Breaking news, Skottbenk found in Amana, Iowa, USA

I must admit that I have been waiting for this day for some time now. The day when I can give you American readers a photo of a naitive «skottbenk» from USA. A few days ago I got a tip from one of my followers on Instagram, @iasjmobler, about a picture of an interesting workbench posted by @benchcrafted. One of our followers from USA, Jason Thigpen, where the first to comment that this bench is a skottbenk. Benchcrafted is a maker of workbenches and hardware and Jason are owner of Texas Heritage woodworks, the official maker of the shop aprons with the logo of Norsk Skottbenk Union. There are a few pictures on Instagram that are tagged as Skottbenk.

The «Skottbenk» on the Amana Woolen Mill in Amana, Iowa. It was originaly used in the nearby Amana Furniture Shop. Now it is used in the shop of Amana Wollen Mill as a display. Photo: Benchcrafted

I am conviced that this is an old Skottbenk that where used in Amana. The bench are very similar to several Norwegian benches we have seen on this blog before. The pattern of the long boards and the vices are similar to the one that Lars Velsand have made, to the bench from Bredalslien and the bench from Bortistu Storlidalen. It is not very different from the Danish bench that Lost Art Press have blogged about. The bench could easily fit in the Norwegian tradition, but could also be related to the Danish or the German tradition. Amana is an old colony of seven villages in Iowa County. The villages were built and settled by German Pietists, who were persecuted in their homeland by the German state government and the Lutheran Church. They moved to Iowa in 1856 and lived a communal life til mid-1930s. For eighty years, the Amana Colony maintained an almost completely self-sufficient local economy, importing very little from the industrializing American economy. The Amanians were able to achieve this independence and lifestyle by adhering to the specialized crafting and farming occupations that they had brought with them from Europe. Craftsmen passed their skills and techniques on from one generation to the next. They used hand, horse, wind, and water power, and made their own furniture, clothes, and other goods.

In this setting the Skottbenk have made it possible to joint long boards with handtools in an efficent way. There could be more interesting stuff in this area? Some of our followers from USA might go there and search for old handplanes that could be connected to use on this bench? I would also like to get some more pictures and also som measurments of this American skottbenk. I would be very happy to get some more information about this bench, and even other similar benches in USA or other parts of the world.

In case you have missed it, we have posted in English before about how to use this kind of benches. In that post we also have some information about how to make your own Skottbenk. There is also a web adress to a Google SketchUp drawing of a skottbenk from Målselv made by James Groover. I have also posted (in Norwegian) about some American patents of some specialized types of Skottbenk.