Woodworker’s Pocket Book

edited by Charles H. Hayward

“Woodworker’s Pocket Book” is small – just 4” x 6-1/2” – but it contains 112 pages of critical woodworking information for the hand-tool woodworker.

Edited by the great Charles H. Hayward and published in 1949, "Woodworker’s Pocket Book” is a guide to everything from finishing recipes to drawing ellipses to choosing the correct screw or nail. 

We own several versions of this book, as it was regularly updated and republished. After reading through all of the versions, we decided to reprint the original edition (with permission, of course). This edition is packed with drawings from Hayward and doesn’t deal much with the metric system, sharpening high-speed steel sawblades or pulley sizes for your machines. In other words, it’s for the woodworker who likes working by hand using fractions, inches and feet.

Also appealing to us is the small size of the book – it literally fits in your back pocket. We recommend keeping it in your tool chest or tool cabinet. It belongs in the shop and is more like a tool than a book.

To ensure the book’s long life, we made sure this book is designed for a shop environment. All our books’ signatures are sewn and taped for durability. We wrapped this one in high-density boards and picked a durable paper that improves on the original’s paper.

Like all our books, “Woodworker’s Pocket Book” is printed in the U.S.

Here is the complete index:

Angles, bisecting, 16
Appliances, 84
Arches, 21
Areas, 23
Beetle. wood boring, 63
Bits, 80
Bleaches, 3
Bolts, 34
Boring tools, 80
Castors, 37
Chemicals, list of, 7
Chippendale mouldings, 94 
Chisels, 78
Cramps, 83
Creams, furniture, 5
Dry rot, 64
Ellipse, drawing 12, 14 
Equivalents, mm. and inches, 51
Fibre boards, 87
Files, 77
Fillers, wood, 4
Fittings, 34
French polish recipes, 1 
Furniture creams, 5
Furniture sizes, 65
Gauges, 79
Geometry, useful, 12
Glass, 87
Glues, 38
Hammers, 78
Hardwoods, 57
Hepplewhite mouldings, 96 
Hexagon, drawing, 15
Hinges, 35, 36
Institutions, wood technology, 42
Jacobean mouldings, 92
Joints, 102
Laminated board, 50
Lathe data, 89
Limed oak, 5
Locks, 34
Lubricants, 6
Metal fittings, 34
Mitres, 24
Moisture content, 11
Monarchs, English and French, 91 
Mouldings, 92
Nails, 28
Octagon, drawing, 16, 17 
Oilstones, cleaning, 6
Old woodwork, 100
Period furniture, 90
Pests, wood, 63
Pitches, plane, 86
Plane pitches, 86
Planes, 71
Plastic boards, 87
Plywood and laminated board, 50 
Polishes, etc., 1
Quatrefoil, drawing, 21
Recipes, non-slip, 5
Recipes, wood finishing, 1 
Revivers, polish, 4
Routers, 77
Saws, 68
Scales, 108
Screwdrivers, 82
Screws, 31
Sharpening data, tool, 85 
Sheraton mouldings, 98
Sizes of furniture, 65
Softwoods, 56
Spokeshaves, 77
Squares, 79
Stains, 2
Stays, 37
Stoppings, 6
Strippers, 4
Strop dressings, tool 5
Tables, 41
Terms, timber, 46
Timber, how measured, 43 
Timber terms, 46
Timbers, list of, 56
Timbers, world map, 54
Tool sharpening data, 85
Tool strop dressings, 5
Tools, 68
Trefoil, drawing, 22
Walnut mouldings, 93
Wax polish recipes, I
Wood fillers, 4
Wood pests, 63
Woodwork, old, 100
Worm, wood, 63
Veneers, 52

About the Author

Charles H. Hayward (1898-1998) was the most important workshop writer and editor of the 20th century. Unlike any person before (and perhaps after) him, Hayward was a trained cabinetmaker and extraordinary illustrator, not to mention an excellent designer, writer, editor and photographer. As editor of The Woodworker magazine from 1939 to 1967, Hayward oversaw the transformation of the craft from one that was almost entirely hand-tool based to a time where machines were common, inexpensive and had displaced the handplanes, chisels and backsaws of Hayward’s training and youth.

At Lost Art Press, we spent almost eight years reprinting five volumes that make up just a small part of the information Hayward published in The Woodworker during his time as editor in chief. This includes “Honest Labour” and the first four volumes here.

You can learn about Hayward, as remembered by Robert Wearing, here.