Hickory hickory and woods that are harder, but the combination of strength, toughness, hardness, and stiffness found in hickory wood is not found in any other commercial wood. It is used for tool handles, bows, wheel spokes, carts, drumsticks, lacrosse stick handles, golf club shafts (sometimes still called "hickory stick", even though made of steel or graphite), the bottom of skis, walking sticks, and for punitive use as a switch (like hazel), and especially as a cane-like hickory stick in schools and use by parents. Paddles are often made from hickory. This property of hickory wood has left a trace in
Lacrosse stick players, and by women's field lacrosse players. Wooden sticks are still legal under Canadian Lacrosse Association and NCAA rules but are subject to the same size regulations as modern lacrosse sticks. The only exception to this is the Western Lacrosse Association, which prohibited the use of wooden sticks by non-goaltenders some years ago. The last WLA player to use one was A.J. Smith of the Coquitlam Adanacs, c. 2003–04, who had been grandfathered. In 1970, the first patent (US Patent #3,507,495) for a synthetic lacrosse stick was issued to STX. A modern lacrosse stick consists of a plastic molded head