On 3 Jan 2006 12:46:14 -0800, "scbody" wrote:

How do I get the seat and back to sit in the rabbited groove
in the sides without drilling screws from each end?

No idea without seeing it - you can date old pews by the style of
joinery used to attach the parts. Early Victorians used joinery, later
ones had a simple glued and screwed butt-block underneath. Typically
there's simply a couples of big grooves cut in the end panels (sometimes
a sliding dovetail) and two or three of the long rails (but not the main
seat boards) would have a single large dovetail cut into them to hold
the end panels from moving apart.

If you're feeling medieval and you have some seat length to spare, you
can even cut big tenons on the ends of the seat panels, mortices in the
ends and hold it together with wedges ("tusks") through the tenons.
http://www.timber-routes.co.uk/archi...craft/0018.jpg
(Maybe not quite as big as those - Paul oversizes his tusks)