Nailer
Cliquez ici pour la version française
Le Cloutier | The Nailer
A nailer’s workshop and the variety of nails produced ("Cloutier grossier", drawing by unknown artist appearing in the Encyclopédie de Diderot, http://xn--encyclopdie-ibb.eu/).
The cloutier, or nailer/nailor, was a manufacturer and seller of nails. In New France, all nails were hand-wrought in a forge, made of wrought-iron. After heating a rod in a forge, the nailer would hammer the four sides of the softened end to form a point. The pointed end was then reheated and cut off to the desired length. Then the nailer would insert the hot nail into a hole in a nail header to form a head. The header could contain shapes of different sizes.
Many nails of different shapes and sizes were manufactured, depending on the intended usage. The nailer would manufacture nails for roofing, carts, carpentry, ships, as well as shoes for horses and oxen. He would also make other small metal parts, such as hooks and clamps.
The nailer wasn’t the only person to make nails, however. Other iron craftsmen such as the gunsmith, the edgetool maker and the blacksmith also produced nails.
Only six colonists exercised this occupation under the French Regime. By circa 1850, new instruments and machinery came about which could produce thousands of nails per day, thus eliminating the need to make them by hand. This marked the end of the nailer’s occupation as he knew it.
This occupation gave birth to a variety of family surnames: Naylor, Naylour and Nayler in English, and the common Cloutier or Clouthier in French.
Here’s a video demonstration on making nails by hand.
Known persons who had this occupation: Isaac Hervieux, François Martou, Jean Michelon, Pierre Pellerin dit Saint-Amant, Joseph Pillard, Antoine Vedet
Sources:
Pascale Girard, "Les métiers en Nouvelle-France", Semaine nationale de la Généalogie (2014); online article, Fédération québécoise des sociétés de généalogie (http://www.semainegenealogie.com/extra/articles/182-les-metiers-en-nouvelle-france).
Jeanne Pomerleau, Arts et métiers de nos ancêtres : 1650-1950 (Montréal, Québec: Guérin, 1994), 163-165.