Early Fireplace Spit/Jack

This spit jack was used in front of a walk-in fireplace to rotate a spit with meat skewered to it. It would rotate at a selected rate of speed, set by the operator to obtain the best cooking of the meat. It would be wound up, and on this winding, it would run for 25 to 30 minutes. The speed by which it rotated was set by the two circular disks on the top of the governor of the spit jack.
If the disks were turned to resist the governor, it would run slow, because of the wind resistance that it created. If you wanted the spit to turn more rapidly, you would turn the disks to resist less of the air like shown in photograph # 3.
The governor runs fairly rapidly for the forementioned time and when the governor slows down, a bell, located in the jack, will ring. this directs the operator to rewind the unit.
There is an upper and a lower connection to the jack for the spit to connect to, one turns slower than the other. This also is used to control the rotation speed.
The spit that the meat is fastened to, is held at the other to a hook to level the skewer over the front of the fireplace.
It is interesting that the mechanism is known as a "Jack". This started in the early 18th century when a young boy was employed to turn the spit by hand, very slowly and sometimes all day and in front of a very warm fireplace. He was called "Jack", probably for a lack of another name. The name and term stuck over the century to follow.