Review on Amazon.com

 of HOW TO MAKE A COOPERED WOODEN BUCKET

"Do you see a man skilled in his work? He will serve before kings" , November 14, 2008

Two years ago I found a somewhat lopsided (technically "drunken") wooden bucket at a garage sale, and after a minute of intense negotiation was able to purchase it for $.25. It looked like it should be pretty simple to straighten up, but after an hour of effort, I started looking for some guidance. Luckily, the folks at Colonial Williamsburg suggested this superb how to do it book.

I learned that a cooper is a specialized woodworker "whose job is to bind long, thin strips of wood into ... barrels, buckets, butter churns and wash basins." Coopering requires a high degree of skill, higher than normal carpentry or carving.

There are three types of coopering:

a. Dry coopering, single use containers not required to hold water -- fairly simple to make.

b. Wet coopering, building casks that are water tight, requiring high quality wood and great skill. (Today these casks are used only for fermentation: wine, liquor, Tabasco sauce, wine vinegar, etc.)

c. White coopering, building buckets for carrying sugar, flour and milk. Generally, this coopering called for less skill because it does not involve bending the staves.

Gaster provides a very careful nomenclature, and then step-by-step descriptions in text and in excellent black and white photographs of how to build a water bucket. He provides a list of all necessary tools and suggests substitutes or instructions for making your own.

In my bucket, the bottom and hoops needed to be replaced. I followed the instructions for making the temporary hoops, "bruised" three metal hoops, and riveted each of them together with a single rivet for flexibility; eventually two of the hoops became permanent, held together with two rivets for strength. (The original maker had used three hoops, but Gaster teaches that two are enough, one at the one-quarter mark and the second at the three quarter mark.) Driving the hoops into place took some time, but was very satisfying; when they are tight the sound is like the sound of a wooden bell.

The original maker had left his bucket lopsided; it is essential "that the inside of the bucket be as round as possible; in this way the head will fit properly in the croze and the head will not leak. (The "head" is the bottom of the bucket.) One slides a perfectly round form down through the bucket and shaves off "all the high spots that will keep the circle from slipping through the narrow end of the bucket."

For "perfection", I leveled "off the bottom of the bucket so all the staves [were] even and level. Old coopers would use a topping plane for this but an ordinary steel plane will work just as well." (It sure did on my bucket.)

I was lucky that the "croze" or groove was almost perfect in the original bucket, and I decided to make a head with three pieces; the original was a single piece which "adds a nice touch to the bucket. A one-piece head will also be more susceptible to warping and twisting, while a multiple- piece head will be stronger and less likely to warp."

I ruined two boards making my dowel holes out of true, but the third attempt was perfect and all three piece fit together beautifully. My wife asked me how I would get the head in the croze, and without a word (and following the well remembered directions), I removed the bottom hoop (in this step on the top to take advantage of gravity), and slipped the head into place. I think she was impressed.

In any event, Gaster takes four more pages to describe the final finishing steps - three hours in my practice - including inserting flagging between the boards of the head and into the croze (I used cattail leaves), oiling the outside and waxing the inside of the bucket and attaching a rope handle. Thanks to Gaster my bucket was now truly "better than new" and certainly worth a buck at the next garage sale.

Gaster's book (and experience) will enable you to make a very handsome wooden bucket, even if you are not highly skilled; I barely passed shop in high school, for example. If you would like more book learning, Gaster highly recommends Kenneth Kirby's The Cooper and His Trade. But Gaster and experience are all you really need.

Robert C. Ross 2008