Storey Pole

A storey pole, also called a story pole, storey rod, story stick, jury stick or scantling, is a length of narrow board cut to the height of one storey and used as a layout tool for repeated measurements in carpentry, including stair-building, framing, timber framing, siding, brickwork and tile setting. It is marked, usually from a building's floor platform, for the heights of features such as window sills, window and door headers, interior doors, wall gas-jet fittings and the level of the next storey's joists, letting a builder take quick, repeatable measurements without a calibrated measuring device or special training. Craftsmen also use a storey pole to mark clapboard and brick courses so a course ends neatly below a window sill or at a door's architrave, and in remodeling work to match new siding coursing to an existing wing. Evidence of similar boning rods survives from the construction of Egypt's Great Pyramid, an early counterpart of the modern storey pole.