Calipers were used by machinst and woodworker alike. A large number of surviving examples are the product of the craftsmen who made them. Given that, it should come as no surprise that the calipers would reflect different designs of their makers' whims.
Many makers settled upon calipers shaped like a pair of legs, where they have complete freedom to rotate around each other a full 360 degrees - certainly the craftsman must have gotten the same joy that I get by adjusting these calipers to a position that's impossible for mere mortals to assume. They may have been their version of GI Joe, or something. Where was I? Calipers in the form of legs are often called dancing leg calipers, and other than the fleeting delight one gets from owning a pair, they are rather ho-hum in tool collecting circles.
Other makers decided to to go a bit farther in their anatomical designs. Some would design theirs to reflect the female form in a rather Ruebenesque fashion. Others still made stiff, cardboard-like stick figures, hinged at their heads, that have more in common with Roswellian visitors from afar than they do with Earthlings.
But what of this pair of calipers pictured here? These are calipers! They celebrate the joy of human form to the fullest, where man and woman are forever joined at the hip, always at the ready to measure whatever is tossed their way. If only we humans afflicted with our own personal ball and chain could be as blissful.
The camera failed to capture the exquisite details of each figure where hair, eyes, clothing, etc., are scratched into the steel to give them even more character than they already have.
pal, February 17, 1998