As I am weed eating & edging with gas powered implements last night, I had a flashback about how we did it when I was a kid. There will probably be some of yuall that do not know about these older grass trimming implements; some of us will remember the blisters and cursing our parents under our breath... not from my generation, but certainly from my parents and grandparents. I remember seeing these in the barn when I was kid when I was a kid, I remember using these to trim the edge of the sidewalk... the initial 3 minutes are cool... after that it's boring and still causes blisters then I remember at some point in the 70s getting a some of these. I suspect the original ones had a cord, but I do remember having battery powered ones at some point. I thought I was in heaven! if I remember correctly, the battery lasted all of about 15 minutes... then there were scythes and the more industrial revolution version of the scythe. still manually activated though and would wear you out especially in tall grass... I remember finally getting a gas powered weed eater in the late 70s... it was huge, had a harness that you had to wear that it strapped to around your chest, big ape-hanger handles that you operated chest high and had cutting cord the diameter of a pencil. it would cut down all but the toughest woody brush!!! I loved running that thing. in fact, I still have it in the shed. it hasn't run in years. I should try to crank it up some day... all these tools seem to be replaced by a more modern, lightweight and probably more powerful weed eater at my house at least. I'm sure some hipsters, religious cultists/hippies and urban people that don't have gas powered implements still use the manually operated ones, but for me, I'm glad to see them gone from my shed. any of you more crusty people remember these implements of torture? any still use old school tools because a modern one just doesn't do the same job as well? what are some other tools that you remember using as a kid that have greatly improved in recent years that you could not live without today?
I remember using all of those except the first one . I was an odd child though as I never cursed my parents because of the blisters or hard work ...... back then I enjoyed hard work and blisters were the reward Looking back now , I do kind of wish that Round-up would have been invented sooner
I'm beginning to appreciate round-up also. I've always tried to avoid using chemicals, not because I'm THAT much of a hippie, I've just always tried to get along without it... this year I was like screw it and have been using it liberally DIE DIE DIE! YOU DON'T LIVE HERE ANYMORE!
^ you forgot the worst one of all! That's a modern one, the archaic one we had as a kid was just a splintery wooden handled, fully exposed, swirling toe-threatening swarm of rusty blades. My green-freak neighbor lady "tries" to use one of the modern ones similar to the one on top to mow her lawn (maybe 1/3 of an acre.) She usually only makes it halfway through before giving up 3 hours later, completely exhausted. Then 2-3 days later her husband will sneak out (literally) while she is at yoga practice and mow the whole thing in 40 minutes with my gas push mower. He tells her he did it with the manual push mower.
Okie, are you sure that the first picture was for trimming grass ?? For some reason, shearing the wool off of sheep came to mind the second I saw that one, but then again, I have been known to be wrong
I suppose you could use these to trim grass, but I'm pretty sure it's an old pair of sheep shears. I've done my share of swinging these. I've also spent some time with a kaiser blade. Some call it a sling blade; I call it a kaiser blade. Mmmmm hmmmmm.
we had a scythe like that when i was little. dad would make us do a 15'X15' section in the pasture as punishment when we got in trouble for certain things.
my mistake then. I never actually used thos, I just saw the pic come up when I was trying to find pictures on the googles and thought oh lord, I would have hated to use those! regardless, it would probably be tough to shear a sheep with them too, no?
yeah they are for sheep, my mistake... the kaiser blade? that thing looks like WAY too much work... /mustard
Actually, THIS is a kaiser blade, also known as a sling blade, and yes, it was WAY too much work. Then again, if we had to use these tools again we'd all be in much better shape and our properties would be much less manicured. Actually, that tool in the bottom pic with the serrated blade also used to be called a sling blade by a lot of people. I wasn't aware of that.
