Cyrus Keim's Tool Chest

My triple great grandfather, Cyrus Hamilton Keim, was born in Pennsylvania in 1833. (That is him on the left) He moved to Mt Carroll, IL before 1860, where our branch of the Keim’s lived until my parents left in 1984. He was listed as a carpenter in the 1860 and 1870 census, then as a farmer until his death in 1909. Below is a cabinet built by Cyrus, which I remember placed in my grandparent’s kitchen. My parents had it for a while and I got it when they moved a few years ago. It is made of white pine, with bold dovetails and rustic but skilled construction. The family story is that it was two different pieces stuck together, but they look like they were made at the same time, with the same tools and same materials, so I think they were meant to go together. The bottom cabinet’s carcass is made from 18” wide pine boards! This is when Wisconsin was cutting all of their old growth white pine trees, so this sort of lumber was readily available.

I have inspected the cabinet closely and can see his tool marks easily. His faint smoothing plane tracks are visible on the hidden sides of all the boards, his knife/gauge marks outline his joinery and his saw marks show on the back boards. The simple molding also look to be shop made, with slight variations that a machine made molding would not show. It could have been made anytime between 1860 and his death, I haven’t been able find anything that would narrow that down.

(See the horizontal scratch? That is from his marking gauge, laying out the dovetails.)

The cabinet is here in my shop/office and stores books, blueprints, templates, musical equipment and some family heirlooms. There are even a couple of secret compartments!

My father told me that one of his cousins has a tool chest that belonged to Cyrus. He would have inherited it from my great uncle, who got it when my great grandfather died. My great grandfather still lived on the property that Cyrus settled, where he also built the house and barns. Our cousin just sent three pictures to us of the tool chest, which I will share below with some comments on what I see.

This looks like a simple pine box, probably 3 feet, 1.5 feet by 1 foot. The top has “breadboard” ends and looks to be made of two pieces joined together. I see a lock on it.

With the chest open, it reveals a “till” towards the back, which is a removable tray. It seems to hold two planes in the center section and a scraper on the right. The scraper seems to be a bit of steel set into a curved handle, very cool. At the front left, I think there is a hinged lever, designed to flip up and hold the lid open.

Here we see the till removed, revealing longer standard planes like a jack, try and smoothing plane. I think I also see the knobs of a moving fillister there as well. In the front row are a set of molding planes of many sizes. I see hollows, rounds and more complex planes. These would have been used to cut the decorative trim for cabinets, furniture or even whole houses. Below is one of mine, called a side bead plane. I use it to add a rounded edge and groove to boxes, drawer fronts and cases. You can see a side bead that Cyrus cut above it, to the right of the hinge.

Cyrus’ molding planes are in the chest nose down, with a dowel across the chest to hold them in place. Clever. The presence of the standard planes plus the molding planes points to a full set of planes for a country carpenter who also can do cabinet and trim work. I bet every plane he ever needed fit right there. But, there is a lot missing that would be needed to do his job: hammers, saws, chisels, screwdrivers, squares, rulers, chalk line, plumb bob, level, whet stone, knives, gouges, marking gauge, pliers, clippers, draw knife, spokeshave, punches, nail sets, etc…I bet all of those could have been kept in a separate tool tote like these:

We will likely never know where the rest of his tools went or how he stored/carried them. The only tools I have from the family are a draw knife from the 1950’s and a whet stone and sheep shears from my maternal side. I am hoping to see Cyrus’ tools in person someday, I will keep you posted.

Thanks for keeping the lights on,

A