Egan Farm - Axes

The smallest axe, with a relatively narrow blade, is a felling axe used for cutting a wedge into a pine trunk so that the tree may be felled where desired. Before 1870 only axes were used in this process.

The two larger, similarly shaped and heavier axes are scoring axes. One appears to have been hammered as a wedge. These were used to roughly shape the sides of a log square by notching the log and by score-hacking.

The largest axe is a broad-axe, bevelled and sharpened on one side only along a steel blade welded into the iron body. It was used like a large chisel to square and smooth the sides of large pine logs into squared timbers.

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