FAHRENHEIT 2300 by Crocker Farm

During his presidency, George Washington visited each of the original thirteen colonies during a three-part presidential tour. Washington took the opportunity to travel about the new nation as (I’m sure amongst other concerns) a way to help galvanize the states into a Union. Similar to Washington, in the wake of the War of 1812, James Monroe undertook his own national tour, visiting New England, the Mid-Atlantic states, the South, and the West, in four parts. About two decades later, following Andrew Jackson’s reelection to the presidency, fellow Democratic party members in New England tried to coax the President up to their neck of the woods for a tour of his own.

The clamor for the Jackson tour seems to have begun in January 1833 at the Hartford, Connecticut, “Jackson celebration.” The March 26, 1833 issue of the Hartford Connecticut Courant described the initiative this way:

It will be recollected by our readers that at the Jackson celebration in this city last January, a resolution was adopted appointing a Committee to invite the President to visit New England. The letter addressed to the President has been recently published, and we hasten to lay it before our readers, as a production too valuable to be lost. It is the more desirable that the letter should have an extensive circulation at this time, as no less than three of the committee are Jackson candidates for Congress; and if anything were wanting to enlist a becoming state pride in their favor, … it is abundantly furnished in this admirable composition.

The letter itself, mailed in early February and also printed in the Courant, addresses the “Chief Magistrate” in almost comically sycophantic terms:

Sir—The preceding resolution was adopted at a meeting of our fellow citizens at Hartford, on the 8th of January 1833, while commemorating the events of that “glorious 8th” [Jackson's victory over the British on January 8, 1815 at the Battle of New Orleans] in which you were the principal actor, and from which, has been reflected upon our country, so much honor. …

The savage torch was lighted up—the scalping knife and tomahawk glittered in the sunbeam—and the cry of the innocent victim did not reach your ear in vain. The name and prowess of ANDREW JACKSON have proved a sure defence against savage brutality over the Western States, where dwell our kindred.

The “mother country,” made haughty by European conquests, claimed dominion over the ocean. Under her flag, the right of search, and the right to interrupt the commerce of the whole world, were avowed. To maintain these arrogant claims, and to plant the standard of a King, upon the soil of a Republic, her armies marched boldly on, shouting in advance, their notes of conquest, desolation, and death. The eyes of a nation were fixed on you. General ANDREW JACKSON heard the calls of his country, and met her enemies with his open bosom. He had a home and a country to save, and his own life was thrown between that country and its foes. The results are known to the world, and history shall give to that knowledge, perpetuity.

The letter did illicit responses like that seen in the March 27, 1833 issue of the Norwich [Connecticut] Courier:

The Washington Globe received to-day contains a correspondence between a committee of Jackson men at Hartford, (Conn.) and President Jackson. The committee, it seems, addressed a letter to the President, inviting him to visit New England, as soon as it may suit his convenience. The President thanks the committee for their politeness, and tacitly accepts the invitation—but intimates a doubt whether he shall be able to make the visit during the present, or not until another year.—The letter of the committee is one of the most ridiculous pieces of bombast, and slavish exhibitions of adulation, that we recollect to have seen. It beats the famous proclamation of Sachem Mooney, in which it was represented that “terra trembled,” and “all creation expanded to explosion,” at the approach of General Jackson, when he visited this city in 1818. The reply of the President, however, is a very proper one—and very modest—all things considered.

But Hartford’s invitation set off a string of like-minded correspondence from many other New England towns. On March 11, for instance, a committee of Bostonians wrote Jackson inviting him to their city, saying, “The Republicans of this city, and we may safely assume to say, those of all New-England, … would feel proud to exhibit to the victor of New-Orleans, the plains of Lexington, and the trenches of Bunker-Hill, consecrated to liberty by the blood of our revolutionary martyrs.” (See the June 4, 1833 edition of the Portsmoth New Hampshire Gazette).

Jackson was not able to accept the invitations of every city who sought his presence, but decided he could “leave the seat of Government early in June, and be absent about six or eight weeks, with but little inconvenience to the public interest … .”  Making good on his word, on Thursday, June 6 he set out with the plan of traveling as far north as Portland, Maine; his route to New England took him out of Washington, D.C., through Baltimore, then Philadelphia, then New York—with smaller stops along the way. Besides a slow start in Baltimore, where Jackson was upstaged by the famous Sauk Indian chief Black Hawk (who had joined his delegation for the day) the President’s visits on his way to New England were marked by almost riotous adulation on the parts of thousands of Americans—and Jackson seemed to eat up the fanfare afforded him as he participated in various parades, dinners, and meetings. In Philadelphia, for instance, when Jackson attempted to welcome guests to a private reception at Independence Hall, the crowd outside entered the building and filled it beyond maximum capacity—so much so that, according to one reporter, when someone opened the windows, people came falling out. In New York, one hundred thousand people gathered around the harbor to watch Jackson as the boat he was riding on docked and the General disembarked to review troops on horseback before traveling to City Hall. So many people crowded on the bridge between Castle Garden and the Battery that it collapsed, sending many, including the Secretary of War, into the water.

The over-the-top adulation for Jackson, however, essentially subsided once he hit New England, whose political enthusiasm for him did not in any way match other parts of the Union. He made several barely-noteworthy visits between New York and Boston; in Hartford, the citizens gave him a Bible and Jackson’s thank-you note was printed in the papers (see the Norwich [Connecticut] Courier, June 26, 1833) and in New Haven he visited Yale University. Jackson entered Boston on Friday, June 21—just over two weeks into his journey—at about 4 pm. According to the June 28, 1833 issue of the Amherst, NH Farmer’s Cabinet, Jackson was escorted to Boston Common by a procession of military men, a military band, various city officials, and firemen. The firemen would remain major parts of the various celebrations in which Jackson took part during his time in Boston. After meeting with, among other dignitaries, Massachusetts Governor Lincoln at the President’s quarters in a local hotel, Jackson was treated to a review of the various companies of the Fire Department; one engine decorated with an apparently life-sized Indian figure especially caught his fancy. After dinner, fire engines appeared, all decked out in flags and banners, one in particular hanging a banner emblazoned “January 8, 1815” from a hickory branch (referring to Jackson’s nickname, “Old Hickory”).

President Jackson spent Saturday engaged in more processions and meetings, but by Sunday lingering health problems caught up with him. According to Fletcher M. Green’s excellent article, “On Tour with President Andrew Jackson” (see note at the conclusion of this article), Jackson “suffered infection of the throat, bleeding of the lungs, and severe pain in the back. [The important physician] Dr. J. C. Warren … bled him profusely and ordered him confined to bed where he remained two days.” The President’s illness caused him to miss the ceremonial sailing of the U.S.S. Constitution early Monday morning, at the conclusion of which three canes made from the timber of the vessel were presented to Governor Lincoln, Jackson confidant Joel Roberts Poinsett, and the President himself, via Vice President Martin Van Buren. The sickness also caused Jackson to postpone what was to be a momentous appearance at one of America’s most cherished battle sites.

Shortly before Jackson had departed Washington, on Wednesday, May 29, a group of residents of Charlestown, Massachusetts—now a section of Boston, but at one time its own entity and even the first capital of the Massachusetts Bay Colony—met to discuss the prospect of bringing the President to their town. According to the June 10, 1833 edition of the Concord New Hampshire Patriot and State Gazette,

A meetimg (sic) was held in Charlestown on Wednesday afternoon, at which resolutions were passed favorable to the services and character of General Jackson, and inviting him to visit Charlestown in his proposed tour. On the question of adopting the resolution, Mr. E Everett observed, that he concurred in the object, for which the meeting had been called. He should cordially unite with his fellow-citizens, in tendering a hospitable reception to the President. Mr. E. remarked, that, though politically opposed to the President, he had ever been able to do justice to his public services; and on the first occasion, on which he ever made a speech in Congress, he has paid a sincere tribute to their value. This he had also done at a later period, and was ready on every proper occasion to do it again. In opposing some of the measures of the administration, he had exercised his right as a freeman: but the most important of those measures, those which had been recently adopted for the preservation of the Union, had had his cordial support. During the four winters, which he had passed at Washington, under the administration of the President, Mr. E. observed that he and his family had received each season the hospitality of the President’s house, and such attentions, as it would be his duty and a pleasure to reciprocate, even to a private gentleman. … It was then voted to appoint a committee to make necessary arrangements, and a committee of twenty-five (including the Board of Selectmen) was appointed.

(The aforementioned “Mr. E Everett” was Edward Everett, at the time a member of the House of Representatives and, as a Whig, a critic of the President, as referenced above. The 39-year-old Everett had graduated from Harvard at the age of 17, became an ordained pastor when he was about 20 years old, and had subsequently taught at Harvard for several years before his election to the House. He would go on to serve as Governor of Massachusetts, President of Harvard University, U.S. Secretary of State (under Millard Fillmore), U.S. Senator, and Vice Presidential candidate as John Bell’s running mate on the Constitutional Union Party ticket in 1860. A well-known orator, he used this ability to promote Abraham Lincoln and the Union itself during the Civil War, before his death in early 1865.)

Jackson had, according to an article in the June 13, 1833 issue of the Keene New Hampshire Sentinel, planned to arrive at Bunker Hill on Monday, June 17, an apt date that marked the 58th anniversary of the battle there. At some point the intended time of the General’s arrival was moved back one week to June 24, and it was on that date that an elaborate military exhibition was planned, presumably by the Committee of Arrangements, and this display proceeded as intended despite the President’s illness and absence. As printed in the June 28 issue of the Farmer’s Cabinet,

The appointed military parade took place in Charlestown in the course of the forenoon, notwithstanding the indisposition of the President.— The troops, consisting of two regiments of infantry, and one of artillery, were reviewed by Gov. Lincoln, and the contemplated ceremonies were conducted with as little deviation as possible from the published arrangements. It is not certain that the President will be able to proceed this morning on his Eastern tour. He was in the hands of Dr. Warren, yesterday, who could not foretell the state of his health to-day.

Jackson did not feel sufficiently hearty enough to venture on until Wednesday, June 26; he left Boston at about 9:30 a.m. that day and arrived in nearby Cambridge where he was welcomed by the President and the Fellows of Harvard University. At Harvard—much to the chagrin of Jackson’s predecessor and political opponent, Harvard alum John Quincy Adams—Jackson was awarded the degree of Doctor of Laws.

Meanwhile, the citizens of Charlestown who lived in the shadow of the most memorable hill in American history had been waiting for the President to show up. The focal point of General Jackson’s visit was to be Bunker Hill (actually Breed’s Hill) and its monument, and that fact taken along with the close proximity of momentous Lexington and Concord reinforced the already strong military bent of the celebration—thus the choreographed military exercises that, although not in any way unique to the Charlestown segment of the tour, held particular meaning within the confines of that place and whose importance seemed to transcend the actual presence of the Commander-in-Chief. The Committee of Arrangements was particularly concerned with presenting Jackson with a gift weighty with a symbolism that encompassed both the place and the man who would visit it. Some local woodworker, probably, fashioned a box—described by one reporter as a “mahogany casket”—out of wood from the U.S.S. Constitution. This container was meant to hold two artifacts rife with meaning: a grape shot dug out of the Bunker Hill battlefield and a six-pound shot, a relic from the Battle of New Orleans. Inscribed on a silver plate probably fashioned by a local smith, the Committee of Arrangements had the following inscription engraved:

These now harmless memorials of the 17th June, 1775, and the 8th of January 1815, were presented to General Andrew Jackson, President of the United States, by the citizens of Charlestown, on the 24th June, 1833, on his visit to Bunker-Hill.

In the spirit of this fine gift and any number of other commemorative objects produced to mark the President’s tour, the local stoneware manufactory made a pot.

The aforementioned manufactory was owned by one Barnabas Edmands. His pottery is perhaps best known for two different types of pots seen in stoneware collections all over the country—early stoneware jugs devoid of cobalt, dipped in a brown, iron oxide slip and often marked “CHARLESTOWN”; and later vessels, reminiscent of other Victorian stoneware such as that produced by the Nortons in Bennington, VT and the New York Stoneware Company in Fort Edward, NY, adorned with cobalt flowers, birds, and, rarely, deer. But between the crude early products of this pottery and the later more familiar ones, the potters working in Charlestown obviously created a wealth of stoneware in line with contemporary design and manufacturing trends.

The best secondary source on Charlestown stoneware I have found is Lura Woodside Watkins’ familiar, extensive 1950 book appropriately titled Early New England Potters and Their Wares. Part of her work seems to have been based on a 1902 book called Old Charlestown by Timothy Thompson Sawyer. Sawyer gives a quick sketch of the trajectory of Edmands’ pottery business as follows:

Barnabas [Edmands], whose homestead was in Richmond Street (Rutherford Avenue), in his early business life was a brass-founder, but he gave this up and, assisted by his brother-in-law, William Burroughs, established a pottery on Austin Street, not far from the State Prison. … For a time in the early history of the pottery Frederic Carpenter … was a partner with Mr. Edmands. After many years the pottery was removed to a wharf-estate on Mystic River which had been purchased by Mr. Edmands. In 1850 he sold the business to his sons, Edward and Thomas R. B., and Charles Collier, who had been his foreman, and they continued it under the style of Edmands & Co., adding to it the manufacture of drain-pipe; the latter part of the time by machinery, an invention of Mr. Collier’s for the purpose having been patented. This part of the business has now been given up, owing to western competition which has made it unprofitable, but the original pottery-manufacture is still kept up by Edmands & Hooper, as successors to Edmands & Co., at their kilns on Medford Street.

But expanding on this summary, Watkins says that Frederick Carpenter—a name, like Edmands’, that is quite familiar to students of stoneware—arrived in Charlestown in 1801, about 11 years before Barnabas Edmands bought his pottery, with Carpenter apparently as the master potter (Edmands himself clearly not a potter, but a businessman). During the interceding years, Carpenter may have himself produced stoneware bearing marks like “CHARLESTOWN” and “BOSTON.” Once Edmands’ shop got up and running, Carpenter seems to have ran it until his death in 1827. While I do not know the exact location of the pottery, it was situated on Austin Street, near the State Prison, probably quite near to the river. Watkins says that after Carpenter’s death, Charles Collier “became the foreman” and that by 1831 the pottery employed only five workers; they got their clay out of New York and New Jersey. It seems that making fairly elaborate presentation pieces was a part of Collier’s regular repertoire. According to Watkins,

In 1839 Edmands exhibited a very large stone jug at the second annual fair of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanics’ Association. It was described as “an excellent specimen of so large an article of stone ware” and was said to have been turned on the wheel by an expert workman. Again, two years later, they again succeeded in obtaining awards at the Mechanics’ Fair—one, a diploma for Charles Collier, the other, for the company. Since they were the only entrants in the field, we cannot judge the quality of their exhibits by the fact that they won prizes. The commentary from the catalogue of the fair is worth quoting in full:

The Committee have but a limited field on which to construct the Report, as they find but two articles of Stone Ware offered for exhibition—one, a large Fifteen Gallon Water Pitcher, made by Mr. C. Collier; the other, a Water Jar, of nearly equal capacity, from the manufactory of Barnabas Edmands & Co., of Charlestown. The Committee find the material of these two articles of a very superior quality and the workmanship of a higher character than any that they have ever before met with of this country’s manufacture. They show an advance in the article highly creditable to the makers, and give promise that the hitherto almost untrodden field of the finer quality of Stone Ware manufactures may soon be occupied by the skill and taste of our countrymen. The Committee, however, could not but notice, that general fault in all articles made of Stone Ware, applied, (at least in one of the specimens) to those now exhibited. They found that the covers to the articles were not made with that care and fitness which they deem highly necessary; and they felt surprised that articles showing such a high state of improvement in the art, should not have met with a greater share of attention in this respect.

Just as he would do for the Mechanics’ Fair, Charles Collier was charged with producing something special for the arrival of the President of the United States. He probably did so at Edmands’ request. A prominent member of the town, Edmands, if not a member of the unknown Committee of Arrangements himself, may have been involved in that day’s planning on some level. We don’t know how many pots Collier—or one of his co-workers—made for the occasion, but my guess would be it was more than one. In doing so, he incorporated the same theme that both colored the plans for the Charlestown celebration as a whole and informed all of the artwork and objects produced for that event, as well as the Boston days. He threw a large jar and applied a molded patriotic eagle to the front. Underneath the eagle he incised the words “Gen. Andrew Jackson” in finely executed script, emphasizing the celebrated military background of the now Commander-in-Chief. He dipped a brush in a dark gray mixture of water, clay, and cobalt oxide and painted over the eagle, encircled the entire design in a cloud-like halo, then filled the General’s name in, as well. On the reverse, in large, bold characters he wrote, “17th June 1775.” Left to dry, what was a very dull, gray, matte vessel would be fired, salt-glazed, and brought out of the kiln shiny with electric blue decoration.

We don’t know, for sure, what Edmands, Collier, et al. intended to do with the jar, but it was evidently made to stand in some prominent position. Edmands’ shop on Austin Street was located near the Bunker Hill monument, but Jackson’s route into town did not take him by the pottery. So although it was possible that this pot was meant to sit either in the shop’s window or out front as a way for the pottery to both participate in the day’s festivities and show off its work, I do not think so. With the prominent Bunker Hill date on one side and Jackson’s name with the eagle on the other, the piece seems to me to have been produced to sit somewhere that could show off both sides and fit specifically with the theme of the jar. With all of this in mind, it very well could have been made to sit beside the Bunker Hill monument. In particular, it may have been used, perhaps along with others like it, to pot plants in or in some other way decorate the area where Jackson was to receive his gift and make his remarks.

The use of molded, applied eagle designs on American stoneware has been noted on a few other pieces from the time period but until recently was associated almost entirely with one pottery in particular—that of Henry Lowndes in Petersburg, Virginia. See, for instance, this piece—posted on Ceramics in America’s website—that shows the motif seen on a small number of Lowndes vessels, obviously highly regarded by American stoneware students and collectors. A few years ago, a stoneware water cooler with cobalt floral decoration and a similar eagle surfaced at a small auction in the Baltimore area. While it looks very close to Lowndes products and was thought to be a Petersburg piece at the time, after close study it appears to have been made in Baltimore. Last year we were very excited to sell a finely-made stoneware pitcher—similar, in fact, to the Staffordshire style of the aforementioned Lowndes pitcher—with applied eagles on both sides and stamped with the maker’s mark “WM * PORTER,” referring to the potter of the same name who worked in Pleasantville, Venango County, Pennsylvania. The discovery of this piece, made hundreds of miles away from Lowndes’ pottery, demonstrated that the use of this decoration was not a technique unique to Petersburg, Virginia, but probably part of some greater design idea within the industry at large.

Even before this revelation, though, a different style eagle that was sometimes used in Ohio had been documented for some time. We sold a churn in November 2005 with an identical eagle to that seen on a famous piece pictured in Gary and Diane Stradling’s The Art of the Potter—a six-gallon water cooler inscribed in cobalt “Anthony Baer / Cleveland / Ohio,” referring to a tavern keeper. Another similar churn is also pictured in Donald Blake Webster’s Decorated Stoneware Pottery of North America. But the existence of another eagle done in what was considered to be the exclusive style of Henry Lowndes reinforces a theory I subscribe to that this design—though clearly not often used—was employed by potters working all over the eastern part of the United States.

I do not know where these potters procured the molds for their designs. I do not believe that they fashioned them themselves, and I also do not believe that they “bootlegged” them by making new molds off of other potters’ work (for instance, china or Rockingham ware) or even the products of metal workers. (The Bell family, for instance, in Waynesboro, PA and Strasburg, VA were famous for making plaster molds from spaniels and other pieces of pottery made, I’m sure amongst other places, at Edwin Bennett’s pottery in Baltimore.) I don’t know, for that matter, where potters got a hold of their various potters’ tools—those that weren’t handmade—and this is an area of study that I hope will one day be fleshed out.

Edmands, in particular, though, seems to have been fond of the eagle design. An Albany slip-glazed stoneware crock we sold in July 2008 reads “EDMANDS, / &,CO / CHARLESTOWN” within a wreath, topped with a molded eagle.

In the late morning of Wednesday, June 26, President Jackson made his way out of Cambridge and headed over to Charlestown, where he arrived around noon. The Columbian Guards and the Warren Phalanx—local military companies—escorted him into town to the sound of the Charlestown Artillery’s guns, and he followed Main Street, flanked by lined-up local school children, to Bunker Hill. (Incidentally, according to Old Charlestown, Barnabas Edmands’ cousin, Thomas Edmands, was one of the original members of the Warren Phalanx when it was founded in 1804 and had also served as its commander.)

At Bunker Hill—that is, near the monument—Edward Everett gave a somewhat verbose speech in which he said,

To you, Sir, who, under Providence, conducted the banners of the country to victory, in the last great struggle of the American arms, it must be peculiarly grateful to stand upon the spot, immortalized as the scene of the first momentous conflict.

We have thought it might not be unwelcome to you, to possess some joint memorial of these two eventful days, and such an one I now hold in my hands;—a grape-shot dug up from the sod beneath our feet, and a cannon-ball from the battle-field of New-Orleans, brought from the enclosure, within which your head-quarters, were established. They are preserved in one casket; and on behalf of the citizens of Charlestown, I now present them to you, in the hope that they will perpetuate, in your mind, an acceptable association of the 17th of June, 1775, and the 8th of January, 1815;—the dates of the first and last great battles fought under the American standard.

The silver plate on Jackson’s gift still read “June 24,” the day he was supposed to show up. Accepting the box of mementos, after Everett finished his remarks, the President made his own, saying, in part,

It is one of the most gratifying incidents of my life, to meet my fellow-citizens upon Bunker-Hill, at the base of that Monument, which their patriotism is erecting; and upon the sacred spot hallowed by so many interesting recollections:—A spot rich in the various national objects which it presents to view, and richer still in the associations, moral and historical, which belong to it. …

I accept with gratitude the interesting relics you have presented to me. I am sure I speak the sentiments of my fellow-soldiers upon the plains of New-Orleans, when I say, that to be associated with the memory of that band of patriots, who fought with Warren, when he sealed his principles with his life, is the highest meed of praise, which our country could bestow. … It was my good fortune, on that eventful day, to lead an army composed of American citizens, appreciating the value of the prize they contended for, and determined upon exertions proportioned to its magnitude;—and it was theirs to expel a superior force, and to preserve an important section of the Union.

When Jackson said that the citizens’ patriotism was erecting the monument, he was referencing the incomplete state of that structure, which—through an interminable process of building interrupted by funding issues—would not be finished for another nine years. (Construction had commenced way back in 1825.) Nevertheless, even incomplete, the monument carried the appropriate solemnity that it was designed to project. After giving his remarks, the President climbed up to the monument.

While two different newspaper articles I consulted (see note on sources) claim Jackson left Charlestown at about 1 p.m. that day, Green states in his article that “Everett’s lengthy speech was followed by a two-hour procession around the city and a party afterwards. The speech-making and the long tour so fatigued Jackson that he was late for his scheduled appearance at Lynn [Massachusetts], where he was too ill to attend the dinner given in his honor.”

Jackson was, in fact, quite ill. He would call in sick to the dinners planned in his honor at the next two stops of his tour, as well—Marblehead and Salem, Massachusetts. He managed to move on to Lowell, Massachusetts, and Portsmouth and Concord, New Hampshire, without medical incident, but at some point after reaching the latter town on June 28, he decided—quite abruptly—to cut the tour short. He had, as mentioned previously, intended to take his road show all the way “down east” to Portland, Maine. Partisan bickering in New Hampshire may have played more of a role in Jackson’s quick exit than he let on, and John Quincy Adams suggested as much publicly. Either way, Jackson made up his mind to return to the nation’s capital and embarked on July 1, returning to the White House on Independence Day.

The potters of Charlestown, Massachusetts, seem to have been steeped in the knowledge of their revolutionary, patriotic roots that likewise colored the overall atmosphere of the town. Somewhat ironically, almost two decades later, the Edmands pottery was burned to the ground—though the business lived to see another day—when the nearby rope walk caught fire as the presumed result of firecrackers lit to celebrate America’s independence. (See the July 7, 1852 issue of the Boston Daily Atlas.) The pot that Edmands’ shop produced to mark the occasion of President Jackson’s visit to the hallowed ground of Bunker Hill provides a rare opportunity for us as we study this specialized segment of American material culture–one where the “high” history of Presidents and almost mythical subjects like the American Revolution intersects with the story of artisans and the objects they made and left behind.

Note on Sources: Fletcher M. Green’s excellent article, “On Tour with President Andrew Jackson,” published in The New England Quarterly, June 1963, provided my information for the background, circumstances, and happenings of Jackson’s New England tour, in general. Actual quotes from newspapers, however, were located and quoted directly by me. Green mostly glosses over the actual Charlestown visit, however, and for that large section of my article other sources take over. My three main sources for Jackson’s time in Charlestown are “Politics and Statistics: The President’s Tour” in The New-England Magazine, August 1833, the July 4, 1833 edition of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts Sun, and the June 29, 1833 issue of The Portsmouth [New Hampshire] Journal of Literature & Politics. In some instances, but only when filling in minor details such as the specific date Jackson arrived in a particular city, for brevity’s sake I did not cite the exact newspaper article I used to flesh out the detail. Any significant primary documentary sources are noted in the body of the article.

An important large-sized redware dog by the Bell family will cross the block in our January 30th auction of the William Kelly Young collection. Measuring 8 3/4″ long by 8 5/8″ tall, the figure is one of a small number of this size known to have been produced by members of the Bell family in Strasburg, VA and Waynesboro, PA. The standing pose and robust body form, finished with a curled tail and large flattened ears, are characteristic of the Bells’ work. Examples of this general style by various members of the Bell family are documented in The Shenandoah Pottery by Alvin H. Rice and John Baer Stoudt, Folk Pottery of the Shenandoah Valley by William Wiltshire, III, and The Pottery of the Shenandoah Valley Region

by H.E. Comstock. These pieces include a few by John Bell and his son, Charles Frederick Bell, of Waynesboro, a pair by Samuel Bell of Strasburg, which descended to his son, Ashby, and a pair by Samuel’s son, Charles Forrest Bell, now in the Henry Ford Museum. An oustanding punch-decorated dog with monkey rider, attributed to one of Samuel’s sons, also bears similarities in form and size. Interestingly, the dog selling in our January 30th auction is pictured on p. 264 of The Shenandoah Pottery, catalog-numbered 157, indicating that it was collected by Alvin Rice in the Shenandoah Valley prior to 1929. The damage visible in the photo, including an area where a basket was once connected to its neck, has since been restored.

The dog is constructed from two conjoined, wheel-thrown cylinders, one forming the body and the other forming the neck. (Many of the animals produced by various Pennsylvania makers have a similar hollow-bodied construction.) Several balls of clay were placed inside the dog’s body prior to firing, causing the figure to rattle when shaken. To prevent damage during the firing, vent holes were bored into the corners of the dog’s mouth, the lower breast, and between the back legs. The famous Solomon Bell redware lion in the MESDA collection, as well as a John Bell stoneware lion, are also vented through the breast and mouth, as noted by Shenandoah pottery authority, H.E. Comstock (Comstock, pp. 151, 232).

The animal’s fur is produced from numerous diagonally-incised lines. The toes with incised demarcations and unusual incised toe nails are also visible on two of the feet. One of the most distinctive “Bell” features of the dog is its impressed eyes, composed of an oval with an inner arching line. This decorative stamp is used to create the eyes and embellish the bases of several animals produced by the Strasburg and Waynesboro Bells (Comstock, p. 155).

The surface is decorated in daubs of manganese and cream-colored slip and coated in a clear lead glaze. The use of a simple lead and manganese glaze is typical of Bell animals, as well as most animals produced by various other 19th century potters. However, the addition of cream slip spotting is unusual for animals made by the Bells (or those by any potter for that matter). The overall color is remarkably similar to a pair of cats and a seated dog attributed to Solomon Bell and pictured on pp. 232 and 233 of The Pottery of the Shenandoah Valley Region.

True Bell animals are quite rare and have been increasingly difficult to find in the antiques market. The family’s notoriety for producing figural pieces, coupled with the desirability of Bell pottery in general, has led to numerous erroneous Bell attributions. (A look at the Sotheby’s catalog for the auction of the Pauline Heilman collection, held way back in 1982, will give you an idea of these frequent errors.) This dog is a different story. With a firm attribution and Rice provenance, this example is the first of its size and origin to sell at auction in some time, with many of the “BELLS” and whistles one looks for in a quality American redware dog.

The Texas stoneware snake jug we will be selling on January 30 was one of the highlights of Kelly Young’s prominent collection of antique American utilitarian ceramics. We featured a picture of Mr. Young holding the jug on the title page of our current catalog (see below). The jug is also one of the most monumental examples of nineteenth century American folk art we have ever handled. A large snake forms the handle of the jug. His head protrudes from the other side of the jug top, biting the head of a man in a bizarre predicament–his lower half hanging out the side of the vessel. Another snake, a centipede, and a lizard also hug the surface of the jug. Several inscriptions highlight the scene. The two most prominent, as if written on plaques, are the maker’s inscription and the name of the pottery where the jug was made: “MADE & PRESENTED TO THE Fire Brick & Tile Company By J.L. STONE”  and “J.P. Johnson & J.W. Dillon / MANUFACTURERS/ OF / ALL KINDS OF / STONEWARE / Kosse Texas.” (Note that we cataloged the jug as reading “J.F. Johnson,” but after subsequent research and study, it reads, “J.P.”)

Surrounding the unfortunate man’s body are the words “First Attempt,” topped by the phrase, “Go in lemmons (sic) and come out squeezed.” Words beneath the man’s head read, “The Result.” To the right of the handle, what appears to be a brick is incised “Timse’s Best,” probably referring to a worker at the brick company.

While trying to do further research and put this remarkable jug into better context, I noticed that another example of Stone’s work was acquired by the Bayou Bend Collection of the Houston Museum of Fine Arts in 2003. A large stoneware spaniel, measuring 11″ tall, was made in a style rarely seen in American stoneware. Instead, it was made in a manner most associated with redware figures of the time period–a dog on base, standing in the front, seated at the back, incised to create fur on the body and the ears. This Midwestern pottery dog that straddles the line somewhere between redware and stoneware resembles the Stone spaniel in its body shape, tooled fur to body and ears, and smooth face and legs. Stone’s dog differs, however, in its clear spaniel breed, its size, a large base (reminiscent of that seen on some molded King Charles spaniel figures made out of various types of pottery in the nineteenth century), and its clear stoneware clay body. No slip decoration–such as cobalt or manganese–decorates the dog. Prominently incised on the front of the base are the initials “J. L. S.,” referring to John L. Stone.

Stone’s snake jug is most closely related to very similar vessels made by the famous brothers, Wallace and Cornwall Kirkpatrick, at Anna Pottery in Anna, Union County, Illinois–so closely related, in fact, that part of my motivation in researching Stone was to try to tie him to that prolific duo (or at least figure out why something made in what could be called the “Anna Pottery school” was produced in Texas).

According to an article in the March, 2003 issue of The Magazine Antiques, which describes recent acquisitions of the Bayou Bend Collection, Stone “came to Texas from Illinois and worked at a number of potteries in Limestone County, Texas, from about 1870 to 1900.” Diving into the federal census and also other period documents has enabled me to flesh out Stone’s life a bit more. Born on May 18, 1850 in Union County, Kentucky (according to a twentieth century passport application and immigration document), Stone was potting in Limestone County, Texas, by the time he was twenty years old–where, according to the 1870 federal census, he was clearly working with an Illinois-born potter named William C. Knox. Did Knox have ties to the Kirkpatrick brothers? Very possibly, but he had apparently left the state of Illinois sometime around 1855– judging by his children’s ages and places of birth–a few years before the accepted founding of Anna Pottery. Knox probably had trained as a potter in Illinois, but then spent some time in Kentucky before taking the helm of his own pottery in Hempstead, Texas (in Austin County, about 60 miles northwest of Houston) where he was working when the census taker made his rounds in 1860. About ten years later, Knox had moved about 100 miles up the road to Limestone County–probably in or near Kosse–and John L. Stone took his wife and baby boy and joined him there.

By ten years later, in 1880, John L. Stone was one of about seventeen potters or pottery workers operating in Kosse, and John Knox had turned, at least primarily, to farming. Although there was apparently one major pottery in the town at which the potters worked–Stone one of them–the census does not explicitly state who owned it. Turning to the Stone’s jug, then, which remains as a document of its own (albeit one made out of clay) we can use the census to try to interpret the pottery situation in Kosse during the time period.

According to the 1880 census, J.W. Dillon was a merchant who apparently also owned hotel, which his wife kept. He was born circa 1842 in Georgia to immigrants from Great Britain. J.P. Johnson, on the other hand, was listed as a “Brick Mason,” born circa 1840 in Virginia. Based on the records I have access to, it seems very probable that sometime around 1880, Dillon and Johnson struck up a partnersh1ip and began manufacturing stoneware in Kosse; they probably also owned the Fire Brick & Tile Company, which seems to have been run, however, as a separate concern. Three potters, another pottery worker, and one brickyard worker were all residents of Dillon’s hotel in 1880.

Fleshing out the meaning behind the jug’s inscriptions further, the name “Timse” likely refers to a member of one of the Tims families, one a family of free blacks, who lived in the area. At least three free African-Americans were employed at the pottery in 1880, and it seems one of the Tims’s worked in the brick and tile company.

By 1892, Stone moved to Washington state, where he was probably working at some as-yet-unknown pottery, but returned to Texas, probably initially Limestone County, by the early 1900’s. In 1910 he was working at the Athens Pottery Co. in Athens, Henderson County, Texas, about 100 miles northwest of Kosse. Along the way, he had at least 11 children with two different wives. Sometime after 1910, as Stone ventured into his 60’s, he divorced his wife and moved back to Washington, moving on to Los Angeles, California, by 1923. It was in that year that he, citing a desire to travel to Central America, applied for a U.S. Passport. The passport document contains very interesting information on Stone: his exact birth date and county of birth; his father’s name; his occupation (”Potter”); his physical description; his address in L.A. It also includes a photograph of Stone as an older man–another photograph of John L. Stone as a younger man also exists.

But the most fascinating part of the document is a notarized statement attached to verify Stone’s claims about himself, and brings us back to one of my prime motivations in researching Stone’s life. It reads,

Personally came before me a Notary Public in and for said County and State aforesaid, C.E. Kirkpatrick, whom I know to be entitled to credit, and being duly sworn, on his oath deposes and says that his Post Office address is Anna, Union County Illinois age 71 years, and says that he is an … American Citizen a resident of Union County, that he has known John L. Stone as an American Citizen for Sixty years, and from what I know, and have heard he was born in Union County State of Kentucky on the 18th day of May 1850. That said information he has obtained from intimate association with John L. Stone and associates during said time that John L. Stone is known and has been known during said term among his associates as an American citizen.

C.E. Kirkpatrick is none other than Cornwall E. “Cornie” Kirkpatrick, son of Cornwall Kirkpatrick, nephew of Wallace. Cornie’s statement provides a unique window into the interpersonal relationships of American stoneware potters in the nineteenth century. Incisive research into American stoneware paints a dim picture of a widespread network of potters and shops that, while financial competitors, often enjoyed strong bonds of friendship and cooperation, where potters worked at each other’s shops, and sometimes established relationships with many different manufactories in disparate places throughout their lifetimes. But this document reveals much not only about Stone’s development as a potter, but about a friendship that was probably a very common one amongst nineteenth century stoneware potters and artisans in general who shared a kinship based on their specialized knowledge of complicated crafts.

Cornie Kirkpatrick was born circa 1852, making him about two years younger than John L. Stone. While still a young boy, his father and uncle founded Anna Pottery in Anna, Illinois. Stone was born in Union County, Kentucky, less than 100 miles east of Anna. Kirkpatrick said he had known Stone for sixty years, establishing that Stone had arrived in Anna sometime circa 1863, when he was thirteen years old. The evidence suggests that Stone’s family moved to Anna around 1863 and that Stone apprenticed at Anna Pottery, learning the trade of potter that he would carry with him throughout his life, and became lifelong friends with Kirkpatrick in the process. Sometime in 1869 or early 1870, Stone left Illinois, possibly directly from his employ at the Kirkpatricks’ pottery, and went down to Texas, perhaps with the ultimate goal of striking out on his own. He met up there with another Illinois potter, William C. Knox, who was probably also associated with the Kirkpatricks in some way. Stone’s snake jug is closely modeled after similar jugs made at Anna Pottery, with men’s bodies forced through the jug in the same way; Stone seems to have literally grown up around such vessels and probably made them there, himself.

According to genealogist family members of Stone, John L. Stone died in 1928 in Limestone County, Texas. Unlike some potters who seem content to have produced mostly utilitarian ware and remain anonymous parts of larger potteries, Stone seems to have been essentially concerned with producing true art works that he signed, fired, then consigned to posterity. In this case, something he made about 130 years ago has helped us further uncloud our window into that time and into the artistic legacy of the Anna Pottery school of stoneware potters.

Author’s Note: The work of genealogists was invaluable in researching Stone’s life and discovering what I think is one of the most interesting documents I have ever come across while studying American stoneware. If you happen upon this blog because you also have information on John L. Stone or his family, please send me a reply or otherwise contact us. I would be more than happy to pass genealogical info along to these researchers.

Two exciting redware (or earthenware) animal bottles will cross the block in our January 30th auction of the William Kelly Young Collection. Both were purchased by Mr. Young in 1993 at Christie’s in New York City, in a sale that included several other fine examples of American redware and some stoneware. Both of these bottles were produced in Salem, North Carolina, sometime during the early part of the 19th century, by German-born potter, Rudolph Christ (1755-1833). Christ took control of the shop of deceased potter, Gottfried Aust, in Salem in 1789 and continued to work there until 1821 (Bivins, p. 30). He is most well-known for producing a variety of wonderful molded animal forms (along with a line of wheel-thrown vessels), including squirrels, owls, turkeys, crayfish, chickens, bear, sheep, foxes, and several sizes of fish.

The first redware bottle of the two to be sold, in the form of a standing squirrel holding a nut, is decorated with daubs of manganese and copper over a yellow slip and covered in a clear lead glaze. The reddish-orange color of the underlying clay is visible on the underside of the bottle’s recessed foot. Interestingly, manganese is brushed in a figure 8 pattern on one leg. Whether this treatment was implied to mean the number 8 or whether it was merely the haphazard brushwork of the potter, we will never know. The glaze is remarkably similar to the “multi-glaze” or “polychrome glaze” used by the Bells and Eberlys of Strasburg, Virginia, several decades later. In fact, I have seen a few Moravian pieces misattributed to the Shenandoah Valley for this reason. In actuality, this glaze was meant to mimic a glaze popularized by the English potter, Thomas Whieldon, during the mid 1700’s (Bivins, p. 209). The second Moravian bottle is more stylized, in the form of a portly bear. The figure’s small mouth reveals a few tiny sharp teeth, and its right foot rests upon a slain animal, possibly a sheep or pig. Its surface is covered in a dark brown glaze composed of lead and manganese.

Until recently, the most exhaustive study of North Carolina’s Moravian redware was John Bivins, Jr.’s book, The Moravian Potters in North Carolina, which was written in 1972. This book is an excellent source of information, and I encourage anyone interested in this fascinating school of pottery to take a

look at it. However, new information has come to light since then, particularly in the last three years. At the time the book was printed, for example, the author’s knowledge of some of Christ’s rarest forms could only be gleaned from period inventory lists and the existence of the objects’ original molds. Regarding an owl form, Bivins notes “since no finished examples are available, we do not know for what use the owls were intended (Bivins, p. 204).” The same is mentioned regarding a fox mold. However, both finished forms have surfaced since that time, adding to our knowledge of this potter’s work.

The 2009 edition of Ceramics in America, published by the Chipstone Foundation, is dedicated entirely to the Moravian potters of North Carolina, offering a current look at their work with several new discoveries.  Edited by Robert Hunter and Luke Beckerdite, the book includes the following articles:

Eighteenth-Century Earthenware from North Carolina:
The Moravian Tradition Reconsidered
Luke Beckerdite and Johanna Brown

Staffordshire in America: The Wares of John Bartlam at
Cain Hoy, 1765–1770

Lisa Hudgins

Staffordshire Ceramics in Wachovia
Robert Hunter

Tradition and Adaptation in Moravian Press-Molded Earthenware
Johanna Brown

Salem Pottery after 1834: Henry Schavner and Daniel Krause
Michael O. Hartley

The Mount Shepherd Pottery Site, Randolph County, North Carolina
Alain C. Outlaw

Making a Moravian Faience Ring Bottle
Robert Hunter and Michelle Erickson

Making a Moravian Squirrel Bottle
Michelle Erickson, Robert Hunter, and Caroline M. Hannah

The front cover of this edition pictures an incredible copper-glazed figure of a fox clutching a chicken (which in my opinion is one of the finest examples of early American pottery I’ve seen in some time). Looking at this piece, it is easy to understand why there is such great interest in Moravian pottery among historians and folk art collectors alike. I recommend anyone interested in the charming and useful objects created by Christ and others from this tradition to take a look at Ceramics in America’s latest installment, a great contribution to our knowledge of Southern decorative arts.

The case of the “Absalom Bixler” group of redware is a very interesting one. Redware pieces bearing his name, or clearly by the same maker as those that do, have long stood as landmark pieces within the canon of antique American utilitarian ceramics. Decorated with applied, bright yellow and green figures of birds and cats, or with quite elaborate sgraffito scenes depicting subjects with incredible folk art appeal, one hallmark of Bixler’s pottery is the use of large, blocky printer’s type to inscribe the ware. Several of these bold impressions read “ABSALOM BIXLER TO HIS WIFE SARAH” (or variations thereof), but no explicit maker’s mark or signature exists on any of the vessels.

As I discussed briefly in my Henry Rambo article, names inscribed on nineteenth century American pottery can be problematic. Even pieces stamped with apparent maker’s marks can be difficult to evaluate. For instance, someone unfamiliar with the history of Alexandria potters might see a jug marked “E.J. MILLER / ALEXA.” and assume that, as with many other pieces with similar marks made in that city, E.J. Miller was the maker of the item. But he was not—he was a merchant who had the Milburn family of potters make stoneware for him. Nevertheless, in the case of small stamps applied to a vessel in the manner of a maker’s mark, the situation is usually fairly straightforward—if the name isn’t the potter, it was probably some other businessman who would be reselling or otherwise distributing the vessel to consumers. Other times a pot is inscribed in an unusual manner, but the potter makes it very easy on us. For instance, the work of Henry Lowndes in Petersburg, Virginia, is signed in large slip-trailed cobalt script across the front of the ware, “H Lowndes / Manufactor / Petersburg / Va” or “H Lowndes / Maker / Petersburg / Va.” We can thank Mr. Lowndes for being so clear, but he was a rarity. Had he not added “Manufactor” to the front of his pieces, and we knew nothing about Virginia stoneware, we would have to turn to period documents to figure out who H. Lowndes was. In fact, we might assume that he was some obscure individual for whom a jar was made. Even so, our understanding of period American stoneware and redware—beyond the most simplistic of evaluations—always demands that we turn, in one way or another, to contemporaneous documentary sources. In the case of H. Lowndes, someone, at some point, opened a city directory or some other document and determined that the potter’s first name was “Henry” and not “Horace” or “Hezekiah.” But far beyond fleshing out first names, period documents are absolutely vital in properly evaluating the bulk of eighteenth and nineteenth century American ceramics—and no more so than in the case of mystery names like “Absalom Bixler.”

The best evaluation and discussion of the Bixler group that I have seen was written by Cynthia G. Falk and published in the July 2003 issue of The Magazine Antiques. Her article, “Sarah Bixler’s Plates and Flowerpots” is a comprehensive study of what are by far some of the finest pieces of Pennsylvania redware to have surfaced. One of my favorite pieces of redware, period, is the flowerpot decorated with an applied cat stalking a bird, inscribed in type, “READY FOR A CATCH” and “ABSALOM BIXLER FOR HIS WIFE SARAH,” in possession of the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. Another piece I greatly admire is a redware plate with a sgraffito scene of a man holding a rifle with two Indians on horseback, inscribed in the trademark Bixler type around the rim in broken German, “DAUNAE.L BOON. DES FANKNESS INDAUNAS./1787″ (something like, “Daniel Boone’s Capture by Indians”); this piece, like several others, is housed in the Winterthur Museum. For those unfamiliar with Bixler’s work, I highly recommend you read not only Falk’s article, but see also Jeannette Lasansky’s “Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, Pottery” in the September 1982 issue of The Magazine Antiques and The Pennsylvania German Collection by the Philadelphia Museum of Art and Beatrice B. Garvan.

Falk sums up the various attempts, over the decades, to assign a maker to the “Bixler” pieces as follows:

[S]cholars have disagreed on who exactly made the Bixler plates and flowerpots. Miriam E. Bixler, writing in the Journal of the Lancaster County Historical Society in 1977, asserted that Absalom Bixler was the potter. Without citing her sources, she stated that Absalom crafted pots, which he often signed “A. Bixler,” working in a little stone house on his property near Fivepointville in what is now East Earl Township, Lancaster County. She believed the building was originally the house of Absalom’s grandfather Abraham. According to Miriam Bixler, Absalom was a multitalented individual who worked as a farmer, woodcarver, maker of gunstocks, and justice of the peace, as well as a potter.

Later scholars, while continuing to cite to Miriam Bixler’s reference to Absalom as a jack-of-all-trades, have suggested another possible creator for the Bixler pottery. According to Jeannette Lasansky, Absalom Bixler was never taxed as anything other than a farmer, and his estate included no potter’s tools (although it did include printer’s type). Absalom’s brother, David, however, was taxed as a potter in Brecknock Township, Lancaster County, from 1841 to 1847, the year of their father, Abraham’s (1782-1847) death. The pottery was located on land previously owned by their father. Lasansky could not determine whether Absalom or David made the plates and flowerpots, since Absalom could have had access to the family pottery.

The case of Absalom Bixler, then, is a case where turning to period documents has unfortunately failed to give us the answers we seek. It also underscores the difficulty of researching artisans working in rural areas where city directories and even newspapers are rarely viable avenues for investigation—where (if, as in this case, the Census is no help) tax records, probate records (both of which Jeannette Lasansky attempted to use), land records, and other legal documents are our only hope of solving a mystery. Early researchers of American stoneware and redware have sometimes done the work for us, in one way or another, but often fail to cite their sources properly; in some cases we can reconstruct their work, in other cases we are forced to assess the credibility of their accounts and then make our own judgments.

Turning to the original text of Miriam Bixler’s article (”David Bixler, Folk Artist,” written mostly about Absalom’s brother, available in Vol. 81, No. 1 of the Journal of the LCHS), she writes,

Absolam [sic] (d. 1884), David’s brother, lived on the old homestead farm of his grandfather, Abraham Bixler, now occupied by Ammon Sauder, Denver R. D. #1. A deteriorating family graveyard is there. Absalom also was a Justice of the Peace as well as farmer, woodcarver, maker of gunstocks during the Civil War and potterer.

He often signed his pottery “A. Bixler” and worked in a little stone house on the property thought to be the original house. At a public sale of his goods over one hundred eighty planes were sold. A flowerpot inscribed “Abs Bixler to his wife Sarah, 1834 [sic]” is in the Titus C. Geesey Collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Ms. Bixler does not cite her sources properly, but does include a list of source material at the end of her article. While her information about Bixler’s pottery may be apocryphal, the details do not seem to be merely “imagined” by a creative historian or otherwise made-up. Ms. Bixler interviewed antiques dealers, curators, a librarian at Franklin & Marshall, and, most importantly, two locals who would have been familiar with at least a rough account of Absalom Bixler’s life and work. One of her interviews dates back to 1963, when people whose parents had had direct contact with Bixler himself were still alive to tell their stories.

One of the most interesting parts of Miriam Bixler’s account is her statement that Bixler “often signed his pottery ‘A. Bixler.’” This does not seem like a fact pulled out of thin air, and, if the author is referring to a stamped maker’s mark, is consistent with the types of signatures found on plenty of other redware made up and down the east coast and westward. It would seem that if we could find a piece stamped “A. Bixler,” we would be able to put the matter to rest and say with confidence that Absalom Bixler was a potter and that he, beyond a reasonable doubt, made the group previously doubtfully attributable to him. A piece that we discovered in the Kelly Young collection can help us immensely in this regard.

A miniature redware jar, covered in a lead and manganese glaze and measuring only 1 ¾” tall, is impressed on the bottom with one of the most important marks we have ever seen on a piece of American redware: “A. Bixler.” The typeface used to produce the mark is one I have never encountered on redware or stoneware. The style, a kind usually associated with Germany, prompted me to look into what sort of typeface this was. The University of Texas at Austin’s College of Fine Arts has an amazing collection of period typefaces, The Rob Roy Kelly Wood Type Collection. According to the University the collection “is comprised of nearly 150 faces of various sizes and styles, including examples of the most popular printing types in use between 1828 and 1900 … .” Kelly, a “noted design educator, collector, and historian,” used his collection in the early 90’s to assist the Adobe software company in resurrecting period typefaces in digital form. One of the types featured in Kelly’s collection is particularly appropriate for our evaluation of the “A. Bixler” jar. Blackletter script and, more specifically, the blackletter typeface called “German,” are strikingly similar to the type used to produce Bixler’s mark. Click here to have a look. Note in particular the strange lowercase “x,” also seen on the bottom of the pot.

According to Falk, printer’s type was sold in Absalom Bixler’s estate. While listed as a farmer in all Federal Census population schedules between 1850 and 1880, it seems that Miriam Bixler’s assessment of Absalom as a veritable one-man band of nineteenth century Pennsylvania handicrafts is correct. In their 2005 book, Flying Leaves and One-Sheets : Pennsylvania German Broadsides, Fraktur, and their Printers, Russell and Corinne Earnest note the existence of a book plate depicting a man surrounded by angels, Adam & Eve, and a sun face, inscribed, “This BOOK is the property belonging to ABM BIXLER ESQR,” probably printed, according to the authors, by Absalom Bixler in Lancaster County. (Bixler is referred to as “Absalom B. Bixler Esq.” in the 1860 Census.) Bixler’s work as a printer would explain the large, interesting type used to inscribe his redware in general, and would also explain the unusual (and apparently unique) blackletter script used to sign his miniature redware jar.

We are unaware of any other examples of American redware impressed with Absalom Bixler’s maker’s mark. It is hard to overstate the importance of this pot, which conclusively establishes Bixler as a potter and, by extension, the origin of the mystery group of Bixler redware. It also stands as an artifact of a man who clearly lived a life of artisanship and self-reliance, in this case combining his skills as both a potter and a printer to produce one object whose size does not belie its great significance.

Last August, when my father, brother, and I, traveled down to Ft. Worth, Texas, to take possession of Mr. Young’s collection, an interesting stoneware harvest jug sitting on his living room table caught my eye. According to Young’s daughter, it had been purchased by Mr. Young at an antiques show in New York City during the early 1990’s, where it had been erroneously described as a piece of Indian pottery.

The form of the jug itself was in the typical domed or beehive style characteristic of 19th century American stoneware harvest jugs. Yet the vessel was made extraordinary by the addition of a large applied rattlesnake, which curved around the body of the vessel and formed its handle. I was really taken with the look of the snake. The style was different than that of the Kirkpatrick brothers, who produced the majority of 19th century stoneware snake jugs. The head was not executed in the usual flattened, closed-mouth form characteristic of the Kirkpatricks’ work. Instead, the animal assumed an almost comical expression, as its large open mouth curved into a slight smile, exposing numerous applied teeth. The creature’s body was further embellished with numerous slashes of brushed Albany slip, and its tail ended in a thin rattle. I believe the jug was possibly made in the Midwest, where the majority of harvest jugs and snake vessels were produced during the 19th century. Yet the subject matter suggests it is more likely a product of the Southcentral U.S., possibly Texas, where the rattlesnake was a very familiar animal.

While cataloging this piece, I was wondering about its unusual form. The vast majority of harvest jugs known have two spouts, one on each side. One spout, which was larger than the other, was designed for pouring liquid into the vessel. A smaller spout on the opposite side was designed for pouring liquid out of the jug. This harvest jug, however, only had one spout, and nothing on the other side. As I studied the jug, I noticed a hole inside the back of the snake’s mouth. Seeing that the snake’s head rested on the jug’s finial, I wondered if the hole might connect through the finial to the interior of the vessel. I decided to do a test with water. After pouring a small amount of water into the tubular spout on the jug’s side, I carefully leaned the jug over a sink. Voila! The water began to flow from the snake’s mouth! Hence, a smaller,

pouring spout did exist on this jug. . . only in the form of the snake’s head!

I am impressed with the ingenuity of this jug’s potter, whoever the person was. By the addition of a clay snake, he created a handle and a pouring spout, as well as significant decorative appeal to an otherwise simple form. I, for one, am sold on the piece! We’ll see what the bidders think on January 30th.

A stoneware pitcher consigned to our October 31 auction came to us incised with both a highly desirable, folky patriotic eagle decoration and an indecipherable maker’s name. We assumed it was the maker’s name, though differentiating a maker’s name or initials from those of a recipient or owner can be a difficult task at times. The first name of the individual in question, Henry, was easy enough to make out, but the last name was very difficult to read. It began with the letter R, but beyond that, the name was not incised deeply enough into the clay to be legible under the salt glaze.

None of the standard reference books on American stoneware contained an obvious answer to the riddle. But since the pitcher was clearly of Ohio or some other Midwestern origin, I recently decided to search some of my research notes for Ohio potters’ names that might fit the bill for this interesting piece. One name, Henry Rambo, jumped out at me right away; pulling up a good photograph of the name my brother, Luke, had taken, the letters were now almost as plain as day. Henry Rambo was, indeed, the name on the pitcher. But there was one problem: when this pitcher was made, the Henry Rambo in my notes probably wasn’t born yet.

The Rambo I had found was listed in the 1880 federal census as a 50-year-old potter working in Newton Township, Muskingum County, Ohio, in a stoneware/pottery hotbed that includes later art pottery centers of Zanesville, Roseville, and Crooksville. The pitcher, meanwhile, is prominently dated 1826 on the patriotic shield that covers the eagle’s breast. It was possible, though not likely, that this apparently early piece was actually made later than 1826–made, then, to commemorate an important event–and that this Rambo had made it. But thinking that this potter may have had a father by the same name, I went back to the 1850 census and had a look. There I found the maker of the pitcher–Henry Rambo, Potter, born circa 1804 in Ohio, and working in Newton Township.

Rambo was in good company in Newton. No fewer than 46 other potters or pottery workers were also living in this small town in 1850, eight of them other members of the Rambo clan; the oldest among them was George Rambo, probably Henry’s older brother, born a few years before him in Pennsylvania. Other Rambos included two other young Henrys and two men named Washington Rambo, one of them Henry’s son, who I feel bear mentioning solely based on their auspicious monikers–composed of the surnames of two of the great American military figures.

As is borne out by both cursory examination of subsequent census schedules, as well as the known history of the area as a whole, Newton Township continued to grow in subsequent decades as a major potting center. Nevertheless, its status as such has been more or less relegated to the waster pile of history. At the very least, those familiar with the American stoneware canon have probably seen a very famous Ohio jug made in support of the presidential ticket of James Buchanan and John C. Breckinridge; dated 1856, the jug is inscribed “Buck and Breck” and “Made by E. Hall Newton Township Muskingum County, Ohio, at W.P. Harrises Factory, Holesale and Retail Dealers in Stoneware for Joshua Cites.” (See John Ramsay’s American Potters and Pottery, 1947, page 73; and between pages 204 and 205, for photographs.) Based on the jug’s inscription, we know that at least one of the proprietors of the town’s stoneware shops was one William P. Harris, who is listed on the same page as Henry Rambo in the 1850 census, and for whom Rambo was probably working at that time. Harris was born in Delaware circa 1803, but judging by the ages of his children and where they were born, he didn’t arrive in Ohio until at least circa 1833. So where was Rambo working in 1826? We can be confident he was already potting in Newton Township, based on a biographical sketch of Henry Rambo’s grandson written in 1905:

James C. Rambo, a prominent general merchant of White Cottage, was born about a mile from the village on a farm in Newton township, October 31, 1863. He represents one of the old families of Pennsylvania, where lived his great-grandparents [Henry Rambo's parents], who came from the Keystone state to Muskingum county, Ohio, during the pioneer epoch in its history. The great-grandfather entered land in Newton township and began the development of a farm in the midst of the forest. There he reared his family and it was in this county that Henry Rambo, the grandfather of our subject, was born. He remained here until 1849, when he went to California, attracted by the discovery of gold on the Pacific slope, but not realizing the fortune that he had anticipated he returned to Muskingum county and resumed farming operations here. James Rambo, father of our subject, was born in Newton township in October, 1827, and is now living in White Cottage. His entire life has been devoted to the pottery business and to farming. He has owned and operated two potteries in Newton township and through many years has carried on general agricultural pursuits. He is now practically living retired but owns thirteen acres of land in White Cottage, where he has a pleasant and comfortable home. His political support is given to the democracy and he is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church. (Past and Present of the City of Zanesville and Muskingum County, Ohio, by J. Hope Suter, page 677)

We can be reasonably positive that Rambo did not, in fact, travel to California in 1849; he very well may have gone prospecting at some point after the 1850 census was taken, but he was still firmly ensconced in Muskingum County when that happened.

But returning to Henry Rambo’s 1826 eagle pitcher, according to James L. Murphy and James F. Morton’s 1986 paper, “Muskingum Bluebirds: A Preliminary Checklist of Nineteenth Century Potters and Potteries in Muskingum County, Ohio,” one Jacob Rosier was making stoneware in Newton Township by 1814 (Murphy and Morton, page 104). Their source, J.F. Everhart’s 1882 book, History of Muskingum County, Ohio …, states,

The first pottery [in Newton Township], for stone-ware, was started in 1814, by Jacob Rosier, on a place now owned by — Rankin. The next was started by A. Ensminger, about 1828. …

The pottery of Joseph Rambo [possibly Henry Rambo's son] is situated in the extreme northwest corner of Newton township, near Gratiot road, and was built in 1863, at an expense of about four hundred dollars, including his shop and kiln. Mr. Rambo has had to employ an average of three hands, including himself. The average number of gallons of pottery made, per year, has been about forty thousand, worth, in the market, from three and one-half to eight cents per gallon. The kinds of ware made consist of jugs, jars, pans, and churns, and they are remarkable for durability, neatness of pattern, and finish. The clay will also make a superior fire-brick. Mr. Rambo has some in his grate that has stood well for ten years. (Everhart, pages 344-5. Ramsay notes the existence of Joseph Rambo’s pottery, as well, on page 234.)

Was Henry Rambo working at Rosier’s pottery when he made his eagle pitcher? Perhaps, but he just as easily may have been working at some other unknown shop, or one of his own. In the 1830 federal census, Rambo is listed apparently living next door to his brother, George; the pair may have been running a family shop at that time. Either way, Henry Rambo’s pitcher is the only existing piece of his work I am aware of. It remains as an interesting and important reminder of a prolific potting community that clearly served the needs of Muskingum County and beyond for decades. Rambo’s descendants and family members carried his craft far into the nineteenth century; I am aware of at least one jug stamped simply, “J. RAMBO,” referring either to Henry Rambo’s son James, the aforementioned Joseph Rambo, or even possibly another family member. One of my favorite parts of studying American stoneware and redware is not only being able to flesh out the lives of long-dead potters, but to, on occasion, identify potters whose names have slipped into historical obscurity but whose memories can be brought back through researching the work they left behind. In this case, simply deciphering the last name of the mystery potter has helped illuminate, albeit very dimly, a potting community as a whole, and, as is the case with Ohio stoneware in general, my hope is that more work is done on this contributor to our American ceramic history.

In 1817, Jonah and Calvin Boynton were in their second year of business together in Albany, NY. They imported high-quality New Jersey clay to Albany and, as Jonah Boynton boasted the previous year, they produced “as handsome real Stone Ware, as ever was manufactured in the United States… .” We have no way of knowing the exact number of stoneware vessels manufactured at the Boynton’s factory in 1817, but we do know that

they produced at least two exceptional keg water coolers with incised fish decorations that year. Both known examples were made at the Boynton factory, both bear the date 1817, both bear artistic incised decorations, both could have been produced in the same kiln firing and ironically, after not being offered for public sale for 192 years, both surfaced this year.

The first water cooler sold in March 21 as Lot 1 in our Spring 2009 Auction of Antique American Stoneware and Redware. Holding the world auction record for the highest price paid at a stoneware specialty auction ($103,500), this cooler is one of the finest surviving examples of Albany stoneware. Adorned with two incised birds and two incised fish filled with vibrant cobalt oxide, this two-gallon keg is also incised “Albany August 7, 1817,” above its spigot hole. The maker’s mark “BOYNTON” confirms the makers of this piece.

The second such water cooler, a three-gallon keg, will be sold in our October 31 auction. Recently consigned to us, this vessel was found roughly 20 years ago in a home in the Fairfield, NY, area and has never before been offered for public sale. Although unsigned, the striking similarity between this example and other known Boynton examples, notably the above-mentioned keg from our March 2009 auction, leaves no doubt of the makers of this piece. With cobalt-oxide equally vibrant to that on the two-gallon Boynton keg, the three-gallon example is also an exceptional representation of early Albany stoneware. A carefully-incised star-shaped blossom flanked by flowering vines adorns the front upper portion of the cooler and two fish face the incised date “1817″ on either side.

But the most exciting aspect of the newly-discovered keg is the large incised name, which fills a large portion of the middle of the keg’s front. The potter carefully incised in bold block letters “Doct.. Jonn. Sherwood / Fairfield / 1817″ onto the front of the cooler and research has revealed that this example is as historically significant as it is visually appealing. Dr. Jonathan Sherwood was an instrumental figure in the founding and

operation of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of the Western District of New York (commonly, Fairfield Medical College). Officially founded in 1812, the Fairfield Medical College was the eleventh medical school established in the United States and the first west of the Hudson River. Only surviving until 1841, when the new medical school in Albany became the preferred institution for studying medicine in the region, Fairfield graduated over 600 doctors throughout its brief existence.

Sherwood was a practicing physician in Fairfield and a founding member of the board of trustees at Fairfield Medical College. Additionally, he served as the school’s registrar and received an official medical degree from Fairfield in 1818. Evidence of Sherwood’s impact on the school survive to this day in the form of letters and a pamphlet that he authored. Several letters that he wrote to Dr. Lyman Spalding, Fairfield Medical College’s first president, are published in Dr. Lyman Spalding: the originator of the United States pharmacopoeia… by Dr. James Alfred Spalding. Most letters concern guest lecturers, ordering books, enrolling students and the like, but one letter published on page 232 of Spalding’s book illustrates the greater concerns of Sherwood and his contemporaries. Sherwood wrote in great detail of the United States military’s campaign in Canada and the subsequent death of General Pike along with 200 American troops when the British detonated hidden underground munitions. Additionally, Sherwood authored, as registrar, the pamphlet, “Ordinances of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, of the Western District, of the State of New-York.”

While most stoneware presentation pieces bear the names of people or institutions that carry little to no historic significance, this water cooler was made for a man about whom we know a great deal. While a presentation water cooler this early is highly unusual, the fact that the Boyntons made this example for a man who left a mark on history that is still remembered today makes this piece even more appealing. One can imagine Sherwood using this cooler in his office at Fairfield. And given the beauty and symmetry of this keg, I believe it was exactly what the doctor ordered.

Good Evening Everyone,

Tony, Luke, Mark and I are very excited and proud to announce the marriage of our eldest son, Brandt, to Dr. Janna Pachuski on Saturday, August 15, 2009. Janna is a pediatrician who is Chief Resident at the Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh. Brandt will now be residing in Pittsburgh, PA, and will continue to be a very important part of our business. He will, of course, still be present at all of our auctions. We hope you will join us in wishing them a long, happy and prosperous life together.

Happily Yours,

Barbara Zipp

Many agree that John Bell was one of the most creative American potters of the 19th century, with a highly diverse product line unlike most of his contemporaries. His career spanned over fifty years in Hagerstown, MD, Winchester, VA, and Waynesboro, PA, and during that time his products included cobalt-decorated utilitarian stoneware, simple and high-styled redware in a wide variety of forms and glazes, various molded household objects, and molded and hand-modeled animal figures. Bell’s works are included in some of the nation’s finest private folk art and museum collections, including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Henry Ford Museum, Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts, and Winterthur. This icon of American folk pottery is perhaps best known for his distinctive dotted tulip decoration, usually consisting of circular or oval petal flanked by thinner petals and accented with a series of brushed cobalt dots lining the top edge of the blossom.

The dotted tulip motif is commonly found on Bell’s salt-glazed stoneware, often applied over a kaolin slip to improve the color of the clay and decoration. The design is also frequently found applied in manganese on the unglazed exteriors of some of his redware jar forms. It is also seen, albeit very rarely, applied in cobalt on Bell’s redware over a glazed surface, most notably on his celadon-glazed redware jugs and pitchers. One such jug bears the initials “C F B,” indicating it was likely made by Bell’s son, Charles Frederick Bell. Two other examples of this style can be seen on p. 31 of George and Connie Manger’s Pottery of the Shenandoah and Cumberland Valleys.

Two early examples of John Bell redware pictured in H.E. Comstock’s The Pottery of the Shenandoah Valley Region are decorated with a tulip design, which can be viewed as a precursor to his dotted tulip motif. Both were made before 1845, when he began producing stoneware.  A very rare large-sized redware jar, pictured on page 116, plate 4.96, is decorated with an extensive cobalt tulip design over a whitish slip. A phenomenal tin-glazed teapot, pictured on page 126, plate 4.132, is decorated with a similar, vertical design in brown and green slip. Both of these early examples feature a ball-shaped petal flanked on each side by two very thin petals. Neither exhibits the dotted embellishment known on pieces produced years later.

As is the case with most stoneware decorators, it is unknown what inspired Bell to make this his trademark decoration, though it bears a resemblance to PA toleware decoration of the period (Comstock, p. 117). It appears that Bell’s tulips did not go unnoticed. Dotted brushwork on the floral designs of stoneware produced by John Young from Harrisburg, PA, circa 1854, and Samuel Irvine  of Newville, PA, circa 1865,  indicate that Bell’s style was probably being emulated by competitors in the state.

We have been consigned a very fine example of tulip-decorated John Bell stoneware for our October 31 auction, a three-gallon jug marked simply “JOHN BELL,” which descended in a Hagerstown, MD family. Its taller, thinner  spout and shapely form, which is slightly more ovoid than most of Bell’s stoneware jugs, suggests it may have been produced in the very early years of his stoneware production in Waynesboro, PA, circa 1845 to 1850. The form closely relates to an extremely rare early Bell stoneware jug sold through Crocker Farm in May 2008, which bears the abbreviated mark “J. BELL.” It is pictured below. That jug is the only example of Bell stoneware we have seen bearing this early mark, usually found on redware pieces made before 1850. The clay color and cobalt band around the spout are also noticeably similar to the jug we will be offering in October, further supporting the notion that both jugs were made early into Bell’s stoneware venture.

Most noteworthy about the jug is its elaborate cobalt slip decoration extending vertically from base to shoulder on each side. The design consists of two long stems bearing two smaller tulips, swags, and stylized dashed brushwork, each culminating in a very large dot-embellished tulip at the shoulder. These tulips are two of the largest I have observed on a piece of John Bell pottery, measuring about five inches wide each. Such profuse decoration is rarely seen on Bell’s jugs, suggesting this piece may have been made for a special client. The decoration on a standard Bell jug of this size is usually relegated to the shoulder area, typically having a tulip on each side and a third design on the front. An example of a fairly typical Bell jug, made circa 1860-1875, is pictured below.

Another interesting feature of the jug to be sold on October 31 is a small incised design, composed of two leaves connected by a stem, which underscores the three-gallon capacity mark. It may have been impressed rather than incised, made as part of the jug’s three-gallon capacity stamp.  I do not recall seeing this treatment on another piece of Bell pottery.

Since handling nearly four-hundred pieces of Bell pottery from Waynesboro, PA, the work of this master craftsman never ceases to amaze me in its variety, quality, and artistry. It is clear that Bell’s purpose for this jug was two-fold, as was the case for so many 19th century potters. While designed to be used as a household good, the jug’s highly decorative nature  reveals Bell’s intent to impress its owner with a thing of beauty.