While there had been a very few, bespoke makers of ice axes in the UK way back in the early days of mountaineering, it wasn’t until the 1960’s that legendary Scottish mountaineer, Hamish MacInnes, started mass producing his range of metal shafted axes, the first being the equally legendary MacInnes/Massey. Prior to that, ice axe shafts had been universally fashioned from wood and in the UK the almost universal choice was the Stubai axe from Austria with the few exceptions also coming from the continent. The only exception to this rule that we are aware of, are ice axes commissioned by the Ministry of Defence, and we have a ‘Brades’ axe elsewhere in the collection which comes from that source. Without the vast array of outdoor shops that proliferate the modern world, ice axes were hard to come by back then. Couple this with the ‘make do and mend’ mentality that prevailed at the time and you get the ‘homemade’ brand emerging; a fine example of which we have here in the collection. The axe belonged to Professor John Boyes, who at one time (1960’s?) was Dean of Dentistry at Edinburgh University. Either he, or someone else, must have made the axe sometime earlier. Either way, it is rather crudely made, with the head looking like it’s hand forged, possibly by the local blacksmith. The lovely little leather cover for the head is well worn and shiny, indicating that the axe was probably used more as a walking stick than an axe, with the cover in place to protect John’s hand. John’s daughter, Rosalind, kindly donated this fine axe to the collection in 2014.