That’s a Paddlin’: A Mystery Train Tool with a Super-Specialized Function

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I recently attended the opening reception for an informal exhibit of New York City subway memorabilia. The festivities included a “Mystery Artifact Guessing Contest” in which attendees were invited to speculate on the subway-related purpose of the paddle-like wooden implement shown above.

The only guideline was that we couldn’t Google the text stamped into the end of the tool. Here’s a closer look at those markings:

I was amused by the use of “MAN DATE,” instead of the more common “MFG DATE.” Perhaps there’s a mandate to use “MAN DATE”!

I’m not one of those super-obsessive transit geeks (surprising, right?), but I’m reasonably subway-knowledgeable. Yet I’d never seen one of these wooden paddles before and had no idea what it was for. Do you know?