Comments on: What Is It? Game 57

By: Alex

Alex — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 22:57:28 +0000

The funniest set of guesses, EVAR! You guys are awesome

Congrats to ad, who got it right first: it’s a banker’s hammer to mark canceled checks.

By: Bernard

Bernard — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 13:59:57 +0000

This is a hammer for marking trees to be logged. Still used now, but flashes with a hatchet or paint marks are increasingly used.

By: Randall

Randall — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 12:52:41 +0000

David Larsen, I have a cousin David in Florida, is that you?

By: tripleX

tripleX — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 11:57:50 +0000

You can make patterns on leather by hitting on the other end.

By: Alannah

Alannah — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 06:04:25 +0000

It’s a butting tool for making wooden cross pieces.

By: Carl

Carl — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 01:36:43 +0000

I bet it’s to set the spaces between lines of type in old printing presses. Kerning and leading. Just a guess. (probably won’t be checking the thread to see how wrong I am, though…lol)

By: Moshe

Moshe — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 00:12:11 +0000

Hammering out pieces of a fence.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

By: Knife Knut

Knife Knut — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 22:15:06 +0000

I think it may be a stonemason tool to mark out an area.

By: leeloodallasmultipass

leeloodallasmultipass — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 20:54:53 +0000

It’s a finish carpenter’s hammer to mark the wood and then use chisels to remove the excess wood.

By: Greenmantle

Greenmantle — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 19:16:01 +0000

It’s a swage or hot set, used for dressing a forge welded crosspiece. It is not a hammer, but is struck with a sledge or hammer. The forge welded crosspiece is placed under the X, and the other side of the swage is struck with a hammer. This shapes and “cleans up” the crossed bar appearance.

By: Christophe

Christophe — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 19:15:23 +0000

I’ve no clue but LOL @ empty-minded’s guess

By: bademailname

bademailname — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 18:50:10 +0000

It was clear to me the very moment I ran across the picture:

It’s the meanest cookie cutter ever.

By: empty-minded

empty-minded — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 18:42:15 +0000

@ Howard: You rock, man.

By: Ryan H

Ryan H — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 18:37:12 +0000

The initial way Charles Xavier accepted mutants into the X-men.

By: yaker

yaker — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 17:48:14 +0000

It was used for Indian women’s forehead caste-marking (“tika”), until they noticed the population drop off from using this device, when the modern vewrmillion dot was employed.

By: Alasdair

Alasdair — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 17:34:00 +0000

Easy. You super-heat metal until it’s liquid, then you press the hammer-thingy into the liquid metal, and voila! A screw driver!

By: mark

mark — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 16:54:41 +0000

Lumber/log marking hammer as Cin city Paul says, though i’m not sure about the payment part. I think it has to do with the quality of the lumber rather than the ownership.

By: Ali S.

Ali S. — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 16:52:42 +0000

It my professors “X” (wrong answer) marker. He first dips it in sheeps blood and then invoking the powers of the Gods he then slams it down with such force on my papers that I feel the vibrations from the other side of the campus.

By: anon

anon — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 15:20:03 +0000

Branding iron

By: Howard

Howard — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 14:45:44 +0000

The very first Home Pregnancy Test. The other side has a minus sign.

By: Randall

Randall — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 14:42:52 +0000

Its not a hammer at all. This is a Frengle bitsetter for use in the delicate art of goat crossfertilization. I can only explain its use as ‘coercive nudging.’

Goats are complex animals.

By: DrJones

DrJones — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 14:42:32 +0000

A simpler version of the boredom killer “maze pens.”

By: Mad Wet Squirrel

Mad Wet Squirrel — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 14:24:12 +0000

Three Words:

Tic Tac PWNED!!

By: Joe H

Joe H — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 13:48:16 +0000

It’s a screwdriver for very large screws.

By: Lemons

Lemons — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 13:36:04 +0000

It’s used to mark those little crosses on communion wafers.

By: dan

dan — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 13:27:57 +0000

extreme tic tac toe

By: T UPTO

T UPTO — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 13:11:06 +0000

it’s a fancy meat tenderizer.

By: oshean

oshean — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 13:05:59 +0000

When used this hammer perforates a check indicating that it has been paid by the drawee bank and cannot be renegotiated. It’s a canceled check stamp otherwise known as a bankers check canceling hammer.

By: pridesax

pridesax — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:55:59 +0000

it’s the early x-box shaper prototype

By: ad

ad — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:48:38 +0000

it is for bankers checks to be cancelled

By: Daveness

Daveness — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:38:50 +0000

It’s a hammer for marking trees. The mark indicates that the tree is owned by someone, and sometimes it means the tree is to be felled.

By: wil9000

wil9000 — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:38:21 +0000

For those of you old enough to remember Old School Sesame Street, it’s the thing that “Cowboy X” used in the cartoon of the same name, marking everything in town, until a young boy asked him to stop. Then he said “From now on, I’ll be known as cowboy O”, and marked everything with an O. The punchline, which sticks with me is:

So the people of the town lived happily ever after….
because they really weren’t very smart.

By: kc

kc — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:32:33 +0000

Leather tooling?

By: Ellen

Ellen — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:30:13 +0000

It’s a shoe branding hammer

By: Jenny, Bloggess

Jenny, Bloggess — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:25:29 +0000

Two words:

Crucifiction pancakes.

By: Nestor

Nestor — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:47:45 +0000

Uh! The mighty wafflemaker!

By: Jerse

Jerse — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:41:48 +0000

THAR BE ME TREASURE! (thwomp)

By: Paul in Cin City

Paul in Cin City — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:38:44 +0000

It’s a lumber marking hammer. Struck into the end of a log it ensures that the proper people get paid for the wood. I have an antique one that is the letter D for the last name of my family.

By: Jerse

Jerse — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:34:54 +0000

It’s the tool that pirates use to mark where their treasure is buried on maps…

By: empty-minded

empty-minded — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:23:40 +0000

Thor joins the X-Men!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

By: Oomi

Oomi — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:17:01 +0000

Something a shoemaker would use perhaps.

It’s a little known fact that Bedrock was located in Florida and that’s Fred Flintstone’s voting hammer. No hanging chad-rocks.

By: bean

bean — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:09:57 +0000

It’s the lesser-known Philip’s head sledgehammer.

By: Shadowfirebird

Shadowfirebird — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:04:34 +0000

Device for marking a pat of butter?

By: Miss Cellania

Miss Cellania — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 10:59:20 +0000

As an instrument of torture, that would leave a mark!

By: sparge

sparge — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 10:59:07 +0000

It is used to mark where the treasure is, silly!

By: David Larsen

David Larsen — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 10:54:53 +0000

I have several of those. I use them to crush the living shit out of the kids who won’t stay off my lawn.

By: dede

dede — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 10:33:51 +0000

Van Hellsings first cross weapon against Vlad Dracul… which failed… but still a nice kittchen tool for extraordinary cookies… of course with a lot of garlic flavor… ( this was his second weapon hehe )

By: Jacky

Jacky — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 10:26:13 +0000

It is used by cowboys to brand their cattle

By: Jeremy

Jeremy — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 10:13:52 +0000

It’s used for extreme games of tic-tac-toe.

By: Mindpimp

Mindpimp — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 09:51:07 +0000

Having waded through little Timmy’s exam paper for over an hour and failed to find /any/ correct answers, Mrs Williams reached for the correct-o-tron 2000 and decided to save herself time by just marking him as wrong.