The Cooper and His Trade

by Kenneth Kilby

A history of barrelmaking and the various types of coopers.

192 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1971

Reviews

[Enzo Kerr · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really interesting. The first half is sort of a crash course on coopering with some anecdotes from the author’s life thrown in and the second is a history of coopering. It jumps around a bit and can sometimes be a little hard to follow, but it’s entertaining enough that it never bothered me. Certainly worth a read if you have any interest in the cooper and his trade.

[Koen Crolla · Rating 4 out of 5]

Coopering is interesting because it remained relatively unadulterated by automation well into living memory—in fact, it's relative lack of susceptibility to industrialisation is why it ended up almost disappearing, wooden casks and other coopered items being replaced by metal and plastic ones that were capable of being mass-produced by machine.
Kilby, writing in 1971, provides a solid overview of the various kinds of coopering (as far as the English were concerned) and How It Was Done at his employer's, and incidentally demonstrates that you can be a skilled craftsman and still not know jack shit about the materials you're using.