Marshall Scheetz has been coopering since 2002 and has completed a six-year apprenticeship under a traditionally-trained master cooper. Scheetz practices tight, dry, and white coopering and creates accurate reproductions of period cooperage including hogsheads, barrels, firkins, butter churns, tubs, piggins, and other coopered containers.
Scheetz is also an historian and has researched and documented known coopers from the 18th and 19th centuries as well as the culture surrounding the economy and life of the cooper’s trade. Scheetz has collaborated with researchers, archaeologists, curators, and tradesmen to further their understanding about the art and science of coopering and coopered containers throughout the years.
Buckets were traditionally used for hauling water from the well, collecting milk from the cow, or carrying feed for the livestock. Sailors used them for water to swab the deck and to hold tar for the ropes. Miners used them to haul ore. Full of liquid, buckets can weigh close to 25 pounds.
I'm currently working on a parcel of gunpowder casks (barrels, half-barrels, quarter-barrels) for Fort Loundoun State Park. The British often used these sizes of powder cask for the defence of the colonies and for gifting powder to the Cherokee and Catawba indians.
Copy and photos supplied by Marshall Scheetz. More of Marshall's work and ordering information can be found at Jamestown Cooperage.
