Enter the pot mender. Consisting of a metal washer and bolt, the hole was cleaned, the washer positioned on the outside and the bolt threaded through the hole to be tightened on the other side.
The metal washer was soft enough to be applied to corners and curves so was easily applied to many situations. Recycled milk tins, metal buckets and hot water kettles all lasted longer with the use of pot menders. I'm sure many of you remember Nan's old pot which had more menders in place than the original bottom.
Today's example was made by the Peter Pan company and advertised to "mend leaks instantly in aluminium, tin, copper, brass and sheet iron, hot water bags and rubber goods".
While not evident in our example, most other cards came equipped with a small wrench to make the card a one-stop pot mending product, without the need for soldering, cement or rivets. Some designs benefited from the addition of a soft cork washer to add extra security on the outside.
Nowadays you can still purchase pot menders if you search hard. They retain the exact original design.
Vintage pot menders are quite rare owing to their utilitarian use but the majority of extant examples come from the war years of the 1930s to 50s, a time when metal was rationed and scarce so pots made from cheaper metals developed holes faster.
The best vintage pot mender cards are decorated with images of a 1950's housewife holding up her favourite pot.
Slogans appealed to housewives operating on a tight budget: "Don't throw it away", "use at once" and "no other tool or skill needed".
While this tried and true method of mending holes hasn't changed much in the last century, it has been a practice throughout history.
We don't have many occupational repairers for small household goods like lamps, vases or cutlery, but in the 1800s there were many more specific jobs servicing the repair trade, including pot menders.
A mender or a patcher of general items was also termed a "Botcher".
Evidence of the skill's basic form has been found in archaeological sites of Medieval and Roman Britain. A plug was formed in the hole of a storage or cooking container by pouring molten hot lead directly into the vessel.
Lumps of lead with a plug shape on the base, from the inside of wood, pottery, leather or metal vessels, is evidence of the long-term practice of mending and sustaining valued resources as long as possible. Sherds of pottery remaining in the lead plug have helped date individual plugs.
Alternatively, copper alloy has been used to form paperclip-shaped rivets to seal a hole.
Humans have been very good at repairing things for a long time. It is only in the time of mass production that it is often easier to dispose of a broken item and buy a new one.
Metal cookware is also more often made of stronger materials and more likely to have a kitchen accident rendering a pot useless than for the base to wear through.
However, I hope we can take advice from the way people have operated for hundreds of years and be more creative about repairing and maintaining things for the future.
• Georgia Kerby is exhibitions curator, Whangārei Museum at Kiwi North.
