DON DOUGAN
For many years I worked for a man who collected antique tools.  He sold them as well, but he also had me build and display them according to different trades and types of tool.  The collector has now passed on, but the collection is a major part of a museum attached to a local college - 114 display panels of over eight-thousand hand tools.       (see the links page for more info on the tool museum)

While he was alive I would buy tools from him I could work with - antique stone carving and woodworking tools mostly.  Sometimes he would decide to tools like this one, which is a Cooper's Hoop Driver, because it was so abused it wouldn't be suitable for his displays or for sale to other collectors.  But what a treasure trove for a pack-rat artist! 

I have a couple of boxes of parts and pieces* and many-times-over repaired tools that periodically appear as elements in sculptural works.  This oak Hoop Driver, with its bashed and frayed head, is a beautiful example of the results of tool-using (wearing-out) process that I literally rescued from the dumpster. 
             *see the Duck Head too!
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