What the heck is Weichsel wood?

I just posted this question on one of my favorite woodworking forums: Workshop Companion Forum
I've been doing some research into Missouri Meerschaum history and the other night I stumbled across an ad from 1913 which mentions that they used German Weichsel-wood for their stems. This is the first I've heard of this wood and after a short Google search I was still a little hazy. I tired to attach the ad to my question on the forum, but it was too large. Here it is.
Click on ad to Biggie-Size

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Per Wikipedia Weichsel is the German name for a local, Semi-sour, cherry tree.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherry_tree and look under "species"

Thanks,
Bill

Scott said...

Thanks Bill. Nick Engler, an old buddy of mine who has forgotten more about wood than most of us will ever know actually sent me an email with the results of an exhaustive search that he did on weichsel. You did an excellent job summarizing his findings. Scott