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Author Topic: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B  (Read 92929 times)

John Ousterhout

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #45 on: July 04, 2014, 11:55:52 AM »

I've always thought of the second hole being for a brad.  In any case the purpose would be to prevent rotation.  Removing the screw would allow the gidgie to rotate about the brad/pin/whatever.  The wear marks around the screw hole may be from repeated removal, which implies occasional need to do what?  Adjust something?  Remove something?
I find it curious that the teeth don't appear to be bent.  If they were supposed to hold something down, like a claw, then I would expect them to be bent slightly.
They remind me of a picture-frame hanger, except they're too small and the teeth are spaced wrong.  The hanger I'm reminded of engages a nail in a wall, the teeth allowing repositioning left and right to get it to hang straight.
Intriguing indeed.
Cheers,
JohnO
 
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Roger London

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #46 on: July 18, 2014, 03:50:11 AM »

These two brackets/gidgies appear to have been screwed to wood, it follows, given their size, the wood would have been significantly larger thus offer positive buoyancy and facilitating their dispersion across the lagoon. It is therefore very possible that these brackets/gidgies came from the Norwich City.
Looking for a likely use on a freighter could focus the source-search. Laundry room, drying rack, crockery storage shelving/racking, etc. They do not look as though they were originally high quality, thus less likely to have been associated with anything in, or from, chart/navigation/radio/bridge room equipment.
A superb project, Roger
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Joe Cerniglia

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #47 on: July 18, 2014, 05:27:56 AM »

These two brackets/gidgies appear to have been screwed to wood, it follows, given their size, the wood would have been significantly larger thus offer positive buoyancy and facilitating their dispersion across the lagoon. It is therefore very possible that these brackets/gidgies came from the Norwich City.
It's possible, but previous analysis on EPAC didn't seem to point in the direction of the Norwich City, a British-built freighter.  In 2002, A British researcher observed the gidgies appear American in origin.

"The nature of the plates make it virtually certain that they
were amateur made and used American screws...

The thicknesses are reasonably consistent with an American origin, either
Brown and Sharpe gages or "preferred thickness" gages. The thicknesses do
not tie in so well with a British origin as this would mean an SWG (Standard
wire gauge) thickness which lies in both cases just outside the maximum and
minimum thicknesses. It has to be said that the variation in thickness over
the plate makes a nominal thickness difficult to be certain of or even if it
is relevant, but ... The American gage (B & S) of the plates would be 17 (0.0453) and 19 (0.0359) .
Equivalent preferred thickness would be 0.036 and 0.045."

He suggested the LORAN station as one probable source but neither did he rule out the hypothesis that it was for a modification to a sextant box.

Joe Cerniglia
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Roger London

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #48 on: August 05, 2014, 11:44:18 AM »

Yes agreed Joe, the gidgies appear to be US made. Or Canadian? Thus pointing to when the Norwich City was repaired locally after her bridge collision near Vancouver. The masts and funnel were smashed, along with bridge damage. The accident pictures, whilst good, do not clearly show what damage may have occurred below decks especially when the masts were smashed.
A brilliant project, Roger
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JNev

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #49 on: August 05, 2014, 11:53:24 AM »

The gidgies are aluminum and hand-crafted.  That does not seem like shipboard fare to me.

Hand-crafted may be 'amateur' - or the work of a craftsman with limited time and resources.

Other than having American screws and possibly American gage material, I couldn't begin to assume with any reliability that they are American (or Canadian) made, and obviously I personally don't see the N.C. connection anyway.

The sextant box modification seems plausible as a line of pursuit - however one can pursue it without the box.  Same for these things turning up as a make-do do-dad for the interior of NR16020 if it could only be found so (maybe will surface in a picture one day that happens to capture some odd detail with these in it.  Maybe they were meant to retain soft goods in the cockpit or cabin somehow.  The Cabin had an expanse of what appears to have been wood decking.

Other than those guesses, it seems like a big, fat... guess, for now.
- Jeff Neville

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Roger London

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #50 on: August 05, 2014, 12:01:03 PM »

In addition to the various uses others have suggested, the gidgies, wherever they came from, whilst still attached to a piece of timber batten, would have made a wonderful crab-killer or crab-deflector. In particular whilst laid prone sleeping such an armament would have been very effective meted out with venom when attacked. Once too weak to move however, these gidgies might have been a very sad cutting-last-stand against the crabs’ war of attrition.
A brilliant project, Roger
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JNev

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #51 on: August 05, 2014, 12:17:54 PM »

They'd make good back-scratchers, too.
- Jeff Neville

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Matt Revington

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #52 on: February 03, 2016, 11:29:34 AM »

This artifact has puzzled me for a long time.  The Luke field inventory lists AE's radio headphones as model WE 588A which I have not been able to find a picture of online but I did find WE 528 headphones (that I hope are similar) for sale on eBay, I have attached a photo from that ad.  The hook on the incoming wires to the headphone goes through a part that seems to me to be very similar to 2-6-S-03B.  (edit) I added a second copy with an arrow indicating what I am talking about.
« Last Edit: February 03, 2016, 11:35:07 AM by Matt Revington »
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Martin X. Moleski, SJ

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #53 on: February 03, 2016, 03:09:26 PM »

The hook on the incoming wires to the headphone goes through a part that seems to me to be very similar to 2-6-S-03B.

That is one of the best guesses I've ever seen.

Even if it isn't the actual source of the "gidgies," it may show the kind of application they may have come from.

I've moved your post down to this thread for the sake of continuity.
LTM,

           Marty
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #54 on: February 03, 2016, 03:48:14 PM »

Bear in mind that the screws are wood screws and the aluminum pieces are not manufactured but are crudely fashioned.  These things were make-shift homemade additions or modifications to a wooden object.  My guess has always been that they are from rotatable wooden "keepers" Noonan installed in the sextant box.  Earhart, as a castaway, was using the box to carry stuff and she ripped out keepers because they were in the way - bending one of them in the process.  The wooden blocks they were originally attached to eventually rotted away leaving only the aluminum plates and brass screws.
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Matt Revington

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #55 on: February 04, 2016, 06:37:13 AM »

Wood screws don't have to mean wood was used, I assume the cup of those earphones were bakelite, if you google "wood screws and bakelite" you get links to a host of articles from Popular Mechanics and Popular Science from the 1920s and 1930s which outline how to build different types of radios etc, in almost every case they suggest that the bakelite parts be attached using wood screws  after drilling an initial pilot hole. 
However, Ric, I admit your idea makes more sense.  I cannot picture a reason why AE or FN would have taken the headphones from the plane and if they had why would they have dismantled it and why was no bakelite and other headphone parts found at the 7 site with the gidgies.
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Greg Daspit

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #56 on: July 28, 2021, 04:19:14 PM »

It's more than 120 days but revisiting these “Gidgies” and the previous theory they might be related to the Sextant Box.

We know now the Sextant Box was left behind during the Bushnell Survey, but their survey team didn’t report seeing a body or camp.
So let’s assume the Sextant Box was left behind some distance away from the Seven Site. Possibly close to the nearest point marked along the lagoon on the Bushnell survey map. 

A scenario could be the Gidgies, handmade from aluminum sheet, are related to work done on the island by colonist after the search. Possibly salvaged a crashed airplane, on Gardner or another island.

A second scenario could be a colonist in the work crew found the Bushnell sextant box.  He moved it a short distance to the Seven Site where they found the skull. He unscrewed the “Gidgies” there. Then he started to use it as merely a receptacle.  When an extensive search was ordered he realized it was important and reported he had found the box earlier. He also added information that he threw away what might have been part of an eyepiece.  In that scenario the sextant box and these artifacts could still be related. But the extensive search party didn’t find the parts he unscrewed, and there are no reports that the finder told them about unscrewing them.

A third scenario could be that the Bushnell Survey team was using one of their older sextant boxes as merely a receptacle for odd parts from the start.   It wasn’t missed by the survey party at any of the other survey points marked near the lagoon because it didn’t contain a sextant for their survey work. The box was found by colonist during their extensive search near the survey point along the lagoon shore where the Bushnell team left it. The finder claims he threw away part of a broken eyepiece that was with it.  In this scenario the “Gidgies” artifacts found decades later, don’t seem related to the old Bushnell sextant box.

If related to Earhart, what wood object might Earhart haul across the island that could have the Gidgies? Possibly a repurposed wood toolbox on the plane that may have been taken or floated to shore?

The Gidgies still seem like strap fasteners for a wood box to me. There are two of them. They have wood screws.  The jagged teeth with slightly rounded tips intended to spread out the forces on the leather strap so a single hole doesn’t stretch too wide like on the average worn out leather pants belt.
As noted before, the image with Earhart and Noonan sitting under the tail of the Electra has a box with a strap.
https://earchives.lib.purdue.edu/digital/collection/earhart/id/327/rec/348
 Commenters on the theory that this box may have strap fasteners noted that it made no sense for it to be the sextant box. It seemed like it was just a toolbox.  I was never married to the Sextant Box theory.  The Gidgies could be from another box.  That toolbox.
That theory still intrigues me because of one of the Gidgies is bent and the strap on the box in the Earhart/ Noonan image looks forced out, like its fastener is bent.

I’m interested to hear what could be possible uses for these Gidgies now that we have new information regarding the circumstances of the Bushnell sextant box?
3971R
 
« Last Edit: July 28, 2021, 05:18:25 PM by Greg Daspit »
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Don White

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #57 on: July 29, 2021, 07:00:15 AM »

While I'm inclined to think the gidgies have nothing to do with the sextant box, the idea that the box's re-use as a receptacle may have been done by the Bushnell crew is interesting. While we know that a sextant bearing that number was issued to the Bushnell, we don't know what happened to it, or to any of the ship's other sextants. If there is a record, it hasn't been found.

Examination of the gidgies, as described in this thread, suggests an origin in an aircraft repair shop, by someone who was skilled and using hand tools to make them. We know of one instance in which the Electra was worked on in such a shop, which is when the window was replaced by the patch in Miami. Could these be associated with that, or made for some other purpose at that time? This doesn't answer what they were for or how they got to where they were found. Just a thought.

LTM,
Don
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Greg Daspit

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #58 on: July 29, 2021, 09:30:39 AM »

Examination of the gidgies, as described in this thread, suggests an origin in an aircraft repair shop, by someone who was skilled and using hand tools to make them. We know of one instance in which the Electra was worked on in such a shop, which is when the window was replaced by the patch in Miami. Could these be associated with that, or made for some other purpose at that time?
Made in a shop makes sense.
Let’s consider the scenario where a Colonist or a Loran Station USCG member made the Gidgies in a shop. 
Colonist made combs and inlays from salvaged aluminum sheet, so the material, skill and tools were available.
However, these Gidgies seem made for a very specific purpose and some time was expended making them in a shop. 
They were then moved some distance away from the shop and were left in the same small spot that a compact mirror, 1930’s era zipper pull, pocketknife, Freckle cream jar were found?
Based on its provenance I think it is very unlikely that after making them for a very specific purpose they just happened to be left at that exact spot.

If not from a Colonist, USCG or the Bushnell sextant box (being from the Bushnell Survey suggests it was not in sight of Castaway body), I think the leading candidate is The Castaway.
Since The Castaway didn’t have a shop, it must have been brought there having already been made elsewhere.

One of Earhart’s airplane mechanics seem to be good candidates for making them.
In considering the Miami patch work. There may have been an opportunity to secure something to that panel on the inside after it was installed. Maybe something that hooked on or latched on to a stringer that could also be easily detached.
So what object, possibly wood (wood screws), would an airplane mechanic make aluminum latches or grips for that Earhart would want to haul across the island?

3971R
 
« Last Edit: July 29, 2021, 09:59:13 AM by Greg Daspit »
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Greg Daspit

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Re: Artifact 2-6-S-03A & 2-6-S-03B
« Reply #59 on: July 29, 2021, 11:46:40 AM »

As was thought regarding the Sextant Box, any repurposed wood box could be used to keep small crabs away from food and therefore useful to carry around the island.
If once at the Seven Site, the strap fasteners or securing clips were removed from a wood box for another purpose, could larger crabs carry it off?
Have the Coconut crabs tried to carry off food containers in previous expeditions?
3971R
 
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