Acorn Wood Cook Stove

Greetings I recently purchased a Acorn wood cook stove ,I am trying to find out the year it was made, any ideas?

Welcome Chris.

Nice find. R&S Acorn ranges are very rare.

Are you sure it's just for wood ? Can you post pictures inside the firebox showing the grates ?

Often stove makers used the year as part of the part number cast into the back side of parts. Might be the full year, or just the last two digits. If it's the year and not just a part number it'll be the same number showing up on different parts.

Check inside the doors, back side of the mantel, under the mantel shelf, under the cook top surface round covers and support plates, etc..

Paul

Hi Paul, Thank you for the welcome. Ok here are a few picture I have of the stove the oven grate witch is not pictured is cast and it has acorn on the front towards the oven door, the oven does have a hair line crack on the bottom and another on the top towards the eyes. I am planning on having the oven parts recast by Tomahawk foundry.

Chris, thanks for the pix.

Ummmm, you said wood stove. I hope your not disappointed, but you have a coal stove that can also burn wood.

Those are combo grates for wood and coal. And the cast iron plate closing off the front loading door is for when just using coal, which has to be loaded through the round covers on top. It could be removed to load wood in from the front without having to move cook pots off the round covers to refuel.

By the way, a range's "eyes" are not the holes the round covers fit into. The "eyes" are actually the two removable round cover support plates that are shaped like the capital letter "I". The other two support plates are called "tees" because they are shaped like the letter "T".... which aren't as much of a T shape on the Acorns as they are on other makes of ranges.

So, it looks like the number "20" appears at the end of those part numbers. That's how Glenwood labeled their parts, too. First the model name, then the part number, then the two digit year. So, that 20 is most likely the year, or within a few years after that, that your range was made. It was not uncommon to carry over the same part/year numbers for a few years of producing until the model changed.

Here's pix of the "claw" combo grates and firebox in the National Acorn my Melissa grew up learning to cook with. The claw grates would chew through and pull down any clinkers while they were still crumbly. Your grates will do similar. Or just leave the side with smallest openings up for burning wood.

Paul

Well I am learning more and more, so the year might be around 1920? I am sorry I thought you ment the oven grate for cooking the only picture I did not have. No I am not disappointed at all, actually I think the stove it very beautiful and looking forward to restoring it. My girlfriend is in love with it so...well...you know she had to have it. The gentleman I purchased it from said his parents used it right up to a few years ago and they purchased it used many years ago. Paul thank you for the very useful information and I will post some picture when I get done with the restoration. I paid $350.00 for two stoves the Acorn cook stove and a "Mountain Oak" Parlor stove witch needs to be restored but is still in good shape

Chris,

Outstanding deal ya ran into. Glad to see a couple old beauties getting put back doin what they do best. Lookin fwd. to some more pix if ya would. What area ya from C ? I promise, nobody's gonna steal ya, maybe your girlfriend, but not you!!

Chris, your welcome.

That's a great deal you got !!!!

When you get some time, a bunch of us have been contributing to this thread on "Cookin' With Coal". There's a lot of info on the many uses of a coal range. You and the girlfriend may find it interesting.

To go to the thread, click this blue link, Cookin' With Coal

And, tell your girl friend she's not along. Melissa bought my 1903 Glenwood Sunny range for me. As I said, she grew up cooking on that 1900 Acorn National. She fell in love with the Glenwood when we saw it at a stove shop picking up a new wood stove I had ordered. Now 12 years later and the wood stove is still in it's wrapper and the Glenwood gets used 9 months of the year on nut coal.

Paul

I would agree with what has already been said, great find. The only thing that brought up a question for me was the time frame it was made. By 1920, I thought they were making stoves less ornate. They were called "Modern" by being less ornate. I could be way off but I would guess that stove to be from earlier in the 1900's. What do you guys think?
Randy

Edit: I will look through some of my old catalogs to see if I can find any info on these

Photog200 wrote:I would agree with what has already been said, great find. The only thing that brought up a question for me was the time frame it was made. By 1920, I thought they were making stoves less ornate. They were called "Modern" by being less ornate. I could be way off but I would guess that stove to be from earlier in the 1900's. What do you guys think?
Randy

Edit: I will look through some of my old catalogs to see if I can find any info on these

I had the same thought that it was earlier.

Correct. Many ranges were a simpler "cleaner" style by the 20's.

R&S seems to have bucked that trend and held onto the earlier, more ornate styles. Compared to Glenwood and other brands that were moving toward less ornate styles, the Acorn range Melissa grew up with looks older than it is. It's only 3 years older than my Glenwood, but it looks like ranges 10-20 years older.

However, there are some design changes on this range that would go along with trends from the 10's and 20's that lead me to think that 1920 production date may not be so far off.

This range did away with the oven ventilator and control below the firebox, used on earlier models and replaced it with a front access ash pan which Glenwood and other makers moved to by the 1920's.

And I can't be sure, but it looks like Chris's Acorn either did away with, or simplified, the right front handle, elaborate oven damper linkage that Melissa's had and other early ranges like Wilson's Sunny had. Apparently those longer earlier linkages could have heat related problems (according to a Glenwood advertisement) so, simpler oven damper lever system where developed. And, it might have also been a production cost savings ?

Here's a picture of the elaborate push/pull oven damper handle and bar of Melissa's Acorn and the damper cam and axle that bar moved.

A look at more stove part numbers will help to confirm or deny that date.

Paul

Christopher wrote:Greetings I recently purchased a Acorn wood cook stove ,I am trying to find out the year it was made, any ideas?

Looks like a great find.

Unfortunately I do not have any Rathbone & Sard catalogs, only a 1854 Rathbone and Kennedy, Albany, NY catalog.

Randy

I found a very extensively illustrated, 150+ page R&S catalog online, but it's from 1890.

For all the R&S advertising that uses the slogan, "One million stoves sold", there's very few examples of R&S stoves that have survived,.. or literature about the later stoves.

However, I did find some pictures of later Acorn combo ranges and they look very much like their competition's ranges.

Melissa's Acorn uses the same parts labeling method as Glenwood and all the model and part numbers end in a space followed by "00" which is assumed to be like Glenwood uses for the year of production. Hopefully Chris will find more numbers on parts and report back if that "20" is on the tail end of each ?

Paul

Photog200 wrote:Unfortunately I do not have any Rathbone & Sard catalogs, only a 1854 Rathbone and Kennedy, Albany, NY catalog.

Randy

Likely the Predecessor? R&S was in the Albany/Troy area. Info I found on line says R&S didn't form until 1883. Although some say 1873

http://antiquestoves.net/dir/100-research/founders-foundries/65-rathbone-and-sard-acorn-stoves
http://hoxsie.org/2012/05/14/rathbone_sard_co_-_the_acorn_line/

BTW, that first link is who Melissa's Father sold their acorn to when he sold his house. I've contacted them a few times but have not been able to find out what ever happened to it.

Paul

Unfortunately, the catalog does not list the names of the owners. It just says the office was at 9&11 Green St. The foundry was on North Ferry St. I would not be surprised if this was the predecessor company judging by the info in the links you posted. It says that Mr. Sard joined in the company after my catalog was printed. If you want, I can post the catalog I have.

Randy