Thank you for your interest in volunteering as a Registry Steward on the VintageMachinery.org web site. The job is not super demanding, basically you will need to be available to assist with rounding up serial number information on the manufacturer that you choose and managing that list on the web site. We have some admin tools that you can use to assist with your Steward job – in fact, I am working on some updates to the Registry Steward Admin portion of the web site right now which will make the job a bit easier.
Probably the hardest part of the job is getting you initially set up as a registry "steward". In order to do this, we will need some information from you so we can set up the databases so that information specific to your manufactures of interest will work properly.
Here is what we need for each manufacturer you wish to serve as steward for:
1. A list of serial number series for your manufacturer of interest. What we mean by serial number series is a short description of changes in the format of serial numbers over the years along with the order that the series occurred.
For example, for the Crescent Machine Company, there are five currently known series of serial numbers as follows:
The "Crescent" Series. A serial number up to five digits long. Used from the beginning of company until the early 1940's. Example “12345”
The "CA-" Series. A serial number up to four digits long prefixed by the letters "CA-". Used after Crescent was sold to Rockwell in the early 1940's. Example: “CA-1234”
The "A" Series. A serial number up to four digits long suffixed by the letter "A". Used after the "CA" series beginning sometime in the mid 1940's. Example: "1234-A”
The "B" Series. A serial number up to four digits long suffixed by the letter "B". Used after 9999 machines were made in the A series beginning sometime in the late 1940's or
early 1950's. Example: “1234-B”
The "C" Series. A serial number up to four digits long suffixed by the letter "C". Used after the Crescent line was sold to the Enterprise company beginning around 1953. Example: “1234-C”
Many companies only had one “series” of numbers, which makes this very easy – there would only be on series to enter. If you do not know of any different series of serial numbers, or you discover new series that you need to add after you get started, that is fine as well - we can always add a new series later on as you find more info.
2. We need a list of Machine Types made by the manufacturer. This list will be used to populate the Machine Type field in the database. Machine types would be things like "Table Saw", "Jointer", "Planer", etc. You can also include a "Other" category if there are odd ball machines that do not deserve a category of their own. Try to be as specific as possible here.
Once we get this information from you, we will enter your info into the database and you can start entering new info.
Keith Rucker
Tifton, GA