Good pick up, Brian. I remember seeing examples of P&C grind-offs somewhere here on GJ that were theorized to be wrenches like this. Nice to see a survivor.
I guess this answers the question about tools of different brands being made in the same factory!
I didn't realize that was a question. When this wrench was made, sometime between 1941 and 1949, and in my opinion, almost certainly more narrowly datable to wartime plating restrictions, the Plomb Tool Company was proudly advertising the fact that they had thirty-nine factories, and that list included their P&C subsidiary's plant. In fact, as we have discussed before, contract fulfillment help was very likely the primary motivation for the acquisition of P&C to begin with, and I thought it was well known that tools were being made in the P&C plant to fulfill Plomb contracts.
Or more precisely, different brands being made at different factories before Plomb had to change names and before Pendleton Tool Industries was introduced as the parent company
If "before Plomb had to change names" is a reference to March 1950, when the Plomb Tool Company was finally forced in court to stop using the name of their company as a brand name on the tools themselves, adopting Proto as a brand name instead (they did
not change the name of the Plomb Tool Company at this time), I fail to see the significance of your mistake wrench being made before that time. How else would it be marked? Whether it was made by their P&C subsidiary in P&C's Milwaukie plant, or in their Los Angeles plant, "Plvmb" and "P&C" were two of the brands we might expect to see on a mistake at this time. I suppose it's theoretically possible that in 1949 we might've also seen some form of the Prvtv-Plvmb dual marking on one side of a wrench and the P&C brand on the other (a triple-dualie, if you will!) Also theoretically possible, I suppose, for early PENENS-Plvmb or PENENS-P&C mistakes, but I highly doubt the Plomb Tool Company's strategy was as haphazard as all brands being made at all factories, and my money is on your mistake wrench being made at P&C during the war.
EDIT: Likewise, if "before Pendleton Tool Industries was introduced as the parent company" is a reference to the stockholders voting in January 1957 to change the name of the company from the Plomb Tool Company to Pendleton Tool Industries, Inc., I really don't understand the point. It was obviously made well before then.
