
 
  The training of apprentices in adze work begins with learning the proper hang of the blade for each individual and then practice with the tool on a timber. The outside or face of the tool away from the apprentice is coated with chalk and the idea is to remove the chalk without having the cutting edge bite into the timber. This teaches control and that deft touch needed for safe effective work. This takes some time as the muscles become accostomed to the body position and the hand eye coordination develops.

  My first exposure to an artist with the adze came at Nelson Hanson in Seattle. The stern or transom timbers of the schooner we were abuilding needed to be shaped or beveled off the vertical.

Alf who was in his seventies had me set up a scaffolding around the stern and then make him a stool complete with padded seat. He went around the laminated timbers, Alaskan Cedar, and on the under side scribed the finish line he was going to work to. Out came his two adzes,one was a D R Barton straight edge and the other was a Campbell Bros. lipped edge. First the heads were removed from their handles and he used the big old treadle powered grindstone to clean up the cutting edges. The stone had been relieved so that the lipped adze just fit the width of the stone. Then it was to the hand held whet stones and a stropping with a piece of heavy leather belting charged with Clover brand fine grinding compound and a few touches of a file for the spikes. The heads were re-hung on the handles with the slender wedges tapped into place for that all important hang. Alf then climbed up the scaffold and for the next several days he carefully worked those straight edged timber into the sweet curve and bevel you see in the photo.

  That winter in apprentice class we began learning how to use the adze. I went looking for an adze and was not having too much luck and mentioned this to the Les and Alf at lunch one day. At quitting time Alf called me over with his favourite command to me, "Boy, come you here!". He then handed me his two precious adzes and said that he would not be building any more boats and that I should have them and use them well. I still have them and when ever I have used them I think of that short stern Norwegian Master Shipwright and his gift to me and that command, "Boy, come you here". I was just a 27 year old 'boy' that was so very fortunate to be at the right place at the right time.