Old Saddle With Swastikas

[medic0011]

Hello all, first post here and I hope someone may be able to help me.

I have an old saddle that has 11 swastikas or "whirling logs" stamped or carved into the leather in various places. It has a high back and is very unusual. It has been in my family all of my life and nobody can really remember where it came from. It has been hanging in a barn for as long as me or my Mom can remember. One of my uncles seems to think that my Grandpa bought it with a horse in the early 60's. My Dad and I had plans to restore it numerous different times, but he fell into poor health and passed away about two years ago. I finally remembered it a couple of weeks ago and drug it out of the barn.

After cleaning all of the dirt and bird crap off of it, I have started to slowly work some oil into it. My wife has spent hours on google and other sites trying to find other examples or pictures of similar items. She has kind of hit a brick wall and we really can't find anymore information or picures of others.

This has led me to kind of stop my amateur "restoration" of this saddle and turn to the experts. We don't know a whole heck of a lot about fixing up saddles, only to keep the ones we have in rideable condition. I did contact a fella that does saddle restoration online and he quoted me a price of $500 to do the work for us. He cautioned me that it might be more or less depending on when he gets it. The leather feels more like wood than leather and some areas of the skirt and jockey are curled up pretty bad. I'm sure that $500 is more than worth it for the work, but I don't think we've ever paid that much for a good useable pre-owned saddle.

But that leads me to thinking if what we have here is truly unique or valuable, it might be money well spent so I don't mess it up. That's why I'm here asking you experts and folks that know more than we do. I would probably never sell it, but if it is something special, I'll probably go ahead and have a professional do the work.

I do apologize in advance. I haven't been able to find any makers marks or post pictures of it yet. I do have some pictures on my phone, but they aren't of very good quality. If this is something that interests you all, I will do my best to take some good pictures and post them.

Sorry that this is long winded, but I thank you all in advance for the help.

[Ferg]

We love photos of leather work. Please do post some you may have. There are many Saddle people on here that I am sure will know what to tell you.

ferg

Hello all, first post here and I hope someone may be able to help me.

I have an old saddle that has 11 swastikas or "whirling logs" stamped or carved into the leather in various places. It has a high back and is very unusual. It has been in my family all of my life and nobody can really remember where it came from. It has been hanging in a barn for as long as me or my Mom can remember. One of my uncles seems to think that my Grandpa bought it with a horse in the early 60's. My Dad and I had plans to restore it numerous different times, but he fell into poor health and passed away about two years ago. I finally remembered it a couple of weeks ago and drug it out of the barn.

After cleaning all of the dirt and bird crap off of it, I have started to slowly work some oil into it. My wife has spent hours on google and other sites trying to find other examples or pictures of similar items. She has kind of hit a brick wall and we really can't find anymore information or picures of others.

This has led me to kind of stop my amateur "restoration" of this saddle and turn to the experts. We don't know a whole heck of a lot about fixing up saddles, only to keep the ones we have in rideable condition. I did contact a fella that does saddle restoration online and he quoted me a price of $500 to do the work for us. He cautioned me that it might be more or less depending on when he gets it. The leather feels more like wood than leather and some areas of the skirt and jockey are curled up pretty bad. I'm sure that $500 is more than worth it for the work, but I don't think we've ever paid that much for a good useable pre-owned saddle.

But that leads me to thinking if what we have here is truly unique or valuable, it might be money well spent so I don't mess it up. That's why I'm here asking you experts and folks that know more than we do. I would probably never sell it, but if it is something special, I'll probably go ahead and have a professional do the work.

I do apologize in advance. I haven't been able to find any makers marks or post pictures of it yet. I do have some pictures on my phone, but they aren't of very good quality. If this is something that interests you all, I will do my best to take some good pictures and post them.

Sorry that this is long winded, but I thank you all in advance for the help.

[Randy Cornelius]

Personally, I think the 500 is a very fare price. I have done some complete restoration on saddles that totaled up to much more. The problem with some of these old saddles there is just no were to stop as you always find something else that needs fixing when you tear them down. If the leather is hard like you say, I would recommend Lexol conditioner to bring some life back to the leather. Adding just oil I have found does not do the job. I know others will have different oponions, that is what this forum is for. Good luck with the project.

Randy

[WyomingSlick]

There is a thread here on the forum that dealt with the "wheel of life" (swastika) symbol that you are asking about and I think it was Bob P that posted some pics of old saddles that sound like what you are talking about. Do a search and you should find them.

As far as the stamps go, McMillen made quite a few sizes of them plus some rolls that featured the symbol. You can check them out in the old catalog scans on my blog here :

http://leatherworker.net/forum/index.php?app=blog&module=display&section=blog&blogid=31&showentry=79

Edited October 10, 2011 by WyomingSlick

[medic0011]

Thanks Wyoming Slick and all others that have posted. I went and looked at the old ad that had a similar saddle and yes, mine is very close to what that one looked like. I still haven't been able to take good pictures yet, but I will try to upload the one's from my phone. They're not very good and show it before I cleaned it up very much. For some reason, it will only allow me to upload one photo........

Thanks,

[spurdude101]

What we call a swastika shows up in many cultures and is a very old symbol. I believe the Navajo used it quite a bit. I would place that saddle at around the turn of the century in New Mexico.

[PcCowboy]

I had a saddle like that in my shop back in 1999. The border was swastikas. A antique dealer came in and saw it and jumped on it. He gave me the name of the maker that used the swastika on his saddles but can't remember it. He said that it was a Native American good luck symbol. Gave me $600 for it and I paid some cowboy $50 for it.

Oh and I have used this new stuff call "Leather Therapy" on leather that was hard and breaks when you tried to bend it. It turned that leather back soft again.