oakum boat: meaning

Subject: oakum boat: meaning
From: Roberto
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 07:55 AM

In John Jacob Niles's Edward, there is this verse:

My foot I will place on an old oakum boat
And sail me across the sea

What does "oakum boat" mean?

Thank you. R

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Emma B
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 07:59 AM

oakum or okum
: loosely twisted hemp or jute fiber impregnated with tar or a tar derivative and used in caulking seams and packing joints

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Emma B
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 08:13 AM

Oakum. Caulking material made from rope junk, old rope, and rope scraps; it was unwound, picked apart, and the fibers were rolled and soaked in pitch before being driven into the planking seams.

This was a slow and tedious process and was often carried out as the following extract shows -

"From 1882 all workhouses were given a list of tasks that inmates were supposed to undertake.

These included among other things crushing stone and oakum picking (unravelling lengths of rope).

Stones were crushed by pounding with a long heavy bar of iron about four feet long (1.2 metres). The stones had to be broken into small enough pieces to pass through the metal grille in the window shown in this drawing.

Oakum picking was commonly done by small children, and the very old. Both tasks left the hands covered in blisters and bleeding.

The notice below set out the strict rules for "casual paupers", who were people without jobs staying for a short period in the workhouse.
Cwt. - short for hundredweight, a weight equal to 50.8 kilograms.
Pounds - one pound is about 0.45 kilograms."



"As regards Males, for each entire day of detention -
The breaking of seven cwt. of Stones..
or The picking of four pounds of unbeaten or eight pounds of beaten Oakum;
or Nine hours' work in digging or pumping, or cutting wood, or grinding corn.

As regards Females, for each entire day of detention -
The picking of two pounds of unbeaten or four pounds of beaten Oakum;"

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 08:16 AM

Sailors used to 'dismantle' old ropes into strands which as Emma says were then forced or 'caulked' into the joins between the boat's planking. This was done with a long mallet and a 'caulking iron' which is like a bolster chisel with a flattened end, they were then topped off with tar or pitch. You may run into the term 'Picking Oakum' which is what the stripping down of the old worn ropes into fibres was called. It was either a leisure time pursuit, or in some cases a punishment.
Giok

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 08:17 AM

Sorry second post from Emma arrived while I was posting.

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Roberto
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 08:17 AM

Thank you, Emma. It is a tarred boat, right? R

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 08:18 AM

No it's a wooden boat and the tarred strands are packed into the seams to keep it watertight. It's a bloody tedious job, I should know!
Giok

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Emma B
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 08:27 AM

CAULKING - Material used to seal the seams in a wooden vessel, making it watertight.

Forcing material such as oakum into the seams of planks on a deck or a boats sides to make them watertight.

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: kendall
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 09:08 AM

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. This is probably poetic license.

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Mr Happy
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 09:10 AM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oakum

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Emma B
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 09:22 AM

Can't quite work out what Freud has to do with this but sorry if that gives you much more information than you ever needed (or wanted) to know Roberto.
Good luck with the ballad

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 11:10 AM

I hate to quibble with the post which founded the thread, but I'd bet heavy money that's an "oaken boat", not "oakum".

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Emma B
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 11:27 AM

Well Roberto does quote it as the John Jacob Niles version of the ballad and therefore likely to have been "retouched" a little. More "traditional" versions refer to a "bottomless" boat.

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: GUEST, Topsie
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 11:42 AM

My first thought was that it might be 'oaken', but the Shorter Oxford Dictionary agrees with the other suggestions about caulked threads.

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Roberto
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 11:42 AM

I've just checked, Dave (it would have been a pity, after this rich debate): yes, it is oakum. R

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: EBarnacle
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 12:02 PM

I agree with Topsie. The original was probably oaken rather than oakum.
The folk process can get going very quickly. See recent discussions of the Mary L. Mackay and Fiddler's Green for examples. Consider that Creighton recorded the "official" version of Mary L. Mackay fairly shortly after the song was written and that it appears that most people cannot seem to understand that Connoly wrote "in" rather than "on Fiddler's Green" to mean in heaven rather than on heaven.

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Emma B
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 12:07 PM

bearing in mind that the older versions refer to a "bottomless" boat - i.e. the murdering brother is punishing himself by drowning - perhaps it's more likely meant to be an "open" boat - just a thought!

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Barry Finn
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 12:55 PM

I'd agree with it being a boat made of oak, very prized spieces for boat building. An open boat is not likely to "sail me across the sea". Oakum is still used on many wooden boats but it wouldn't cause a vessel to be called an "oakum boat". You might as well call a boat a "ballast boat" because is holds ballast. I think not.

Barry

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Amos
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 01:07 PM

Im amy case there is no such animal as an oakum boat. I'd vote with an alteration of "oaken" by typographical error or perhaps Nile's ignorance of terminology.

A

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Darowyn
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 06:54 PM

An open boat is a phrase that describes an undecked boat- like a rowing boat.
The Vikings did some pretty respectable ocean crossings in open boats. So did the Phoenicians etc.etc.
In more recent times, Captain Bligh, Shackleton etc. both crossed some of the harshest waters on the planet in open boats.
So an open boat would be quite capable of "sailing me across the sea".
Cheers
Dave

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Amos
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 07:35 PM

Well of course, an open boat would fit the concept -- but the probability of slipping from "oaken" to "oakum" is a lot higher than slipping from "open" to "oakum" because of the greater difference in phonemes and letters. Besides, even an eejjit knows what an open boat is so it is less likely to have been misunderstood in the original.

A

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: EBarnacle
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 07:51 PM

Open boat is certainly a legitimate possibility as the original.

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 17 Dec 06 - 11:41 PM

Just say IDJET - Unkle!

PRETEND - It to be whatever you want yourself to believe - just do not go teaching it as fact to others.

The devil to pay; between the devil and the deep blue sea

In the large wooden sailing ships of yore, large beams running down both sides of a ship, supporting the thwarts on which the main deck was laid, were called "the Devil(s)." "Paying" is the task of caulking and pitching seams. Since the devil was outside the guardrails, it was dangerous work because it was unlikely that one would be rescued if one fell overboard (too long to turn the ship around and they were mostly pressed men, anyway!). The task of "Paying the Devil" was assigned to Men Under Punishment; hence, the expression, "I've got the Devil to Pay." If one were really in trouble, one was assigned the task of paying the seam between the devil and the ship's side. This was particularly difficult since one was slung in a bos'n's chair, caulking with oakum (rotten lengths of fibre rope) which rained hemp fibre into one's eyes, then pitching against gravity with hot pitch which splattered all over one's body, burning exposed skin--all the while having to contend with the rolling of the ship. If you were given this task, during its execution you were, "Between the devil and the deep blue sea" - stuck between two most unpleasant options.

http://www.rootsweb.com/~genepool/meanings.htm

Walking a treadwheel or picking oakum (separating strands of rope) were the most common forms of hard labour. Oscar Wilde, sentenced for buggery, (nasty British practice picked up from the Arabs) picked oakum, it broke him and he died two years after writing Ballad of Reading Gaol as an alcoholic in France.

The trial of Ernest Jones together with five other prominent Chartists took place in July, 1848. He was sentenced to two years in prison for making what was termed a seditious speech which he agreed was accurately reported. For 19 months he was neither allowed pen, ink, nor paper, but confined in a small cell, 13 feet by 6, in utter solitude, varied only by a solitary walk in a high-walled prison yard. He obeyed all the prison regulations in a most exemplary manner, excepting one, that as to picking oakum he picked up feathers in the yard, cut them with his weekly razor and used his own blood for ink.

COLOR OF HIS HAIR - by Houseman

Oh who is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his wrists?
And what has he been after, that they groan and shake their fists?
And wherefore is he wearing such a conscience-stricken air?
Oh they�re taking him to prison for the colour of his hair.

'Tis a shame to human nature, such a head of hair as his;
In the good old time 'twas hanging for the colour that it is;
Though hanging isn't bad enough and flaying would be fair
For the nameless and abominable colour of his hair.

Oh a deal of pains he's taken and a pretty price he's paid
To hide his poll or dye it of a mentionable shade;
But they've pulled the beggar's hat off for the world to see and stare,
And they�re taking him to justice for the colour of his hair.

Now 'tis oakum for his fingers and the treadmill for his feet,
And the quarry-gang on portland in the cold and in the heat,
And between his spells of labour in the time he has to spare
He can curse the god that made him for the colour of his hair.

        -- A. E. Houseman 1896

The Politics of Irish Literature
From Thomas Davis to W.B. Yeats
by Malcolm Brown
Chapter Twelve
O'Leary and the Irish People
So O'Leary gave up the Bohemian life of a journalist and litterateur to pick oakum in Pentonville prison, from which he later graduated to rock-breaking at ...

http://www.astonisher.com/archives/mjb/irishlit/irishlit_ch12.html

The daily routine was designed to be dull and repetitive to remind inmates of their situation and discourage other paupers from entering the workhouse. In the same way, the work which filled the day was made hard and disagreeable. The Poor Law Board recommended tasks such as stone-breaking, oakum-picking, sack-making, corn-grinding, laundry work and gardening.

http://www.institutions.org.uk/poor_law_unions/workhouse_life.htm

DIARY IN AMERICA

Maria Brandon, charged with petty larceny. Guilty. Sentenced to pick oakum for six months.

http://www.athelstane.co.uk/marryat/diaramer/diary/diary45.htm

Sincerely, Your Loving Nephew,

GARGOYLE

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Barry Finn
Date: 18 Dec 06 - 12:45 AM

The probability of wanting to ship the seas (play on words) in an open boat would be about the same as Amos's probability above.

Working hot pitch (coal tar pitch) into a hor. seam is pretty dam near impossible. Into a vert seam it's just a matter of pouring, let it cool a bit into the oakum & then the use an iron. Into a hor seam the pitch has to cool down to a pliable form before putting it into the seam. The trouble with working pitch is not so much the heat, espically if working around a water source but the sulfur fumes it gives off. I used to work a lot with hot coal tar pitch & hot asphalt & my hands became very tough to the burns until all I needed to do was spit on them (or use gloves) & peal the pitch off (hot tar was a different story). It was the face & eyes & behing the ears that took the beating from the sulfur. Pitch doesn't need to be heated as much tar to be workable in both a pourable & flowing state & it's very pliable & workable in a warm & even cool state, it has a much lower boiling point (we'd heat asphalt to 525 degrees & pitch to 415 by the time we got to use it it was around 300 & still a liquid). The oakum is used only as a type of backer rod so the pitch won't be lost leaking out completely through the seam. The same way a plumber uses oakum in a drain or pipe connection, the oakum gets forced tightly into the space at the connection between the metal joints then the lead (or pitch) gets poured or forced into place while soft & pounded with an iron until it forms a water tight joint after cooling.

Barry

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Paul Burke
Date: 18 Dec 06 - 04:12 AM

The point is that Edward is expiating a crime. By putting to sea in an inadequate boat, he is putting his survival in the hands of the gods- letting fate decide whether his offence is worthy of death.

So "open" makes far more penitential sense than the safe "oaken" or seaworthy "oakum" options.

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Scrump
Date: 18 Dec 06 - 05:10 AM

I agree with Barry Finn who said: Oakum is still used on many wooden boats but it wouldn't cause a vessel to be called an "oakum boat".

If 'oakum boat' is indeed the correct lyric (which seems open to debate, see above) my understanding would be that the boat is carrying a cargo of oakum (if so, whether or not the boat is itself wooden, or caulked with oakum, etc., would be irrelevant).

So - did boats carry cargoes of oakum, and would this fit in with the rest of the song's lyrics? I don't know the song and haven't seen the lyrics (unless I missed them above) - can anyone post the here so we can all make a more informed judgment?

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Paul Burke
Date: 18 Dec 06 - 05:58 AM

Words of Edward

He kills his brother in a fight, and must do penance.

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Scrump
Date: 18 Dec 06 - 07:07 AM

Er... I couldn't find any mention of boats (oakum, oaken, open or otherwise) in the above lyrics. Or did I somehow miss it?

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Schantieman
Date: 18 Dec 06 - 07:23 AM

Oakum would never be carried as cargo - it was available in all sailing ships and ports from old and condemned rope.

Steve

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Emma B
Date: 18 Dec 06 - 07:32 AM

There are many versions of "Edward" - Motherwells MS, quoted by Childe, gives the verses

What death dost thou deserve to die
Son Davie, son Davie
What death dost thou desrve to die?
And the truth come tell to me.

I'll set my foot in a bottomless ship
Mother lady, mother lady
I'll set my foot in a bottomless ship
And ye'll never see mair of me

Many of the verses are shared with The Twa Brothers a longer ballad of fratricide of which Edward may be a detached fragment but as versions of Edward, in this shorter form, appear in other Northern European traditions this is open to dispute

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: GUEST,DonMeixner
Date: 18 Dec 06 - 09:04 AM

I'll go with allowing Niles some incredible poet license on this. Oakum was probably a very shippy, neat, and folksy word to his ears. I don't buy oaken unless you are specifically relating to its ribs. Oak is too heavy and too valuable to use as planking in small boats. And too unlikely a plank in large boats. (At least in US boats)
      
    I think open makes more sense for this song. Murder ballads tending to be allegorical in their retribution and all.

Open Boat = little or no boat at all, too open to the sea to be safe. A certain death/punishment by drowning

Don

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: EBarnacle
Date: 18 Dec 06 - 11:30 PM

As one who has rowed his whitehall boat on open waters, I would not say that it would be certain death but it would require a certain level of seamanship to stay on top of the water.

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Scrump
Date: 19 Dec 06 - 05:30 AM

Is the Banana Boat Song about a bota made out of bananas? :-)

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Scrump
Date: 19 Dec 06 - 05:31 AM

aghh! boat not bota! doh!

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: EBarnacle
Date: 19 Dec 06 - 10:32 AM

No, but the song makes it clear that the singer is carrying bananas aboard the banana boat in the port. Let's not be disingeuous.

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: GUEST,Jack Campin
Date: 19 Dec 06 - 01:12 PM

Oak was the *preferred* timber for naval ships in early-modern Britain. There was a lot of it available and it's very strong.

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Schantieman
Date: 20 Dec 06 - 04:01 AM

...That's very largely why lots of the New Forest isn't forest any more. The trees planted in the 11th century (and their offspring) would have been nicely mature for ship building in the 17th/18th and the yards at Buckler's Hard and elsewhere had a ready and local supply.

Steve

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Paul Burke
Date: 20 Dec 06 - 04:18 AM

There's another possibility: that Edward would "place his foot in an old OAKHAM boat". This would locate the tragedy in Rutland and date it between 1802 and 1846. Edward would leave via the Oakham canal (which operated between those dates- the boat being "old" would place it later in the period), and continue via the Wreake Navigation (1795-1877), and the Grand Union Canal via Loughborough (1776-date) then the Trent and the Humber, or via Watford Gap, Blisworth, Cow Roast, Rickmansworth, Brentford and the Thames, to reach the sea.

Apart from the Oakham to Syston stretch, the enthusiastic could recreate his journey today (stoppages permitting).

Subject: RE: oakum boat: meaning
From: Scrump
Date: 20 Dec 06 - 04:31 AM

I believe it would be possible to fashion a boat from oakum, providing it was sufficiently coated with tar to render it waterproof and give it rigidity. I doubt it would be as easy to make one from bananas though, partly because of the difficulty of filling the gaps between fruit of varying size and shape, and partly because of the risk of it going off.