everything i needed to know about slate
and was not afraid to ask
(Please accept my apologies if your Google search for practical solutions to roofing problems brought you here. Nonetheless, at the very least, this may still amuse or be of interest. So please read on).
and was not afraid to ask
(Please accept my apologies if your Google search for practical solutions to roofing problems brought you here. Nonetheless, at the very least, this may still amuse or be of interest. So please read on).
When making art work grounded in genealogical research and that celebrated the materials of my ancestors’ workplaces, I found myself in need of expert consultation on the subject of roofing slate, a material not used in the part of the world in which I now live.
Based upon related activity, I know family researchers to be expansive in their experience and generous with their knowledge so, in 1998, I posted the following to a U.K. genealogy website:
I have a question that may seem a little 'off-topic' but I promise you that it is relevant. Does anybody have information as to the standard sizes - if indeed there was/is a standard - of roofing slates? My GG grandfather was a slater and I am more than a little curious about his occupation. Do you have information, or can recommend where I can get information, as to the dimensions and attaching method(s) used: two nails?
Thank You
P.S. If anybody is fortunate enough to live under a slate roof and is tempted to nip up a ladder to do the research, please be careful.
The first reply:
I was fascinated by your enquiry. I seem to remember that roofing slates come in all different sizes, partly because, with stone slates, rather than slate ones, they tended to be graded as you went up the roof to the ridge, with large ones at the wall and thinner smaller lighter ones at the ridge and on the main body of the roof. I also seem to remember that they all have names, rather in the way of paper sizes, like kings and queens and emperors etc. I'm certain that amongst this houseful of unconsidered trifles I have the information, so I'll have a rummage and come back to you.
Regards,
John
P.S. Success in the first place I looked! "The Pattern of English Building", by Alec Clifton Taylor pub Faber 1972. page 164. "Roofing slate sizes, no less than those of stone slates.....have their picturesque names, which apply in Wales too; it was indeed at the Penrhyn quarry that they are said to have been first introduced, about the middle of the 18th Century. For some reason many of these names (about 20 are generally recognised in the industry) are drawn from the female aristocracy. These are princesses, duchesses, marchionesses, countesses, viscountesses and ladies. There are also small duchesses, wide countesses and narrow ladies!"
If you're into building material in general it is a fascinating read without being too dry, and has several references to slates throughout the book. It is the standard layman's work on the subject and should be available in the library.
Several other responses arrived but it is the following from Ken Harrison of North Wales that proved to be a bonanza in more ways than one.
Ken sent the first of several comprehensive and witty missives. I am archiving them here because of how much they contributed to my knowledge and how much they evidence the generosity and good humour of complete strangers. If you want to move beyond the factual content, although it also has its moments, skip to the last two emails.
For reasons of brevity, I elected to exclude my side of the conversation. But it should be clear from Ken's responses as to what additional information I was seeking. Truth to tell, I knew that I wouldn’t have an immediate need of all the information but was enjoying Ken’s letters too much to let him off the hook. Moreover, one email from me would often elicit the equivalent of two from Ken as he indulged in comprehensive post-scripts
As is clear, Ken's all-inclusive responses were attentive to my intervening questions:
Bryan wrote . . . .
'Does anybody have information as to the standard - if indeed there was/is a standard - roofing slate'?
The simple answer is ‘no’ but following on from John who told you about his 'look up' of the word "Duchess", I have a large amount of information on this subject but to type it all out would take hours:-(
Basically slate is from three areas of England (if you include Rutland).
1) WELSH
2) WESTMORELAND (and CUMBERLAND)
3) RUTLAND
Welsh slate is the most common and easier to work and virtually impervious to water.
Westmoreland slate is much harder to work and is totally impervious to water. Only used on expensive houses due to the cost.
Rutland slate is less well known and is of the oolitic limestone slates from Collyweston. I include the above in case you knew where he lived or worked?
The GAUGE of the setting of the battens which hold the slates is dependent on the pitch (angle) of the roof. This is due to the spread of the rain as it flows down the roof and is a subject on its own.
A 'Gauging Square' is used for these measurements. The tools of the trade include a 'Pick Hammer', a 'Splitters Hammer', a 'Slate Ripper' and a 'Sax'. I include these terms just in case you have a will with these terms mentioned?
The size of slate can be of any size but standard sizes were always names after the titles of females of nobility. The smallest slate was called a 'Narrow Lady' through the title of 'Princess' right up to 'Queen'. As you have been told by John in an earlier e-mail a DUCHESS is 24 x 12 inch. A COUNTESS is 20 x 10 inches etc. These names originally came from the North Wales quarries where the trade grew up in the 18th and 19th centuries.
At the edge of the roof under construction you would find sizes such as 'Tile and a Half' and at the ridge you will find shorter slates which are capped by a 'Ridge Slate'.
The 'ROCKMAN' quarries the slate from the ground and once removed the 'SPLITTER' gets to work to to split and shape the end product. This was a highly skilled job. The split slates were then handled by a final person who was called a 'DRESSER'. His job was to cut the roughly shaped slates to the final dimensions. This might have been done on site where the slates were finally going to be used. For many years this job was done mechanically by a machine called a 'GREAVES'. This machine was water powered.
The work of a roofer went hand in hand with that of a 'PLUMBER' (Latin for lead = plumbum/ plumbari-(us) - hence plumber) who would fit the lead-work between slate and the brickwork within the mortar joints. A 'Lead Dressers Hammer' is used to work the lead and is made out of Hickory.
Here endeth the first lesson <grin>.
Slater than we think.
Up here in N.Wales was the world's largest slate exporting area. At any time between about 1790 and 1950, men in red shirts were to be seen dangling on ropes over the quarry edges drilling holes in the face and putting in explosive charges; huge slabs were blasted from the rock face down onto the quarry floor, where they were broken into more manageable pieces for dragging to the cutting sheds, in the early days on horse- pulled two poled sleds, later on, horse drawn trucks on rails, later still, by steam.
At the shed the chunks were sawn to size, usually by water or steam powered machines, and then split along the grain by hand, using hammer and chisel, and then given a final "dressing",bevelling the edges, etc.
The slates were produced in a range of standard sizes, some usually known by their measurements, "8's","16's",etc.(inches),the larger sizes were named after an ascending scale of aristocracy: "countess", "duchess", "queens", ( these were big buggers to manhandle on a wet roof in a strong wind!). These were then taken by the famous "little"(narrow gauge) railways to coastal ports for shipping all round the world. The boom time was the period of growth of the industrial towns, places like Manchester, Liverpool, Hamburg, were springing up over night, and all those grim terraces of back to backs needed roofing. Slate was especially favoured because it could withstand the corrosive atmosphere of those sulphur belching chimnies, particularly Welsh slate; the poorer stuff degraded into a yellow, crumbling, powder, after 50 years or so.
A typical slater's gang might consist of three men: a general labourer, working mostly on the ground, humping slates about, cutting them on a "guillotine" bench(when "half-sizes" were needed"), putting holes in them for the fixing nails to go through, using a screw, or punch, clamped to the bench edge for this, mixing mortar for mucking down the ridge tiles.
A "mate" would load the roof, balancing stacks of slates, known as "tables", on the rafters at regular intervals, so that they were "to hand" for the slater. The slater himself would "size" the roof, that is, judge the required pattern of courses, and set a string line down the two outside edges, or verges; older men might do all this by "rock of eye", without using rule or tape or string!
In earlier times, and for most of the C19th in rural areas, the slate was typically fixed by a single wooden, mostly oaken, peg, in the centre near the top; this went through the slate into the roof lath; the lath was flimsy stuff, the real securing work was done by plastering the underside of the slates with a lime mix, so really they were bonded in plaster.
More expensive roofs had the slates fixed by two copper nails, through the top two corners. Galvanised nails came into use in the early C19th, and gradually became universal. With double nailing the flimsy plasterer's lath was replaced by stouter (eg 2x1) batons. It became part of the slater's work to fix these, as their spacing would depend on the intended pattern of slate courses. The batons are nailed across the rafters, and the slates "hang" from them in overlapping courses, the bottom of a higher slate covering the nail holes of the slate below. The slater himself would generally fit the bottom two courses, after that the pattern simply repeats , and his mate would help nailing the following rows. They would use a "cat ladder", a ladder that hooked over the ridge of the roof, but would be pretty adept at walking about ,stepping from rafter to rafter, even carrying a load of slates along the ridge plate. The slater and his mate would wear either a leather nail bag around their waist, or a slater's apron, with a nail pocket in the front. They would carry slate hammers, double headed, a pointed end for making holes in slates when needed, a flat end for driving nails and trimming edges.
The pattern of courses would be broken when going round a chimney, or a dormer or skylight, slates might have to be specially trimmed in-situ, and lead or zinc "flashing" cut and fixed in place; usually the slater would do this, but quite often it was left to the plumber, indeed, in the days before general domestic water supplies this was what a plumber's work consisted of; historically, the roofer and the plumber were often one and the same.
When all the slates were fixed, the heavy ridge tiles had to be carried up and bedded in mortar, a rotten job having to walk up the full pitch of the roof with a loaded bucket of cement on the shoulder. Once the rudiments were mastered, and a head for heights attained, to fix an "adequate" roof did not require a high level of skill, especially if the sizing was done by the "guv'nor"; but there was a world of difference between this and the best work of an experienced "master" slater (though many of these "masters" remained journeymen all their lives!)The best roof would have a much longer life: the seams being tighter, less water ran through, and they lifted less in the wind; and the good slater would use his ear to detect any dullness of tone, or slight buzzing, when the slate was hammered, which was a sure sign of a fault in the grain, such a slate was certain to crack after a tear or two's exposure.
A team of slaters would typically be hired by the job and payed per square yard, with all the usual variations on this theme. Between roofs they would get by with repair work. The pressures of working "on a price" rather than by the day, meant that work often went on under dangerous conditions, when the roof was wet and slippery, or icy, or in high winds; falls were frequent.
The only major post war innovation has been the use of bitumised under felt, fixed beneath the batons, and rather more regard for health and safety aspects. You could , perhaps, further contextualise this summary by getting hold of some general work on the history of the building trades as a whole.
Hope this helps.
Ken Harrison, N.Wales, UK.
I'm afraid it was "from the head", which, sadly means I know of no book-- at least , not on the roofing trade theme, which I assume is your concern; there are books to be found on the history of
the quarrying industry. IF these interest you I could dig out some references, but its rather oblique with regard to slating as such. And 'no', slate has not been my life, but many years ago when at one of life's "loose ends" I filled in time working with a jobbing slater, and up on a roof all day they TALK! As it happened, a lot of the work involved replacing roofs on old buildings, and the operation
of stripping off C19th, C18th, and even C17th slate roofs became for me an exercise in archeology, to the constant irritation of my workmates! I found things I couldn't understand, and being of a curious disposition, had to seek out retired ancient slaters for the answers. It was a relatively brief but very VIVID experience,(fear of falling being not the least of it!).
The rest comes from moving to this, formerly major slate producing area, over twenty years ago. The whole landscape is shaped and scarred by that industry; the village streets back then were lined with old men standing by their front doors, hardly able to move, their lungs full of quarry dust.Now they are all dead, and most, but not all, of the quarries shut down. But not before I'd had many a long conversation with those old men, one or two of whom had started "on the slate" as young boys back in the 1890s. So that's where the information came from.
I cannot walk or run very far from my door without reaching a quarry edge, or falling into the shadow of a slate face, or tripping over the half buried sleepers of an old slate shifting railway; so although it is far from having been my life, I guess a lot of my life has been lived in the ghost of its past.
Ken.
If I can help further, please say.
Yes tubby (1 inch?) little galvanised grey nails with large round but very flat heads. Now I know a little of the nature of your project an afterthought struck:
Your GGGfather, on his way up the ladder (as it were) from labourer to slater, would have acquired patches on the thigh front of his trouser legs. This is because, if you need to quickly "hole" or cut or shape a slate , ( to fit round a window say,) and don't want to have go to ground, a common method is thus:
Mark with a nail or hammer point where the hole is to go, lay that part of the slate flat on the fleshy part of the thigh, holding the other end very firmly, then punch the hole with a sharp blow from the pointed side of the slate hammer. Spookily, the slate itself and the softness of the muscle seem to soak up the momentum, so that while you may get a reddish dent in your leg, and after a few attempts some holes in your pants (hence the patches), there is no pain or damage inflicted.
It CAN be done with a nail if you don't have a "spike hammer", as they were called, but not quite so easily. The sponginess of the leg is essential to the process; if you rest a slate on a rigid batten or rafter and try do hammer a nail through to make a hole, chances are it will just split or flake.
To cut a slate using this method ( I figured you might want to try this on one of your slates, since its something old John would've done hundreds of times,- but insure your leg first, or lay a piece of flannel over it), scribe a line, so as for instance to shorten it by two inches or so, then "perforate" along the "waste" side of that line, using the above technique; when you have a "dotted line", you can either tap out the remaining pieces by the same method, or just snap off the waste over an edge with the hammer. This leaves you with a rough serrated edge along the waste side of the scribed line; this you can carefully tap back to flat, hitting the slate END ON, with the regular head of the hammer.
Thought this might be a way for you to "work on" a slate in a traditional fashion as well as drawing on it???
And finally, there was a fascinating custom of slate drawing in the culture of the quarrymen, there were traditional geometrical patterns, star maps and so forth, and learning these was part of their "secret" initiation. But this is only indirectly related to the experience of a roofing slater, whose writing on slate probably consisted of working out the wages of his men, and who had borrowed how much from whom; and I have found the inevitable occasional obscene verse scratched on the back of two hundred year old slates!!!
Anyway, good luck,....(and don't blame me!)
Ken.
Hello again, too
Short answer owing to duff hand-(pinched nerve). Slates could vary greatly in thickness, depending not least on the grain itself that it was split along. Sometimes they were smooth on both sides, especially the lighter, more modern machine finished item. But the typical roofing slate would be beveled on the upward facing edges, when one side was rough it would be used as the weather side; a smooth side always faced downwards, so as to nail evenly to the batten at the fixing end. Topsides on some heavy slates might be left very rough, giving a rugged, rustic kind of effect. As a rule of thumb, the thinner the more dressing, the smoother the slate.
Nail holes: say two and a half inches down from the top edge, one and a half in from the outside edge, with the slate what I believe you'd call "portrait" way up(?)
Let me know how it goes.
Ken
All Done By Slate Of Hand......
Big overlaps preferred - wind-driven rain can easily creep 6 or more inches up under a slate, especially with capillary action. Also much less chance of wind-lift. Landscape style not unknown, but pretty unusual.
Remember, when nails were a luxury most slates were fixed by a small (half a Cigarette diameter) wooden peg, into flimsy lath; so the weight of the slates above was the real retainer; no doubt this set the precedent. Nonetheless, I wouldn't want my roof coursed any other fashion, nails or no nails: welsh rain will get in anywhere it possibly can!
But the "verge" course, i.e. the bottom row, WAS usually landscape, and then completely covered by the next course; this for extra strength because the lower lap of the bottom slates projecting from the roof were unsupported.
P.s. I did notice while back someone give you a very suspect etymology for the slater's (s)axe, and also mention the"rip" without explaining its function or design. If these matter I can say more- but not now I'm 'fraid, backn'arm too sore.
Ken. (make holes from the top, so that if it flakes it will with luck do so only on the down-side)
At this point, the small slate and wood sculpture was complete, and I had written a short article for Family Tree magazine (FTM) regarding how I was using family research to generate art works. The exhibition was ready. I felt that I owed it to Ken to let him know how I had put his wit and wisdom to use and he responded by riffing off my story.
Bryan
How good to hear from you, I had wondered how the project was proceeding. I don't see FTM that often, and certainly not this one. To the article, I say Bravo. By which I mean rather more than it may seem. I respond completely to the 'enthrall' that weaves imagination and the sense of material experience together.-- (Knowing that some of mine lived in mews and kept and lived among horses, I have surprised a local stable girl by being found lurking in the dawn shadows to ask, "Please, can I sniff your horses and the straw BEFORE you muck out ?" and "Do you mind if I wrap myself in this horse blanket?". I sought out fields that some of my 'ag-labs' ploughed (Essex clay), and caked myself in it to see how skin felt as it dried on it, and how it felt to walk across the furrows with four or five pounds of the stuff on each boot. I filled a bag with it to bring home and weigh, to see how it altered as it got wet, how it would be to daub a wall with it......, and so on, with tailors, glovers, watermen, etc. )
Well done. And let's have MORE of it !
Ken Harrison N Wales UK
P.S.
Or the time, having considered that my grandmother, having been born and grown up in a Notting Hill Mews in the 1880s, would, as a toddler, have seen the sky as a rectangle, bounded by the four roof lines of the mews court, and the outside world as a rectangle of street, glimpsed through the entrance archway, coaches passing as if on a large t.v. screen, almost? – I went there--the exteriors are the same, the cobbles are original, but the formerly slum flats over the stables are now each one and two million pound properties, the stables are home to ad agencies and pr consultants. I spotted an original drain grating in the cobbles. Clearly, when my granny and her siblings played among the horse muck, they'd've poked sticks down that drain, wouldn't they ? So I did, sitting on my haunches on the cobbles. Then, to see how the sky would've looked to a three year old in 1881, I lay on my back in the yard. Anxious faces were seen at the windows (you must understand I am a bald , wildly grey-bearded, old fellow, in decidedly 'country clothes'.) Murmurs of 'private courtyard.... security guards...... no right to be here...." This last amused me greatly, since my family were in that mews from 1857 (second tenant after it was built) till about 1927, and in the 1890s occupied pretty well all the buildings over the stables, and had three of the stables too. My parting shot was to tell a very snooty young lady that where her desk now stood my had been the truckle bed where my great great grandmother had died in 1881....... of TYPHUS.......
Ken
Sadly, this was the last I heard from Ken. I sent Christmas greetings but didn’t hear back. Perhaps one of Ken's relatives will stumble across this archive and contact me.
Based upon related activity, I know family researchers to be expansive in their experience and generous with their knowledge so, in 1998, I posted the following to a U.K. genealogy website:
I have a question that may seem a little 'off-topic' but I promise you that it is relevant. Does anybody have information as to the standard sizes - if indeed there was/is a standard - of roofing slates? My GG grandfather was a slater and I am more than a little curious about his occupation. Do you have information, or can recommend where I can get information, as to the dimensions and attaching method(s) used: two nails?
Thank You
P.S. If anybody is fortunate enough to live under a slate roof and is tempted to nip up a ladder to do the research, please be careful.
The first reply:
I was fascinated by your enquiry. I seem to remember that roofing slates come in all different sizes, partly because, with stone slates, rather than slate ones, they tended to be graded as you went up the roof to the ridge, with large ones at the wall and thinner smaller lighter ones at the ridge and on the main body of the roof. I also seem to remember that they all have names, rather in the way of paper sizes, like kings and queens and emperors etc. I'm certain that amongst this houseful of unconsidered trifles I have the information, so I'll have a rummage and come back to you.
Regards,
John
P.S. Success in the first place I looked! "The Pattern of English Building", by Alec Clifton Taylor pub Faber 1972. page 164. "Roofing slate sizes, no less than those of stone slates.....have their picturesque names, which apply in Wales too; it was indeed at the Penrhyn quarry that they are said to have been first introduced, about the middle of the 18th Century. For some reason many of these names (about 20 are generally recognised in the industry) are drawn from the female aristocracy. These are princesses, duchesses, marchionesses, countesses, viscountesses and ladies. There are also small duchesses, wide countesses and narrow ladies!"
If you're into building material in general it is a fascinating read without being too dry, and has several references to slates throughout the book. It is the standard layman's work on the subject and should be available in the library.
Several other responses arrived but it is the following from Ken Harrison of North Wales that proved to be a bonanza in more ways than one.
Ken sent the first of several comprehensive and witty missives. I am archiving them here because of how much they contributed to my knowledge and how much they evidence the generosity and good humour of complete strangers. If you want to move beyond the factual content, although it also has its moments, skip to the last two emails.
For reasons of brevity, I elected to exclude my side of the conversation. But it should be clear from Ken's responses as to what additional information I was seeking. Truth to tell, I knew that I wouldn’t have an immediate need of all the information but was enjoying Ken’s letters too much to let him off the hook. Moreover, one email from me would often elicit the equivalent of two from Ken as he indulged in comprehensive post-scripts
As is clear, Ken's all-inclusive responses were attentive to my intervening questions:
Bryan wrote . . . .
'Does anybody have information as to the standard - if indeed there was/is a standard - roofing slate'?
The simple answer is ‘no’ but following on from John who told you about his 'look up' of the word "Duchess", I have a large amount of information on this subject but to type it all out would take hours:-(
Basically slate is from three areas of England (if you include Rutland).
1) WELSH
2) WESTMORELAND (and CUMBERLAND)
3) RUTLAND
Welsh slate is the most common and easier to work and virtually impervious to water.
Westmoreland slate is much harder to work and is totally impervious to water. Only used on expensive houses due to the cost.
Rutland slate is less well known and is of the oolitic limestone slates from Collyweston. I include the above in case you knew where he lived or worked?
The GAUGE of the setting of the battens which hold the slates is dependent on the pitch (angle) of the roof. This is due to the spread of the rain as it flows down the roof and is a subject on its own.
A 'Gauging Square' is used for these measurements. The tools of the trade include a 'Pick Hammer', a 'Splitters Hammer', a 'Slate Ripper' and a 'Sax'. I include these terms just in case you have a will with these terms mentioned?
The size of slate can be of any size but standard sizes were always names after the titles of females of nobility. The smallest slate was called a 'Narrow Lady' through the title of 'Princess' right up to 'Queen'. As you have been told by John in an earlier e-mail a DUCHESS is 24 x 12 inch. A COUNTESS is 20 x 10 inches etc. These names originally came from the North Wales quarries where the trade grew up in the 18th and 19th centuries.
At the edge of the roof under construction you would find sizes such as 'Tile and a Half' and at the ridge you will find shorter slates which are capped by a 'Ridge Slate'.
The 'ROCKMAN' quarries the slate from the ground and once removed the 'SPLITTER' gets to work to to split and shape the end product. This was a highly skilled job. The split slates were then handled by a final person who was called a 'DRESSER'. His job was to cut the roughly shaped slates to the final dimensions. This might have been done on site where the slates were finally going to be used. For many years this job was done mechanically by a machine called a 'GREAVES'. This machine was water powered.
The work of a roofer went hand in hand with that of a 'PLUMBER' (Latin for lead = plumbum/ plumbari-(us) - hence plumber) who would fit the lead-work between slate and the brickwork within the mortar joints. A 'Lead Dressers Hammer' is used to work the lead and is made out of Hickory.
Here endeth the first lesson <grin>.
Slater than we think.
Up here in N.Wales was the world's largest slate exporting area. At any time between about 1790 and 1950, men in red shirts were to be seen dangling on ropes over the quarry edges drilling holes in the face and putting in explosive charges; huge slabs were blasted from the rock face down onto the quarry floor, where they were broken into more manageable pieces for dragging to the cutting sheds, in the early days on horse- pulled two poled sleds, later on, horse drawn trucks on rails, later still, by steam.
At the shed the chunks were sawn to size, usually by water or steam powered machines, and then split along the grain by hand, using hammer and chisel, and then given a final "dressing",bevelling the edges, etc.
The slates were produced in a range of standard sizes, some usually known by their measurements, "8's","16's",etc.(inches),the larger sizes were named after an ascending scale of aristocracy: "countess", "duchess", "queens", ( these were big buggers to manhandle on a wet roof in a strong wind!). These were then taken by the famous "little"(narrow gauge) railways to coastal ports for shipping all round the world. The boom time was the period of growth of the industrial towns, places like Manchester, Liverpool, Hamburg, were springing up over night, and all those grim terraces of back to backs needed roofing. Slate was especially favoured because it could withstand the corrosive atmosphere of those sulphur belching chimnies, particularly Welsh slate; the poorer stuff degraded into a yellow, crumbling, powder, after 50 years or so.
A typical slater's gang might consist of three men: a general labourer, working mostly on the ground, humping slates about, cutting them on a "guillotine" bench(when "half-sizes" were needed"), putting holes in them for the fixing nails to go through, using a screw, or punch, clamped to the bench edge for this, mixing mortar for mucking down the ridge tiles.
A "mate" would load the roof, balancing stacks of slates, known as "tables", on the rafters at regular intervals, so that they were "to hand" for the slater. The slater himself would "size" the roof, that is, judge the required pattern of courses, and set a string line down the two outside edges, or verges; older men might do all this by "rock of eye", without using rule or tape or string!
In earlier times, and for most of the C19th in rural areas, the slate was typically fixed by a single wooden, mostly oaken, peg, in the centre near the top; this went through the slate into the roof lath; the lath was flimsy stuff, the real securing work was done by plastering the underside of the slates with a lime mix, so really they were bonded in plaster.
More expensive roofs had the slates fixed by two copper nails, through the top two corners. Galvanised nails came into use in the early C19th, and gradually became universal. With double nailing the flimsy plasterer's lath was replaced by stouter (eg 2x1) batons. It became part of the slater's work to fix these, as their spacing would depend on the intended pattern of slate courses. The batons are nailed across the rafters, and the slates "hang" from them in overlapping courses, the bottom of a higher slate covering the nail holes of the slate below. The slater himself would generally fit the bottom two courses, after that the pattern simply repeats , and his mate would help nailing the following rows. They would use a "cat ladder", a ladder that hooked over the ridge of the roof, but would be pretty adept at walking about ,stepping from rafter to rafter, even carrying a load of slates along the ridge plate. The slater and his mate would wear either a leather nail bag around their waist, or a slater's apron, with a nail pocket in the front. They would carry slate hammers, double headed, a pointed end for making holes in slates when needed, a flat end for driving nails and trimming edges.
The pattern of courses would be broken when going round a chimney, or a dormer or skylight, slates might have to be specially trimmed in-situ, and lead or zinc "flashing" cut and fixed in place; usually the slater would do this, but quite often it was left to the plumber, indeed, in the days before general domestic water supplies this was what a plumber's work consisted of; historically, the roofer and the plumber were often one and the same.
When all the slates were fixed, the heavy ridge tiles had to be carried up and bedded in mortar, a rotten job having to walk up the full pitch of the roof with a loaded bucket of cement on the shoulder. Once the rudiments were mastered, and a head for heights attained, to fix an "adequate" roof did not require a high level of skill, especially if the sizing was done by the "guv'nor"; but there was a world of difference between this and the best work of an experienced "master" slater (though many of these "masters" remained journeymen all their lives!)The best roof would have a much longer life: the seams being tighter, less water ran through, and they lifted less in the wind; and the good slater would use his ear to detect any dullness of tone, or slight buzzing, when the slate was hammered, which was a sure sign of a fault in the grain, such a slate was certain to crack after a tear or two's exposure.
A team of slaters would typically be hired by the job and payed per square yard, with all the usual variations on this theme. Between roofs they would get by with repair work. The pressures of working "on a price" rather than by the day, meant that work often went on under dangerous conditions, when the roof was wet and slippery, or icy, or in high winds; falls were frequent.
The only major post war innovation has been the use of bitumised under felt, fixed beneath the batons, and rather more regard for health and safety aspects. You could , perhaps, further contextualise this summary by getting hold of some general work on the history of the building trades as a whole.
Hope this helps.
Ken Harrison, N.Wales, UK.
I'm afraid it was "from the head", which, sadly means I know of no book-- at least , not on the roofing trade theme, which I assume is your concern; there are books to be found on the history of
the quarrying industry. IF these interest you I could dig out some references, but its rather oblique with regard to slating as such. And 'no', slate has not been my life, but many years ago when at one of life's "loose ends" I filled in time working with a jobbing slater, and up on a roof all day they TALK! As it happened, a lot of the work involved replacing roofs on old buildings, and the operation
of stripping off C19th, C18th, and even C17th slate roofs became for me an exercise in archeology, to the constant irritation of my workmates! I found things I couldn't understand, and being of a curious disposition, had to seek out retired ancient slaters for the answers. It was a relatively brief but very VIVID experience,(fear of falling being not the least of it!).
The rest comes from moving to this, formerly major slate producing area, over twenty years ago. The whole landscape is shaped and scarred by that industry; the village streets back then were lined with old men standing by their front doors, hardly able to move, their lungs full of quarry dust.Now they are all dead, and most, but not all, of the quarries shut down. But not before I'd had many a long conversation with those old men, one or two of whom had started "on the slate" as young boys back in the 1890s. So that's where the information came from.
I cannot walk or run very far from my door without reaching a quarry edge, or falling into the shadow of a slate face, or tripping over the half buried sleepers of an old slate shifting railway; so although it is far from having been my life, I guess a lot of my life has been lived in the ghost of its past.
Ken.
If I can help further, please say.
Yes tubby (1 inch?) little galvanised grey nails with large round but very flat heads. Now I know a little of the nature of your project an afterthought struck:
Your GGGfather, on his way up the ladder (as it were) from labourer to slater, would have acquired patches on the thigh front of his trouser legs. This is because, if you need to quickly "hole" or cut or shape a slate , ( to fit round a window say,) and don't want to have go to ground, a common method is thus:
Mark with a nail or hammer point where the hole is to go, lay that part of the slate flat on the fleshy part of the thigh, holding the other end very firmly, then punch the hole with a sharp blow from the pointed side of the slate hammer. Spookily, the slate itself and the softness of the muscle seem to soak up the momentum, so that while you may get a reddish dent in your leg, and after a few attempts some holes in your pants (hence the patches), there is no pain or damage inflicted.
It CAN be done with a nail if you don't have a "spike hammer", as they were called, but not quite so easily. The sponginess of the leg is essential to the process; if you rest a slate on a rigid batten or rafter and try do hammer a nail through to make a hole, chances are it will just split or flake.
To cut a slate using this method ( I figured you might want to try this on one of your slates, since its something old John would've done hundreds of times,- but insure your leg first, or lay a piece of flannel over it), scribe a line, so as for instance to shorten it by two inches or so, then "perforate" along the "waste" side of that line, using the above technique; when you have a "dotted line", you can either tap out the remaining pieces by the same method, or just snap off the waste over an edge with the hammer. This leaves you with a rough serrated edge along the waste side of the scribed line; this you can carefully tap back to flat, hitting the slate END ON, with the regular head of the hammer.
Thought this might be a way for you to "work on" a slate in a traditional fashion as well as drawing on it???
And finally, there was a fascinating custom of slate drawing in the culture of the quarrymen, there were traditional geometrical patterns, star maps and so forth, and learning these was part of their "secret" initiation. But this is only indirectly related to the experience of a roofing slater, whose writing on slate probably consisted of working out the wages of his men, and who had borrowed how much from whom; and I have found the inevitable occasional obscene verse scratched on the back of two hundred year old slates!!!
Anyway, good luck,....(and don't blame me!)
Ken.
Hello again, too
Short answer owing to duff hand-(pinched nerve). Slates could vary greatly in thickness, depending not least on the grain itself that it was split along. Sometimes they were smooth on both sides, especially the lighter, more modern machine finished item. But the typical roofing slate would be beveled on the upward facing edges, when one side was rough it would be used as the weather side; a smooth side always faced downwards, so as to nail evenly to the batten at the fixing end. Topsides on some heavy slates might be left very rough, giving a rugged, rustic kind of effect. As a rule of thumb, the thinner the more dressing, the smoother the slate.
Nail holes: say two and a half inches down from the top edge, one and a half in from the outside edge, with the slate what I believe you'd call "portrait" way up(?)
Let me know how it goes.
Ken
All Done By Slate Of Hand......
Big overlaps preferred - wind-driven rain can easily creep 6 or more inches up under a slate, especially with capillary action. Also much less chance of wind-lift. Landscape style not unknown, but pretty unusual.
Remember, when nails were a luxury most slates were fixed by a small (half a Cigarette diameter) wooden peg, into flimsy lath; so the weight of the slates above was the real retainer; no doubt this set the precedent. Nonetheless, I wouldn't want my roof coursed any other fashion, nails or no nails: welsh rain will get in anywhere it possibly can!
But the "verge" course, i.e. the bottom row, WAS usually landscape, and then completely covered by the next course; this for extra strength because the lower lap of the bottom slates projecting from the roof were unsupported.
P.s. I did notice while back someone give you a very suspect etymology for the slater's (s)axe, and also mention the"rip" without explaining its function or design. If these matter I can say more- but not now I'm 'fraid, backn'arm too sore.
Ken. (make holes from the top, so that if it flakes it will with luck do so only on the down-side)
At this point, the small slate and wood sculpture was complete, and I had written a short article for Family Tree magazine (FTM) regarding how I was using family research to generate art works. The exhibition was ready. I felt that I owed it to Ken to let him know how I had put his wit and wisdom to use and he responded by riffing off my story.
Bryan
How good to hear from you, I had wondered how the project was proceeding. I don't see FTM that often, and certainly not this one. To the article, I say Bravo. By which I mean rather more than it may seem. I respond completely to the 'enthrall' that weaves imagination and the sense of material experience together.-- (Knowing that some of mine lived in mews and kept and lived among horses, I have surprised a local stable girl by being found lurking in the dawn shadows to ask, "Please, can I sniff your horses and the straw BEFORE you muck out ?" and "Do you mind if I wrap myself in this horse blanket?". I sought out fields that some of my 'ag-labs' ploughed (Essex clay), and caked myself in it to see how skin felt as it dried on it, and how it felt to walk across the furrows with four or five pounds of the stuff on each boot. I filled a bag with it to bring home and weigh, to see how it altered as it got wet, how it would be to daub a wall with it......, and so on, with tailors, glovers, watermen, etc. )
Well done. And let's have MORE of it !
Ken Harrison N Wales UK
P.S.
Or the time, having considered that my grandmother, having been born and grown up in a Notting Hill Mews in the 1880s, would, as a toddler, have seen the sky as a rectangle, bounded by the four roof lines of the mews court, and the outside world as a rectangle of street, glimpsed through the entrance archway, coaches passing as if on a large t.v. screen, almost? – I went there--the exteriors are the same, the cobbles are original, but the formerly slum flats over the stables are now each one and two million pound properties, the stables are home to ad agencies and pr consultants. I spotted an original drain grating in the cobbles. Clearly, when my granny and her siblings played among the horse muck, they'd've poked sticks down that drain, wouldn't they ? So I did, sitting on my haunches on the cobbles. Then, to see how the sky would've looked to a three year old in 1881, I lay on my back in the yard. Anxious faces were seen at the windows (you must understand I am a bald , wildly grey-bearded, old fellow, in decidedly 'country clothes'.) Murmurs of 'private courtyard.... security guards...... no right to be here...." This last amused me greatly, since my family were in that mews from 1857 (second tenant after it was built) till about 1927, and in the 1890s occupied pretty well all the buildings over the stables, and had three of the stables too. My parting shot was to tell a very snooty young lady that where her desk now stood my had been the truckle bed where my great great grandmother had died in 1881....... of TYPHUS.......
Ken
Sadly, this was the last I heard from Ken. I sent Christmas greetings but didn’t hear back. Perhaps one of Ken's relatives will stumble across this archive and contact me.
