But that spike at the end would cause problems in trying to start it
through ice.


I agree that the way the small spike has been made, it doesn't look like it
would be effective for drilling through ice. Also, I got replies from eight
different ice fishermen on an ice fishing forum, and all of them say it's
not an ice auger.

Though one of them did recognize it and posted:

"It's a swamp anchor for power poles. My dad was a lineman for 27 years so
I've seen a few. It's screwed in the ground in soft boggy or wet areas that
power lines go through. The loop on the top is for the guy wires to
stabilize the pole."

This makes sense and I was ready to declare my vote for earth anchor,
especially since I've seen quite a few similar ones on the web, including
this 48" model:

http://www.alabamatower.com/proddetail.asp?prod=GAS604

I then decided to take one last look on ebay for old post hole diggers and
earth anchors, I came up with nothing on the latter, I was surprised to find
a similar old post hole digger that was patented in 1869:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ANTIQUE-FARM-TOO...QQcmdZViewItem

It's not the exact same as the one in my photos, but the pitch of the blades
is very similar, whereas most of the earth anchors that I've seen have a
steeper type blade that looks to be made more for drilling than for digging
holes.

This site confirms that the tool on ebay is indeed a post hole auger:

http://www.vaughanmfg.com/history.html

This is also verified by going to the U.S. patent site and looking up the
number given on the previous link, it's called an "Improved post auger".
Maybe the one in my photos is from before this time, since the part by the
handle is not built as rugged as the new improved version.

I'm now favoring the post hole digger answer, mostly because I haven't seen
an earth anchor with the same type blades, and also based on the auger from
1869.


Rob