COOPER

If you could examine a colonial cooper’s hands, you would likely find a topography of calluses. If you could listen to his stories, you could expect an earful rich in detail about the life of his fellow countrymen.

In the 18th century, there were three kinds of coopers working on the plantations and in the shops around Virginia’s colonial capital. Tight coopers, the aristocracy of the trade, planed and shaped white oak from the tree’s dense center into precisely wrought staves, earnestly fitting and binding them into tight casks that would hold precious liquids for decades without leaking a drop.

The slack cooper built utilitarian containers for another purpose: holding dry commodities such as flour and tobacco. An industrious tradesman could turn out 10 a day. White coopers formed buckets, pails, churns, tubs and other household goods from the more easily worked cedar and pine.

Age-old coopering skills are practiced today by the tradespeople working in Colonial Williamsburg. The goods they craft and sell bear the impeccable integrity of casks fashioned in the colony nearly 250 years ago.

For inquiries or purchases please contact Prentis Store at 757-229-1000, Extension 2117 or prentis@cwf.org.