Small, two-piece hand fluter consisting of a wire handled, convex rocker or presser with the product name cast in across the top side of its corrugated plate, and a matching, flat, rectangular, corrugated bed with "PAT'D / 1866" cast in its underside; no base. Rocker handle has S-curve or gooseneck sides individually attached to bases or sockets in the plate.
Maker is W. H. Howell Co. of Geneva, IL; Eben Danford and William H. Howell established the foundry in 1862 and Howell continued the business in 1866. Contemporary reference books cite Charles A. Sterling of New York, NY, who received U.S. Patent No. 57,403 for his "improvement in fluting-machines" on August 21, 1866, as the inventor of the "Geneva Hand Fluter". However, Illinois histories published in the 1870s credit Walter D. Turner (an employee or partner of Howell).
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