Tapered like that, I would guess it's a cedar shake, or some kind of wood shake siding.
Oooooohhh someone made a butter churning joke. Haha
Is it Oak? I will guess it is since it sunk into the mud and is still around...probably some form of White Oak, since Red Oak rots.....As an old Timber Framer and Log cabin guy, boat builder, fast carpenter.....
A lot of times a guy simply takes a piece of wood, lets say he's making shingles, or splitting siding or flooring planks or making a square beam with a broadaxe......somesuch...Hell just about anything repetitive effort where things have to be somewhat precise... and instead of using a tape measure all the time to check measurements, he simply grabs a side board laying there and creates a fast 'Try Gage' by sawing a notch and splitting out the swarf..takes like about 15 seconds to make one....so a guy makes one as needed without even thinking about it...
Its nice if its straight, so a guy can use its back as a square even, its nice if its stout, so a guy could use it as a pry bar etc...all sorts of things a guy will use a certain stupid little piece of wood for on a jobsite!.
Even today, a guy has got to do a deck and do the railing and then screw on all the ballisters? Get them all nice and evenly spaced between the vertical supports? A fast right sized piece of wood like that is exactly what you use instead of measuring the entire layout and dinking around with a square and a pencil! So its fast, wont slip through the crack, you can put your foot on it to hold it in place etc....After you get done, you just toss it off into the woodpile or dumpster, on account of the next deck you do will have different dimensions and need just a bit of a tweaking to make it look right yet still fall into legal constraints....
All sorts of things a guy would use that for....to slide along a plank and scribe off the edge....measure length of a shingle blank saw cut......But it wouldnt be really important after the job was done, seeings how a guy would just make another at another site...
Lets say some old guy tells his Grandkid to cut a bunch of firewood to a certain length so it will fit in the stove? Well, back before power tools, when a guy had to saw things by hand, it was imperative to get it right the first time! so a fellow would hand the crosscut to the Kid and the Try Gage for the proper length!....This is super important if you are having to cut big hardwood logs by hand!...Go out and try to cut even a 12" diameter oak with a handsaw at 25" exact length to fill a specific order!! A guy certainly dont want to be long! And he dont want to be dicking around measuring with a tape all the livelong day either! So... a guy whips up a quick "Try Gage"...
Gonna say 'Try Gage'...It just happens to look like a paddle, with that taper...since it was split out of a blank....Or it could be nothing! hard to age and place a value on, ...Unless its made out of American Chestnut!
I think its a really cool find though! I'da picked it up! I'da sold it to somebody on Ebay for prob $50 as an 'Early Americana Measuring Device"! The square nail says its pretty old.... probably put there even as a scribe point for a certain long rip dimension demarcator...No Carpenters pencils or chalk lines around back then...
Depending on the interest and bids, I'd head right out and make myself a whole load of them! !!! I mean hey, $50 for 10 seconds work effort? Sure beats building a deck! or making wooden shingles, or Hickory hammer handles, or riving planks and beams, or cutting firewood! The square nail in it gives you a bit of a believable time frame pedigree....
Yeah..but cedar is very rot resistant..and it "looks" exactly like a cedar shake shingle...even had a nail.. generally..things are exactly as they appear... my 2 cents
I thought about this too Joe...Then I got to thinking before typing my reply, "The OP guy is from the SE USA"..figuring Jawja or the Carolinas..thats piss Oak Country and not so much Cedar...Maybe even Swamp Cypress? but again, who knows? A guy would have to feel the weight and have a close up look....A guy would certainly not ever make a butter churn component out of cedar!..Like damn! Everybody knows this! .
Is it Oak? I will guess it is since it sunk into the mud and is still around...probably some form of White Oak, since Red Oak rots.....As an old Timber Framer and Log cabin guy, boat builder, fast carpenter.....
A lot of times a guy simply takes a piece of wood, lets say he's making shingles, or splitting siding or flooring planks or making a square beam with a broadaxe......somesuch...Hell just about anything repetitive effort where things have to be somewhat precise... and instead of using a tape measure all the time to check measurements, he simply grabs a side board laying there and creates a fast 'Try Gage' by sawing a notch and splitting out the swarf..takes like about 15 seconds to make one....so a guy makes one as needed without even thinking about it...
Its nice if its straight, so a guy can use its back as a square even, its nice if its stout, so a guy could use it as a pry bar etc...all sorts of things a guy will use a certain stupid little piece of wood for on a jobsite!.
Even today, a guy has got to do a deck and do the railing and then screw on all the ballisters? Get them all nice and evenly spaced between the vertical supports? A fast right sized piece of wood like that is exactly what you use instead of measuring the entire layout and dinking around with a square and a pencil! So its fast, wont slip through the crack, you can put your foot on it to hold it in place etc....After you get done, you just toss it off into the woodpile or dumpster, on account of the next deck you do will have different dimensions and need just a bit of a tweaking to make it look right yet still fall into legal constraints....
All sorts of things a guy would use that for....to slide along a plank and scribe off the edge....measure length of a shingle blank saw cut......But it wouldnt be really important after the job was done, seeings how a guy would just make another at another site...
Lets say some old guy tells his Grandkid to cut a bunch of firewood to a certain length so it will fit in the stove? Well, back before power tools, when a guy had to saw things by hand, it was imperative to get it right the first time! so a fellow would hand the crosscut to the Kid and the Try Gage for the proper length!....This is super important if you are having to cut big hardwood logs by hand!...Go out and try to cut even a 12" diameter oak with a handsaw at 25" exact length to fill a specific order!! A guy certainly dont want to be long! And he dont want to be dicking around measuring with a tape all the livelong day either! So... a guy whips up a quick "Try Gage"...
Gonna say 'Try Gage'...It just happens to look like a paddle, with that taper...since it was split out of a blank....Or it could be nothing! hard to age and place a value on, ...Unless its made out of American Chestnut!
I think its a really cool find though! I'da picked it up! I'da sold it to somebody on Ebay for prob $50 as an 'Early Americana Measuring Device"! The square nail says its pretty old.... probably put there even as a scribe point for a certain long rip dimension demarcator...No Carpenters pencils or chalk lines around back then...
Depending on the interest and bids, I'd head right out and make myself a whole load of them! !!! I mean hey, $50 for 10 seconds work effort? Sure beats building a deck! or making wooden shingles, or Hickory hammer handles, or riving planks and beams, or cutting firewood! The square nail in it gives you a bit of a believable time frame pedigree....
I can't help with what that thing is, but maybe with what it isn't...based on living in an 1849 farmhouse.
Our wood shingles weren't nearly that long, maybe 12 inches or so, and they don't have the taper shown on this piece; they taper from bottom to top not side to side.
We don't have any clapboards with a rounded corner, and they all have more than one nail (or nailhole).
+1 like Charlies mom in that chocolate factory movie minus the slots.It could have been used to stir clothes in a large wash pot.
Marvin
https://www.ebay.com/itm/ANTIQUE-VINTAGE-24-DIA-X-14-DEEP-CAST-IRON-WASH-SCAULDING-POT-MARKED-5SF-/361929682698