I just checked the AIC website and found just three male members who are currently-active furniture conservators in Illinois, all in northern Il.
Given that the man we seek is ~ 75 years old, he probably isn't still working.
I found a quality site for an obviously well-established "Midwest Tool Collectors" society. Another LACA member is already in the process of requesting help from them.
Here are all the facts from the original posts that started this, to provide all the source info that's currently available:
"I have been reading your forum and have seen speculation as to whether any records exist for Lefever Arms. I deal in books as a hobby and sometime in the late 90's I bought a large collection of volumes from a deceased bookdealers family in northern Pennsylvania. There was a bound volume of records from Lefever in this collection. The volume appeared to be put together from fragments of at least 3 other books as witnessed by the size and type of paper.The dates were from the 1890's to the early 1900's I believe. I had it for sale at 3 guns shows and in the Gun List for 450 dollars and had no takers and very little interest. I mentioned it to my son and he traded it to someone in Illinois for some tools. I recieved some interest after it was gone and was told that it was probably very valuable but the gentleman who got it assured me that he would make the info available to collectors. Has it ever surfaced? I don't recall off hand who the gentleman was but it was in southern Illinois."
"Well, as I have said this was just a bound single volume with what appeared to be 3 or more fragments of other volumes. The paper type and size was different in each one.I remember that the dates were from the 1890's up to the early 1900's but I never really read them to see if they were a complete block of dates I just wanted to find the earliest and latest date so I could sell them.I can only remember that the gentleman that got them was a collector of woodworking tools and very knowledgable about them and that he was from southern Illinois. ... He did assure me that he intended to share the information with others. ... The gentleman would probably be about 75 or so I would guess."
"I have been thinking ... the only thing I can really be sure of is that the man was really into woodworking and very knowledgable about wood and restoration of antiques ... He was conversant about the high end Winterthur grade stuff. There can't be to many like that in the midwest. I would guess that maybe a call to a high end antiques dealer or the midwest tool collectors might be the way to go. I still have the tool chest and chisels that he traded with. ... I must stress that what I had was a rebound assemblage of fragments and not the total records."
Last edited by Fred; 11/16/06 12:22 PM.
