Handy as a Pocket in a Shirt: Glass Cutter Combination Tools

Chronicle of the Early American Industries Association, Inc., The, Sep 2004 by Turner, Ken

The popularity today of all-in-one tools like the Swiss Army knife and the Leatherman is not a new phenomena. In the nineteenth century, combination tools were also popular. Interestingly, one group of tools did not develop from a basic pen knife, like the Swiss Army Knife, or a pair of pliers, like the Leatherman, but from a rather odd source, a glass cutter. Who would have thought that it would be handy to have a corkscrew attached to a glass cutter? But indeed, a wide variety of pocket malleable iron combination tools were developed from glass cutters.

Samuel C. Monce is credited by many as being the first to come up with the notion of a wheeled glass cutter, and he patented his idea in principle in 1869 (patent no. 91150). The patent specification illustration (Figure l) shows the cutting wheel set in the end of a handle similar to that previously used for holding a diamond for glass cutting.

Monce later used his idea of a rotary glass cutter in various styles of holders. One is a cutting wheel fitted in the end of a malleable iron handle, incorporating a graded glass breaker (Figure 2). The other has a cutting wheel (patent no. 91,150) in the end of a combination tool incorporating a knife/scissor sharpener, corkscrew (available with or without), can opener, and in the center of the tool is a tapered slot which serves as a wrench for nuts 3/16 to 3/8 inches in size (Figure 3). This and other versions of Monce's glass cutters are illustrated in the Millers Falls Company 1X87 catalog. Although not so named in the catalog, Monce's patent glass cutters were apparently at one time marketed bearing the brand name "Excelsior."

In 1873 Samuel Monce took out patentno. 140,426 (Figure 4) to which he added a putty knife to his earlier patented rotary glass cutter. Variations of this design are also shown in the Millers Falls 1887 catalog (Figure 5). Sharing the same patent number as Figure 5 is a modification of patent 140,420 but with an offset cutting wheel. Although this tool is a Monce patent, there is, confusingly, an identical combination tool bearing the name W L. Harrett. Harrett was apparently a foreman of Monce's who had left to set up his own company to produce, presumably by arrangement, this same modified offset wheel glass cutter (Figure 6).

William L. Barrett was bought out by Smith & Hemenway Company in the 1940s. Also once employed by Samuel Monce was his nephew, !'"red S. Fletchcr, who left the company about 1897 to become one of the largest glazier tool manufacturers in the United States. In 1935, Fletcher bought out Monce, his one-time employer.

I doubt that Monce ever envisaged his glass cutter combination tools would eventuate in a confusing proliferation of seemingly identical or near-identical novelty combination tools flowing from various sources.

Herman Hrooks took out a patent in 1874 (no. 150,225) which covers the addition of legs to facilitate the use of the scissor/knife sharpener. (Fellow Hand Tool Preservation Association of Australia member Lewis Harper possesses an example of this tool which he very kindly lent to me for producing the illustration in Figure Tb.) Unfortunately, the rotary glass cutter had at some time broken from the end (Figure 7b, left).

Interestingly, the Hrooks patent covers the modification ("legs added") to the knife/scissor sharpener; the knife sharpener was also available on its own (Figure 7c) without the combination tool.

In 1875, Frank Woodward also decided to get a slice of the action and joined the fray by patenting a different shape cutting wheel. So as not to be seen as encroaching on the ideas of others it seems, Woodward cleverly patented his glass-cutter wheel on the pretext of it having been designed to cut paper stencils. However, this wheel in the combination tool bearing Woodward's name (Figure S) was, in fact, marketed as a glass cutter. Smith & Hemenway, famous ibr its "Red Devil" trademark glass cutters and other tools, claimed in its circa 1926 catalog that "in 1872 the wizard Woodward conceived the idea of cutting glass with steel...," by which was meant a steel cutting wheel. Woodward may have conceived the idea in 1872, but there is no sign of a patent having been taken out by Woodward before 1875. Little wonder that there were numerous glass cutter patent infringement cases being fought in the courts in the 187Os and 188Os. Court cases between Monce and Woodward went on for years until in 1879, when Woodward apparently succeeded in having Monce's 1869 patent invalidated. Woodward had evidently proved that similar tools had been in use prior to Monce's patent. This is incidentally verified by an entry in the Directory of American Toolmakers in which it is stated that O. M. Pike took out a patent tor a glass cutter in 1868. This glass cutter bearing, it is thought, the brand name "Magic Diamond," was made by an R. J. Ives, who once employed Samuel Monce. To add to the confusion, the writer possesses two identical glass cutter combination tools bearing the same patent dates, but with different names. One is "The Woodward" (Figure 8) and the other the 'Andress Tool" (Figure 9). Also sharing the same patent date, but without a name, is a combination tool incorporating a glass cutter, can opener, corkscrew, apple peeler, nutcracker, and champagne wire cutter (Figure 10).