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Etymology: o o o o o

A broom is a cleaning tool with stiff fibers attached to a cylindrical handle. It is used to sweep floors, walls, and other surfaces. There are different types of brooms for different tasks - soft brooms are used for light sweeping while hard brooms are used for rougher surfaces. Most brooms fall somewhere in between, suitable for regular home and business floor sweeping. Brooms are also symbolic objects associated with witchcraft and magic.

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54 views2 pages

Etymology: o o o o o

A broom is a cleaning tool with stiff fibers attached to a cylindrical handle. It is used to sweep floors, walls, and other surfaces. There are different types of brooms for different tasks - soft brooms are used for light sweeping while hard brooms are used for rougher surfaces. Most brooms fall somewhere in between, suitable for regular home and business floor sweeping. Brooms are also symbolic objects associated with witchcraft and magic.

Uploaded by

Penny Low
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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A broom is a cleaning tool consisting of usually stiff fibers (often made of materials such as plastic,

hair, or corn husks) attached to, and roughly parallel to, a cylindrical handle, the broomstick. It is
thus a variety of brush with a long handle. It is commonly used in combination with a dustpan.
A distinction is made between a "hard broom" and a "soft broom" and a spectrum in between. Soft
brooms are for sweeping walls of cobwebs and spiders, like a "feather duster". Hard brooms are for
rougher tasks like sweeping dirt off sidewalks or concrete floors, or even smoothing and texturing
wet concrete. The majority of brooms are somewhere inbetween, suitable for sweeping the floors of
homes and businesses, soft enough to be flexible and to move even light dust, but stiff enough to
achieve a firm sweeping action.
The broom is also a symbolic object associated with witchcraft and ceremonial magic.

Contents

 1Etymology
 2Manufacture
o 2.1United States
 3Magic
 4In wider culture
o 4.1Literature
o 4.2Politics
o 4.3Religion
o 4.4Sports
 5Image gallery
 6See also
 7References
 8External links

Etymology[edit]
The word "broom" derives from the name of certain thorny shrubs (Genista and others) used for
sweeping.[1] The name of the shrubs began to be used for the household implement in Late Middle
English and gradually replaced the earlier besom during the Early Modern English period. The
song Buy Broom Buzzems (by William Purvis 1752–1832) still refers to the "broom besom" as one
type of besom (i.e. "a besom made from broom").
Flat brooms, made of broom corn,[2] were invented by Shakers in the 19th century with the invention
of the broom vice.[3] A smaller whisk broom or brush is sometimes called a duster.

Manufacture[edit]
See also: Shaker broom vise
Making brooms, 2012

In 1797, the quality of brooms changed when Levi Dickenson, a farmer in Hadley, Massachusetts,
made a broom for his wife, using the tassels of sorghum, a grain he was growing for the seeds. His
wife spread good words around town, creating demand for Dickenson's sorghum brooms. The
sorghum brooms held up well, but ultimately, like all brooms, fell apart. Dickenson subsequently
invented a machine that would make better brooms, and faster than he could. In 1810, the foot
treadle broom machine was invented. This machine played an integral part in the Industrial
Revolution.[4]

United States[edit]
One source mentions that the United States had 303 broom factories by 1839 and that the number
peaked at 1,039 in 1919. Most of these were in the Eastern United States; during the Great
Depression in the 1930s, the number of factories declined to 320 in 1939.[5] The state
of Oklahoma became a major center for broom production because broom corn grew especially well
there, with The Oklahoma Broom Corn Company opening a factory in El Reno in 1906. Faced with
competition from imported brooms and synthetic bristles, most of the factories closed by the 1960s.[5]

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