galamander

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Jump to navigation Jump to search

English[edit]

WOTD – 15 March 2024

Etymology[edit]

The Robertson Quarry Galamander in Franklin, Maine, U.S.A.

Unknown; said to have been coined by an American blacksmith Elder Littlefield,[1] and possibly from galley (“type of boat”) + meander (“to turn or wind in a course or passage”).[2]

Pronunciation[edit]

Noun[edit]

galamander (plural galamanders)

  1. (Maine, mining, historical) A customized horse- or ox-drawn stoneboat or wagon once used for hauling stone from quarries, with smaller front wheels and larger rear ones, and a derrick to lift blocks of stone on and off the vehicle.
    • 1939 July 10, “Odd items from everywhere”, in The Boston Globe, volume CXXXVI, number 10, Boston, Mass.: The Globe Newspaper Co., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 16, column 2:
      Down at Vinalhaven, Me., which has just been celebrating its sesquicentennial, they used to use what they called a "galamander" to carry heavy stones from the granite quarries. The "galamander" is a combination stone-boat on wheels and a derrick.
    • 1956 August 12, Esther E[lizabeth] Wood, “Granite quarries brought prosperity to Maine coastal areas”, in Portland Sunday Telegram and Sunday Press Herald, volume 70, number 13, Portland, Me.: Guy Gannett Publishing Co., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 47, column 4:
      Galamanders, drawn by oxen or horses, transported the blocks to the cutting sheds, which were usually located near the wharfs. Galamanders were elongated four-wheeled wagons equipped with derricks and the wheels of these locally made wagons were eight or nine feet in diameter. Maine galamanders are few today.
    • 1979 May 17, Martha Durrance, “Galamanders: Restoring a forgotten tool”, in Kennebec Journal, Augusta, Me.: Jean Gannett Hawley, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 23, column 1:
      One hundred years ago, when Granite Hill was being mined, Peter Cain imagines a galamander was used to haul the stone blocks to the docks in Hallowell. The galamander – no one's quite sure where the name came from – was a cart-like contraption made of wood and wrought iron that could transport a block of granite weighing 20 tons. […] [T]here were two abandoned galamanders in the island's quarries at one time.
    • 1993, Elizabeth Richman, chapter 3, in Be Jubilant, My Heart! […], Nashville, Tenn.: Star Song Publishing Group, →ISBN, page 30:
      "I think so too. And this is a galamander. You know this is the Galamander District?" / "So that's a galamander. Why it's just a cart, and I thought a galamander was some kind of animal, you know like a salamander."
    • 1999, David A[rthur] Crossman, “Something Spooky”, in The Secret of the Missing Grave, Camden, Me.: Down East Books, →ISBN, page 104:
      A relic of the island's quarrying days, the galamander was a massive oak and iron wagon with nine-foot rear wheels. It had once been used to carry slabs of granite from the quarries to the cutting sheds. […] Since then, the galamander had been set up as a memorial to the industry―long since gone―and had doubled as a kind of jungle gym for generations of island kids.
    • 2009, Harry Gratwick, “Heavy Freight: When Vinalhaven Granite Traveled the Country”, in Penobscot Bay: People, Ports & Pastimes (American Chronicles), Charleston, S.C.: The History Press, published 2011, →ISBN, part V (Penobscot Bay and beyond):
      Until the use of railroad cars, teams of oxen and horses hauled stones, often in a special wagon equipped with a derrick or crane called a "galamander." […] It is reported that well into the twentieth century there were as many as six galamanders working in the Sands Quarry on Vinalhaven during an average day. Four teams of horses drew the largest galamander, named Jumbo. Today, a restored galamander sits on Vinalhaven's village green, a symbol of an era when granite was king.

Translations[edit]

customized horse- or ox-drawn stoneboat or wagon once used for hauling stone from quarries

References[edit]

  1. ^ Martha Durrance (1979 May 17) “Galamanders: Restoring a forgotten tool”, in Kennebec Journal, Augusta, Me.: Jean Gannett Hawley, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 23, column 1: “It [the name galamander] is said to have originated in Bodwell Quarry on Vinalhaven island, and was not commonly used on the mainland. A man known as Elder Littlefield, who worked for Bodwell as a blacksmith, is credited with thinking up the name, but the basis for the word is not apparent.”
  2. ^ The Maine History News, Lewiston, Me.: Maine League of Historical Societies and Museums, 1967, →OCLC: “The origin of the word Galamander has never been definitely established. It might be a contraction or distortion of some other word, and the words salamander, galley meander and others have been advanced in support of the theory.”

Further reading[edit]

Retrieved from "https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=galamander&oldid=78417303"