EDN Columnist: August 3, 1995

The man had heard about a new technology: nails. They were small, pointed metal stakes that were driven into the wood to secure joints; neither dovetails nor drilling was necessary. The man felt he could save much time if he used nails, so he bought a keg of them.

As an experiment, he placed two boards together and considered how to drive a nail into them. He tried his mallet, which he used to drive dowels into their holes, but the mallet was made of wood, and the head of the nail chewed great holes in the face of the mallet. As the man pondered this problem, a friend approached him.

"What are you doing?" the friend asked.

"I am building a house using nails," the man replied, not without a little pride. "But I do not know how to drive in the nails," he admitted. "The head of my mallet is too soft."

The friend said, "You need a hammer. The head of a hammer is made of steel. You are fortunate, for I am an expert with hammers, skilled and experienced in their use. I shall buy you one and teach you how to use it."

"If it will help me build my house with nails, please do so," responded the man. The friend left, returning the next morning with not one, but seven hammers. He laid them out on a piece of canvas and said, "These are hammers."

"Why have you bought so many?" the man asked.

His friend smiled. "You have a large job. You will need different types of hammers. I like to say 'the right tool for the job.' Let me explain their use." Pointing to the first hammer he said, "This is a standard claw hammer. You will use it most. The claw is used to pull out nails after they have been pounded in." Pointing to the next hammer, he continued, "This is a framing hammer. It is heavier than the standard hammer and is used to drive the larger nails used for framing."

"I bought only one size of nails," the man said.

"We will take care of that," his friend responded, and continued, pointing to the next hammer. "This is a 2-lb hammer. You will use it with the very large nails in your ceiling beams. And this is a roofer's hammer. With this you will put shingles on your roof."

"My house will have a tile roof."

"No matter," said the friend, frowning at the interruption. "This is a finishing hammer. You will use it to set the windows and mount your cabinets. This is a ball-peen hammer. It has a lighter head and a rounded knob at the other end. Finally, this is a tack hammer. It is used to pound in tacks, which are very small nails."

The man bit his lip. "Thank you for all these hammers. I hope I will need them. But now I would like to start building my house. Can you teach me how to do this with a hammer?"

"Yes, of course." The friend picked up the claw hammer and swung it from side to side. After a moment he said, "This hammer is out of balance. I shall need to return it and buy you another one."

"Will it take long?" the man asked. But his friend had not heard him, for he was deep in thought. After a moment, his face brightened. "Better yet, I shall return tomorrow and shall balance the hammer myself."

When his friend was gone, the man picked up the claw hammer in his right hand, held a nail vertically on a piece of wood with his left, and swung the hammer at the head of the nail. He missed and smashed his thumb. When he had finished dancing around, he sat down, nursed his thumb, and said to himself, "Perhaps the hammer is out of balance. Or perhaps using a hammer requires greater skill and experience than driving a dowel with a mallet."

The next morning, the man's friend returned with three metal files, two wood files, and two rasps. With great enthusiasm, his friend, apparently an expert with files as well, skilled and wise as to their use, explained the purpose of each. The man listened patiently. Then, using one of the files, the friend started to balance the claw hammer.

To bide his time, the man picked up a stone in his left hand and a nail in his right and attempted to drive the nail into a board with the stone. This time, he smashed his right thumb. While he was dancing around, his friend smiled at him and said, "Now you understand the importance of using the right tool."

Balancing the hammers took the rest of the day. As the sun was setting, his friend said, "The hammers are now ready. In the morning, I shall return and teach you how to use them."

"I hope so," the man said. The friend had already departed and missed the sarcasm in the man's voice.

The friend arrived early the next morning. The man handed him the now-balanced claw hammer and said, "Please teach me to use this. I would like to start building my house." But instead of accepting the hammer, his friend took a flyer from his back pocket and handed it to the man. "Read this. It describes a power hammer, one that will drive many nails a minute—and all types of nails, as well. You can use it in place of all these hammers. It will allow you to finish your house in far less time. Hammer technology moves quickly."

The man took a deep breath. "I have a house to build," he said. "Using dowels, I would have now been done with the frame. Instead, nothing has been started. You seem interested only in hammers. I am interested in building my house. I would like to start now."

The friend said, "I am sorry preparing these hammers has taken so long. If you purchase the power hammer, you will still finish your house long before you would have using dowels or these hammers. I promise."

The man was torn, but, after some thought and with some misgivings, he decided he would once more trust his friend—although not completely. "Buy it," he said, "but do not alter it. If the power hammer does not work, you shall return it. Agreed?"

"Agreed. I shall order the hammer tonight," replied the friend, happily, and left. A week later, the friend was back with the power hammer. With great ceremony, he filled the hammer with framing nails, plugged it in, and flipped the on switch. The power hammer went berserk, spewing nails indiscriminately. The man dived for cover and was unhurt, but his friend was not so lucky. In all, he took nine nails in various parts of his body. The man, seeing his friend go down, had risked his own life by leaving his shelter and pulling the cord from the power outlet. The power hammer died.

The man rushed his friend to the hospital, where he was immediately taken into surgery. After several hours, the surgeon emerged. The wounds, the surgeon said, were not fatal, but there would be a long recovery period.

The man visited his friend often, first in the hospital, and then at the friend's home. The man talked of many things, but he did not talk about hammers or about his house. His friend avoided these subjects as well. When he wasn't visiting his friend, the man worked on his house. He sawed dovetails, drilled holes, and secured the joints with dowels, pounding them in with his mallet.

Two months after the accident, his house completed, the man was sawing wood for his wood stove. He crosscut each log into sections, and then cut each section in the direction of the grain numerous times into individual pieces appropriate for his stove. It was hard work, and he had much wood to cut to get ready for the coming winter.

"You have a beautiful house. It is well made."

The man turned to find his friend standing behind him. This was the first time his friend had ventured out since the accident. The man put down his saw and greeted his friend warmly.

"But you did not use nails," continued the friend.

"No," agreed the man. "I did not use nails."

After an awkward pause, his friend changed the subject by asking, "What are you doing?"

"I am sawing wood," the man answered. "We will have a long, cold winter, and I will need much wood. I will saw wood for you as well."

The friend looked at the many log sections that needed to be further cut into stove-sized pieces. "There is a type of hammer called a sledgehammer," he said. "With it and some wedges, you can split these log sections, rather than saw them. Using a sledgehammer and wedges would save you much time and energy."

Sadly, feeling justified, the man invited his friend to leave.