FAHRENHEIT 2300 by Crocker Farm

This is the story of a man whose middle name was “Omega.” One of the better middle names I have ever run across, it probably derived from the Christian epithet for Jesus, “the Alpha and Omega.” The grandeur of this middle name was belied, a bit, by the ordinary, typically American name of the man who bore it: Dan Thomas. Dan, like countless other potters, pottery workers, and artisans of all stripes, slipped in and out of life without making an indelible mark on the history of his trade. But as a sixteen-year-old boy, he cared enough about a small, molded stoneware lion he made to inscribe the bottom in his haphazard handwriting–and it is thanks to this artifact that we can now recognize Dan as part of the grand history of American ceramics.

Dan Omega Thomas was born on March 9, 1877 in Thomastown, Ohio, “a considerable village … two miles south of Akron–composed largely of coal miners, mostly Welsh, who … worked the coal mines of that vicinity.” Dan was the son of one of these sorts, a coal-mining Welshman; his mother had immigrated from Wales, as well. In 1893, while just sixteen years old, Dan was already working at some neighborhood pottery, of which there were several. On December 13 of that year, possibly as a Christmas gift, he molded a stoneware figure of a reclining lion, decorating the beast with some sort of brown glaze. On the underside, he scrawled, “DAN OMeGA THOMAS / THOMASTOWN / DEC 13 1893.”

The extremely prolific Akron potteries put bread on the table of Dan’s family, at least several of whom worked in their shops. Dan’s nephews, Daniel and Ben, both found employment at the Whitmore, Robinsons & Co. (“one of the most extensive and complete establishments of its kind in the United States,” and located at the nearby corner of East Market Street and Case Avenue) circa 1900. His brother, William, was a potter, and it was probably he who produced a molded fish pitcher–with a fairly similar glaze to his brother’s lion–pictured in The Potters and Potteries of Summit County …, by C. Dean Blair. A few other Thomas’s show up as potters in the 1900 Akron city directory, as well, but I have not determined if they were relatives. 1900 is also the first year I found young Dan in the directory, where he was apparently working at the Akron China Company on Second Ave., by the Cleveland Terminal & Valley Railroad, producers of “White Granite and Porcelain Ware.”

Dan’s whole neighborhood was rife with potters in that year–so full of them, in fact, that the census taker bothered to differentiate their various functions at the manufactories. Many, like Dan, were simply “Potters,” but others show up as “Potter (presser),” “Potter (turner),” “Potter (packer),” “Kiln-burner,” “Pottery decorator,” and “China ware moulder.” I’m not sure whether Dan could deftly throw on a wheel, or if he was more of a “pottery worker” who could make things in a mold, but I am fairly certain he fell into the latter category.

Dan’s career as a potter was not particularly long-lived. Around the time he showed up in the 1900 city directory, he married his wife, Clara, and the two had a son, Harold. By 1910, he was working as the manager of a novelty store; by 1920, he had become a jeweler–an occupation he would hold until his death. Around seven o’clock on the evening of August 28, 1925, Dan was driving his car near “the river” (I assume the Upper Cuyahoga River), when some bizarre “gasoline explosion” sent him into the water, drowning him. Whether the explosion came from his own gas tank or some outside fuel container, I do not know. He left behind his widow and his twenty-one-year-old son, who succeeded him in the jewelry business. His tragic end capped a life that saw the end of the great American stoneware industry, as mass-production took over and the specialized skills of the potter’s trade fell by the wayside. But his enthusiastic signature on a small piece he made in a mold shows that even for those who did not spend years in apprenticeships, learning to turn graceful forms, the universal desire to create–and to leave behind one’s work–was present.

A Note about Sources: As can be gleaned from my text, I used applicable Akron area censuses and city directories. The two quotes (one about Thomastown and the other about Whitmore, Robinsons & Co.) came from Fifty Years and Over of Akron and Summit County, by Samuel A. Lane (1892), pg. 986 and pp. 479-489, respectively. I found Dan’s tragic fate in his death record, which survives in the records of the Summit County Department of Health. Dan’s birth date, birth place, and marriage date were found in a strange place: Over ten years ago, someone found what was possibly Dan’s family bible in a basement amongst her grandmother’s effects. She had no idea how it got there, but she sought an answer on a popular genealogy message board.

The “MOORE & FOOTE” crock to be sold in our upcoming July 17 stoneware and redware auction is a very interesting example of American advertising stoneware. The impressed mark is one of the longest, most detailed I have ever seen:

MOORE & FOOTE WHOLESALE DEALERS IN GROCERIES, PROVISIONS,
WHITEFISH & TROUT STONEWARE PAINTS OILS, DYEWOODS SASH &
GLASS ANCHORS ROPES, CANVASS & OTHER SHIPCHANDLERY

I did my best in transcribing the punctuation, and also added spaces where, as you can see in the photo below, the potter did not bother to. I am also fairly certain the last character is supposed to be a “Y,” but it looks like the pottery had to improvise and use an upside-down “7″ or some other stamp.

Moore and Foote—Franklin Moore and George Foote—were not potters; they were very prominent merchants in the city of Detroit. In a book written in the latter part of the nineteenth century, History of Detroit and Wayne County and Early Michigan, the author, Silas Farmer, wrote,

In 1835 Mr. [Franklin] Moore engaged in the grocery business, and carried it on alone until 1837, when his store and stock were destroyed by fire. The same year he started a new store …, the firm continuing until 1846, and doing a large and ever-increasing business. It was succeeded by the wholesale and retail grocery house of Moore & Foote, George Foote being the junior partner. In 1859, on the admission of John J. Bagley, the name of the firm was changed to Moore, Foote & Company, and for many years they did the largest business of any grocery firm in the State, their sales aggregating millions of dollars annually. (History of Detroit and Wayne County and early Michigan by Silas Farmer, 1890, Volume 2, pg. 1220)

An item I found in a Michigan newspaper printed in 1869 was effusive in its praise of Moore and Foote:

A few weeks since a justly deserved compliment was paid through the columns of the Mining Gazette, to the high character of the well-known house of Messrs. MOORE, FOOTE & CO., of Detroit. There is not, probably, a merchant or mining company on Lake Superior who cannot vouch for every word of that high encomium. Ever courteous and affable in their intercourse with patrons, and exceeding lenient to all who are willing, though at all times unables to meet their obligations promptly, these gentlemen have won a place in the estimation of their many friends on the Lake, second to no other house east or west.
(Lake Superior Miner [Ontonagon, Michigan], 9/11/1869)

Moore and Foote were apparently kingpins of the Detroit merchant scene.

The crock itself may have been made under the auspices of some pottery owned by Moore and Foote, but very probably not, as is almost always the case with advertising stoneware such as this. It very closely resembles Wisconsin stoneware that I have seen, but it wasn’t necessarily made there, and could have been made in Detroit or elsewhere in Michigan or nearby Ohio by some potter using the same style. Little has been written about potters working in this area of the Great Lakes region, but my main initiative in writing this brief article is to establish the identities of the merchants Moore & Foote, and to discuss what I believe is a fascinating aspect of American stoneware production.

Growing up around stoneware and seeing the myriad advertising pieces that stand alongside those that bear potters’ marks (or no marks at all), I tended to take for granted their existence without thinking much about why they were there. But I think exploring their origin helps us not only to better understand these piece themselves, but to better understand the nineteenth century American stoneware industry in general.

Merchants who bought stoneware directly from potteries who emblazoned the vessels with their names were obviously concerned with “getting their name out there.” (For another discussion of merchant stoneware, see this article, written about one year ago). But different merchants seem to have had different mindsets about what they were accomplishing when they ordered their stoneware. Sometimes the marks seem like requisite afterthoughts, affixed mostly because it was the proper thing to do, and because the potter did it for free or cheaply. I hesitate to lower stoneware to the critical level of a free pen given out at a trade show, but I do think the same mindset always came into play with advertising stoneware—in using a vessel (or a pen) on a daily basis, the consumer is constantly reminded of whatever firm’s name is imprinted thereon. Often (I would say usually) the jug, jar, or bottle bore simply the merchant’s name and (though not always) his city. I’m not sure how much control over the wording on a particular pot the merchant had, but my educated guess is that in most cases the pottery had a standard way of handling things, which could be altered for extra money or through some other arrangement. So if Smith & Jones in Scranton, Pennsylvania, dealers in turpentine, wanted a group of jugs to sell their turpentine in, the pottery, by default, probably marked them “SMITH & JONES / SCRANTON, PA.” Had Messrs. Smith and Jones wanted their jug to spell out “DEALERS IN TURPENTINE, &C.,” they most certainly could have had that done, but it might have cost more money—or, perhaps, taken nothing more than extra negotiation or a friendly request.

So what was the point of stamping your name (and sometimes city) alone on a particular piece of pottery? I’m sure this often confused consumers. How was someone supposed to always know the difference between a maker’s mark and a merchant’s mark? Suppose they saw a beautiful jug and wanted to contact the pottery for a bunch of their own? If all they had to go on was the name impressed in the clay, wouldn’t they assume that person was the potter? This is the same problem we often encounter today in evaluating pottery. By now so many potteries are documented, but unknown marks, or barely-documented ones, turn up all the time. Often a piece is so obviously made by a known pottery that the mystery mark on it is very certainly that of some other business owner. But sometimes not, and we have to turn to paper documents to sort things out.

Often these names were so well-known to consumers of their time period that no further introduction was needed. This seems to be the case for Moore and Foote, though they still felt the need to be long-winded. But what happened when this wasn’t so? I’m sure, actually, that this was partly the point. Any particular pot stamped with a merchant’s mark was meant to direct you to that merchant. You could buy stoneware directly from a pottery, but you could also buy it from a middle-man—and that was the business relationship that the mark was supposed to initiate. This might seem like a bad deal for the potter, but it was not. Whether a pottery sold its stoneware to an agent or sold it right out of their warehouse was probably neither here nor there, and any lost mark-up that they normally enjoyed in dealing with the general public was simply the cost of doing business.

In many cases, then, I believe the merchant shop, for all intents and purposes, wanted the consumer to see a particular pot as its product, not that of the local (or distant) stoneware manufactory. For small towns where the stoneware industry was non-existent, I’m sure customers had little choice (or barely knew better) than to procure all of their stoneware through merchants. But in localities where the stoneware industry was booming, and well-known to residents—say, Bennington, Vermont, or Baltimore, Maryland—the consumer was presented with a choice between merchants or potteries. I wonder if some potteries, like most modern-day companies providing consumer goods, simply did not deal with the general public. I really doubt this, however; potters needed to make money wherever they could, and often bartered for their ware, taking necessities like firewood in exchange. Sometimes, I suppose, the price a person paid at a merchant store was the same or even less than they paid directly from the potter, depending on what the merchant paid for the ware, and what specials they might have been running on that particular day.

This implies, however, that the merchants were even selling stoneware as a standalone commodity. In the case of any theoretical company like Smith and Jones, who sold nothing but turpentine and a few other odds and ends, the only stoneware they sold would probably be given over as containers for their primary product. So a customer who needed turpentine also received a stoneware jug for his or her money. Smith and Jones wouldn’t have even bothered dealing with stoneware manufacturers if they didn’t need vessels to hold their turpentine. Taking businesses like this into account, as far as distribution of stoneware went, there were probably only a few different types of merchant shops.

There were those who sold specific consumables like liquor or turpentine, and who only provided stoneware as containers to customers. In these cases, the stoneware may have been handed over as part of some deposit system.

There were merchants who acted as brokers for stoneware potters—either selling the stoneware of one particular pottery at a time, or maybe offering the wares of a few different ones. In my Commeraw article of 5/31/2009, I noted that a Portland, Maine, merchant had advertised, in an 1828 newspaper, “a large assortment of ‘Croliu’s’ [sic] New York painted, superior ware,” claiming that he was “agent for several extensive New York manufactories” of all kinds of goods. In my 6/8/2009 article on the Boston advertising jug, I likewise mentioned how David D. Wells, a Boston merchant, had advertised that he was a “Wholesale and Retail Dealer in every description of BENNINGTON STONE WARE” in the 1859 Boston city directory. An extreme example of these types of dealers would be someone like D.P. Hobart in Williamsport, PA, who sold ware made at the local pottery, which was stamped “D.P. HOBART, Agent / Williamsport, PA.” Within this framework, there were probably infinite iterations of how a particular firm did business. Some probably openly sold, say, stoneware marked “J. & E. NORTON / BENNINGTON, VT.” Others sold pieces like the subject of this article—made by a stoneware pottery, but marked with the merchant’s name. Those businessmen who chose to have their names emblazoned on a jug or jar had varying philosophies on the “ad space” of the vessel, and those that saw it as a valuable marketing tool had nice, descriptive stamps fashioned. Others were content with their name, and maybe address. For those that only sold stoneware marked with their own name, I wonder how often they marketed it as the product of a particular pottery, or how forthcoming they were as to its origin. And still other merchants probably sold a mixture of both—for instance, some marked with the Nortons’ stamp, some other identical ones marked with their own.

But the vast majority of merchant shops—especially in the case of run-of-the-mill general merchants—probably provided stoneware in both the above two ways. Someone could come into the shop and buy grain, liquor, or pickles, and take it home in a stoneware vessel. Another person might be in need of a group of containers for his home or farm, and take back a quantity of empty stoneware. Consumers buying stoneware as its own product or merely as a container could have ended up with pottery marked by the maker or marked with the merchant’s name, probably at the discretion of said merchant. In some cases, the merchant probably saw, say, the Nortons’ stoneware as a good, salable brand, and thus favored it as the product they offered. Others probably saw more value in having their own name affixed, and that was the product they offered. Perhaps, in fact, stoneware bearing merchants’ names was (usually) that designed only to be sold as a secondary container, and stoneware bearing the potter’s name was that supposed to be sold as its own product.

In the end, this brief discussion probably provides more questions than it does answers. But I think they are questions worth considering as we attempt to understand this eighteenth and nineteenth century product we value as art and how, and why, the general public bought it.

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.

Growing up, I remember reading about Anna pottery in antiques books and was always fascinated by the stuff. A large snake jug I saw in an art magazine particularly made an impression on me. The jug was made of blue-decorated stoneware, something my family had been selling at antique shows for years, and yet the object seemed like something altogether different. The level of sophistication of the jug was unlike most of the stoneware we had sold, or seen for that matter. It was imbued with a sense of motion and seemed alive as several hand-modeled snakes slithered across its surface and formed its handle. A horrified man ‘s head and limbs protruded through the walls of the jug, his body trapped inside. If one of these objects was discovered from a different pottery, it would be hailed as a potter’s single greatest masterpiece. What is amazing is that two brothers, Wallace and Cornwall Kirkpatrick, who owned and operated Anna Pottery in Anna, IL, from 1859 to 1896, produced a large number of these extraordinary items. The intricate detail evident in their snake jugs and other highly decorated stoneware pieces makes one wonder, “When did they find the time to make standard utilitarian pots?”

The cover story of the April 24th issue of Antique Week, entitled “Anna Pottery Full of Imagination,” focuses on the Kirkpatricks and their various products. Since setting a record for an Anna pig bottle back in 2004, we have been fortunate enough to handle several fine examples of the brothers’ pottery, and were contacted by Antique Week for their article. My father, Anthony Zipp, was interviewed and some of the pieces we have sold through our auction,  Crocker Farm, are pictured. This article discusses the personal lives and interests of the Kirkpatricks and offers insight into how these influenced their work. Numerous Anna pottery forms are discussed and opinions on the current market are presented. The article is both a visually-appealing and informative read. You can read an online version of the article here.

Anna Pottery has been steadily on the rise in value over the past several years. It remains highly desirable today for a few important reasons. To begin with, it is rare enough to keep serious collectors seeking it and the value high. Secondly, and most importantly, it is pleasing to the eye. In the antiques world in general,  collectors love figural forms. In Anna pottery, human and animal shapes abound. There are pig bottles, frog inkwells, applied dung beetles and salamanders, male and female figures, and  snakes of all sizes. Many such objects and vessles are incised with whimsical and humorous phrases, related to the Temperance Movement or local politics. The all-too-well-known pig bottle, which features a drinking spout at the pig’s rear, is often painstakingly incised with a map of the Midwest. The highly decorative nature of these objects have made them quite popular in folk art circles, of which stoneware may make up only a small percentage. Examples can be found in notable collections across the country, including the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum in Williamsburg, VA, and the American Folk Art Museum in Manhattan. Similar to Shenandoah pottery, Moravian redware, and Pennsylvania-German sgraffitoware, Anna pottery has managed to cross the boundary of limited, regional interest.

Finally, Anna pottery makes a statement and a lasting impression on us. It will turn heads and draw attention even from people who have little interest in antiques or ceramics. When I’ve told my late 20′s friends (who know nothing about antiques) about selling an Anna pig bottle with a hole in its rear, it initiates some sort of response, a chuckle or look of disgust, and suddenly they’re interested. (I can also remember a New England folk art dealer’s look of surprise when he saw the underside of an Anna shoo fly jug a few years back during our auction preview.) It is a testament to the ingenuity of the Kirkpatrick brothers that their cleverly-crafted pieces still elicit a response in us over a hundred years later. And it is the pieces that make the biggest impression on us that we remember the best, love the best, and are truly worth collecting.