Very Rare Baltimore Stoneware Jar with Royal Oak, Maryland Advertising (Eastern Shore of MD)

Summer 2020 Stoneware Auction

Lot #: 66

Price Realized: $1,080.00

($900 hammer, plus 20% buyer's premium)

PLEASE NOTE: This result is 4 years old, and the American ceramics market frequently changes. Additionally, small nuances of color, condition, shape, etc. can mean huge differences in price. If you're interested in having us sell a similar item for you, please contact us here.

Summer 2020 Auction Catalog

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Very Rare One-Gallon Stoneware Jar with Royal Oak, MD Advertising, Stamped "P. HERRMANN," Baltimore, MD, circa 1875, cylindrical jar with tooled shoulder and squared rim, featuring the impressed and cobalt-highlighted advertising, "FROM / S S THOMPSON / DEALER IN DRY GOODS / GROCERIES&C / ROYAL OAK." Reverse of jar impressed with Peter Herrmann one-gallon capacity mark. Royal Oak is a small town in Talbot County, Maryland, on the Eastern Shore of the state, located four miles southeast of more-well-known St. Michael's. Solomon Sharp Thompson was born in or about 1844 and grew up in Baltimore, attending the Maryland Institute School of Design as a teenager. In September of 1861, while only about 17 years old, he entered the Maryland Fifth Regiment and served admirably in the Civil War for the next four years, rising to the rank of Captain and being wounded in action on two separate occasions: in Seven Pines, Virginia on October 27, 1863 and at Fair Oaks, Virginia, on October 27, 1864, exactly one year later. By 1870 he had moved to the Eastern Shore and set up shop as a merchant in Royal Oak--an occupation he would hold for the next few decades. For at least a brief period around the end of the 19th century, Thompson would serve as Talbot County Commissioner. According to a family genealogy, he died in 1908. Few examples of stoneware bearing advertising from this town are known. A 1 3/8" rim chip on reverse. A 2 3/4" hairline from rim on reverse. A small chip and two tiny nicks to shoulder molding. Some minor in-the-firing roughness to rim.