machine designed to test leather-shoe soles. This machine rolls the sample back and forth on a mesh kept flooded with water, like a foot walking on a wet road, and we can test how much water penetrates the leather.”
“What happened?” I asked.
“As supplied, the oak-bark leather wasn’t as good as the others. In fact several of the other leathers were much better. But after dressing with grease and extensive testing, all the other leathers began to fail; many became waterlogged, rather like wet dishcloths. But the oak-bark samples scarcely changed at all. In the end the oak-bark leather was actually two to three times more resistant to water than any other sample. If you still want to make that leather boat, then you should use oak-bark leather.”
With a glow of triumph I put down the telephone. Once again the simple factual accuracy of the
Navigatio
had been demonstrated, this time in the opinion of a skilled scientist.
There remained the problem of where to get the oak-bark leather, and here I had another stroke of luck. John Beeby arranged for me to meet Bill Croggon of Josiah Croggon and Son Ltd., the oak-bark tanners from Cornwall, at a leather fair in London. I was warned that the Croggons were a very conservative firm. “They’ve been making oak-bark leather in the same manner and in the same place for nearly three centuries,” John said. “People have been advising them to change to some more modern methods. But they won’t. I don’t know what they’ll say to your idea of a leather boat, and it’s up to you to persuade them to let you have the leather.”
When I explained to Bill Croggon that I wanted enough oxhides tanned in oak bark to cover a medieval boat, he looked thoughtful. “I’ll have to talk it over with my brother,” he said. “And you must realize that it takes a very long time to make oak-bark leather. Every single piece is nearly a year in preparation and we might not have it ready in time. When would you want your leather?”
“Well, I’d planned to set sail on Saint Brendan’s Day,” I said.
“When’s that?”
“May sixteenth.”
“What a coincidence! That’s my wife’s birthday!” he replied, and somehow I knew then that the Croggons would be helping the Brendan project.
So it turned out. I went down to the Croggons’ tannery in the little Cornish town of Grampound and met the Croggon family themselves, grandmother, sons and grandsons, a whole clutch of Croggons, helpful,hospitable, and soon as excited about the Brendan Voyage as I was. They took me around the tannery, starting with the lime-soaking pits where the animal hides were stripped of their hair. There I was astonished to see one workman actually scraping the surface hair from an oxhide by hand. He was using a double-handed scraper, and as he leaned over the “beam” or block he looked exactly like a woodcut illustration of a leather-worker printed four hundred years ago. We walked across a field, past a string of ducks, and went up to the tanning pits, row upon row of tanks dug into the ground and filled with a rich liquid made of ground-up oak bark and water, which looked like thick beer with a creamy froth and smelled sickly sweet. In this “oak-bark liquor” lay the oxhides, slowly absorbing the tannin in the mixture, which entered the skins and formed a tight bond with the skin fibers, turning a perishable oxhide into some of the finest leather known. “It’s a technique that can’t have changed much since Saint Brendan’s day,” commented John Croggon. “It takes good oxhides, the right oak-bark mixture, and lots and lots of time. Of course, many people say that today it’s very old-fashioned. But some of the very best handmade shoes are soled with our leather, and orthopedic hospitals specify oak-bark leather for certain uses because it is so pure that it is less likely to cause skin irritations.”
“Do you think you could find enough medieval-sized oxhides for me? The cattle in
“What happened?” I asked.
“As supplied, the oak-bark leather wasn’t as good as the others. In fact several of the other leathers were much better. But after dressing with grease and extensive testing, all the other leathers began to fail; many became waterlogged, rather like wet dishcloths. But the oak-bark samples scarcely changed at all. In the end the oak-bark leather was actually two to three times more resistant to water than any other sample. If you still want to make that leather boat, then you should use oak-bark leather.”
With a glow of triumph I put down the telephone. Once again the simple factual accuracy of the
Navigatio
had been demonstrated, this time in the opinion of a skilled scientist.
There remained the problem of where to get the oak-bark leather, and here I had another stroke of luck. John Beeby arranged for me to meet Bill Croggon of Josiah Croggon and Son Ltd., the oak-bark tanners from Cornwall, at a leather fair in London. I was warned that the Croggons were a very conservative firm. “They’ve been making oak-bark leather in the same manner and in the same place for nearly three centuries,” John said. “People have been advising them to change to some more modern methods. But they won’t. I don’t know what they’ll say to your idea of a leather boat, and it’s up to you to persuade them to let you have the leather.”
When I explained to Bill Croggon that I wanted enough oxhides tanned in oak bark to cover a medieval boat, he looked thoughtful. “I’ll have to talk it over with my brother,” he said. “And you must realize that it takes a very long time to make oak-bark leather. Every single piece is nearly a year in preparation and we might not have it ready in time. When would you want your leather?”
“Well, I’d planned to set sail on Saint Brendan’s Day,” I said.
“When’s that?”
“May sixteenth.”
“What a coincidence! That’s my wife’s birthday!” he replied, and somehow I knew then that the Croggons would be helping the Brendan project.
So it turned out. I went down to the Croggons’ tannery in the little Cornish town of Grampound and met the Croggon family themselves, grandmother, sons and grandsons, a whole clutch of Croggons, helpful,hospitable, and soon as excited about the Brendan Voyage as I was. They took me around the tannery, starting with the lime-soaking pits where the animal hides were stripped of their hair. There I was astonished to see one workman actually scraping the surface hair from an oxhide by hand. He was using a double-handed scraper, and as he leaned over the “beam” or block he looked exactly like a woodcut illustration of a leather-worker printed four hundred years ago. We walked across a field, past a string of ducks, and went up to the tanning pits, row upon row of tanks dug into the ground and filled with a rich liquid made of ground-up oak bark and water, which looked like thick beer with a creamy froth and smelled sickly sweet. In this “oak-bark liquor” lay the oxhides, slowly absorbing the tannin in the mixture, which entered the skins and formed a tight bond with the skin fibers, turning a perishable oxhide into some of the finest leather known. “It’s a technique that can’t have changed much since Saint Brendan’s day,” commented John Croggon. “It takes good oxhides, the right oak-bark mixture, and lots and lots of time. Of course, many people say that today it’s very old-fashioned. But some of the very best handmade shoes are soled with our leather, and orthopedic hospitals specify oak-bark leather for certain uses because it is so pure that it is less likely to cause skin irritations.”
“Do you think you could find enough medieval-sized oxhides for me? The cattle in
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