Dyed With English Dragon's Blood

I love this little animation from Early Rhode Island Toolmakers & Tradesmen, a collection of planemaker bios and maker's marks that dates back to 2000, but unfortunately hasn't been updated since 2015. The way the shaving briefly curls around the wedge is a nice touch.

Earlier this month I posted a video about a two-year test I did on a few wood samples treated with boiled linseed oil. It ends with a sidetrack on the “controversy” of using BLO on planes. Something that didn’t make the final cut in the video was a fact I stumbled on recently that really surprised me: Some English plane makers and hardware merchants in the 19th and early 20th centuries dyed their planes red. Not bright red, just a reddish tint. I’ll admit this is a very American reaction; this is probably well-known in the UK.

The earliest reference in print to the practice that I can track down is from the June 15, 1866, issue of the English weekly newspaper English Mechanic and Mirror of Science and Art:

POLISHING PLANES.- Or, to use the trade term, oiling planes. … Planes made from naturally dried beechwood are much lighter in colour than those made from artificially dried beech, or steamed, as it is called in the trade. For planes made of the first-named beech beech, proceed as follows: Raw linseed oil, 1 gill: dragon’s blood, 1 pennyworth; yellow ochre, as much in bulk as dragon’s blood; mix these together, and rub the planes all over except the sole or bottom; let them remain one day, then give another coat; then let them remain about a week. Take them and rub well all over with a clean soft rag; give one more coat of oil alone. Let it dry for three or four days, then rub well with a clean rag; lay them by for a week or two; rub again with rag, and use them if wanted. Let care be taken to keep them free from dust while the oil is wet, or they will be a dirty colour. For steamed beech proceed the same, except not to use more than about half the quantity of dragon’s blood. The ingredients can be got at any oil shop or druggist.

The paragraph was signed by an anonymous “Plane Maker.” Dragon’s blood is a red resin that can be derived from several different tree and palm species found around the world. It’s been used since antiquity for everything from dye to medicine. For reference, a gill is equal to 1.25 pints. A pennyworth was the amount of dragon’s blood powder that could be purchased for a penny.

The dragon’s blood advice was repeated nearly verbatim in Workshop Receipts for the Use of Manufacturers, Mechanics, And Scientific Amateurs, which was first published in 1873 and reprinted multiple times well into the 20th century. It also appeared in The Illustrated Carpenter and Builder weekly newspaper in 1878 in response to a reader who asked about the “dye or wash the toolmakers apply to new planes to give them the red appearance they present when first bought, and [does] beech, being a light wood, if not dressed with a dye … soon show the dirt?”

One more example comes from an account of the Colliers, a Brixton, London, family of tool merchants and toolmakers. They got their start in the 1880s, selling tools out of the front room of the family’s home. In the 1940s, Arthur Collier (born in 1877) recalled that, “All planes which were sold were carefully rubbed over with a clean rag and linseed oil, slightly diluted with a concoction called Dragon’s Blood to give a better colour. Saw handles, which were made to [my father’s] own pattern, were given the same treatment.” Five generations since their founding, the Colliers are still making tools.¹

Because dragon’s blood was a common ingredient in wood varnishes and dyes, it’s difficult to track down other 19th century examples of how it was used for planes. I know many British planes from that era are a darker color than those made in North America. Is that from the combination of linseed oil and dragon’s blood, both of which darken over time? As is the case whenever I write about UK plane making, I’m in a bit over my head. If anyone knows more, please let me know, and I’ll update this story.

Interested in more stories about unusual planes?

• Who Stole This Solid Ivory Plow Plane?
• 'A man of rare ability and taste': A Legendary Gunsmith's Personal Gunstocker Plane
• Glass Has to be the Worst Material to Make a Plane From
• Dyed With English Dragon's Blood
• The Tiniest Planes You'll Never Use