For sale is a restored antique STANLEY SWEETHEART NO. 30 WOOD & BRASS LEVEL. This cherry wood level measures about 30 inches in length with brass metal end caps on both sides. All three glass vials are intact with the fluid and air bubble. This level was made by the Stanley Rule & Level Company, New Britain, Connecticut. The top brass plate is marked the Stanley trademark. The wood on this antique level has been refinished and the brass plates polished. A premium collectible vintage tool.
In the United States, the words “tools and hardware” and “Stanley” are almost synonymous. The company began modestly in 1843, when Frederick T. Stanley founded a door-hardware company in New Britain, Connecticut. In 1857, Henry Stanley, Frederick’s cousin, launched the Stanley Rule and Level Company, which acquired Leonard Bailey & Co. in 1878. Bailey held numerous patents on such mainstay tools as planes, which Stanley Rule and Level augmented with mitre boxes, rulers, hand drills, hammers, and, of course, its lines of wood and iron levels. By 1920, the two Stanley firms merged.
