Pandora Loved Her Box

QUESTION: I love old boxes and want to start a box collection. But where do I begin? What sort of boxes are highly collectible?

ANSWER: Collecting old boxes is a great introduction into collecting antiques. Boxes are small enough so as not to take up too much room, yet intriguing enough to keep you interested as your collection grows.

Legend says that when Prometheus stole fire from heaven, Zeus, the king of the gods, took vengeance by presenting Pandora to Prometheus' brother Epimetheus. Pandora opened a box left in her care containing sickness, death and many other unspecified evils which were then released into the world. And so antique boxes offer mysteries as to the contents they once held.

Boxes are popular with collectors. The shape of a box reveals clues as to what it once held while the quality and type of workmanship are a key to the type of individual that owned and used it. And when you life the lid of an antique box, you’ll smell exotic aromas of times gone by—the scent of peppery clove, the fruity wood smell of tobacco, the delicate odor of beeswax or bayberry.

With the passing of time, the styles and functions of boxes have changed . Early settlers used rustic wooden and tin boxes to hold necessities like salt, flour, and candles. Colonials in Ben Franklin's day toted their snuff in convenient pocket-size boxes, the elaborateness of which indicated a gentleman's social standing. Elegant Victorian ladies who indulged in the luxury of lace gloves and cloth beauty patches kept them in ornate silk- and velvet-covered boxes. Today,  boxes like these bring a bit of history to any room and can be used to hold keepsakes or simply enjoyed for their own unique charms. So you want to start a box collection? What’s involved?



Before you buy any antique box, research it carefully. If you're looking for boxes made in the late 19th century, for example, read books on the subject, view historical displays of that period in museums, and browse antique shops and shows.  Once you decide on the type of boxes you want to collect, go to auctions, estate sales, and quality flea markets to see what's available.

Once you begin finding boxes to add to your collection , select on the best ones and avoid those that show more than normal wear. Bypass wooden boxes with warped veneers, cracks, and damaged hinges. Check porcelain, pottery, and glass boxes for chips and cracks, and avoid metal boxes that have bad dents. Always buy the best your budget will allow. Quality boxes do appreciate in value with time. Plan to keep any box you purchase at least 10 years to realize this appreciation.

Box collectors particularly favor those handmade by American craftsmen in the 19th century. Many of these are rustic and were designed to hold everyday possessions, such as salt and seasonings or grooming aids. The contents of a box usually determined its shape. A box made for a three-cornered hat, for instance, was triangular, while a candle box was long and narrow. Craftsmen decorated some boxes with carving or delicate hand-painted designs while they left others plain.

Brightly colored boxes made by Pennsylvania Germans, and boxes with finger-style joinings made by Shakers are excellent examples of folk art, and command high prices today. Fortunately, most antique shops and shows have many other types of primitive boxes at reasonable prices.

Boxes made during the early 20th century are also gaining popularity with collectors. Victorian women used some of the most common ones, made of cardboard covered with silk, velvet, paper, or shells, to store gloves, handkerchiefs, sewing items, and trinkets. You’ll find these boxes for $15-20 and up. Other early 20th-century examples include assorted sizes of Japanese lacquered  boxes, selling for $20 or more, small brass Oriental ones with metal appliques, and porcelain "fairing boxes," originally sold at English country fairs. You’ll usually find these “fairings” in antiques shops or at shows, starting at around $125.

Collecting boxes can be addictive because there are so many different kinds out there. The more focused your collection is, the better.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 30,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about  La Belle Epoque in the 2020 Spring Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.

The First Lawn Chair

QUESTION: We’ve had a Windsor chair in our family as far back as I can remember. I believe it belonged to my great-great grandmother. Today, I use it as a chair at my computer desk. What can you tell me about this chair?

ANSWER: You have a standard bow-back Windsor chair, the kind found in just about every upper class household in Colonial America. While most people consider them delicate antiques, they’re quite sturdy and have many uses.

Today, the ubiquitous white modeled plastic patio chair appears on decks and patios throughout the world. It’s a serviceable chair, easily stacked and stored. But this isn’t the first chair of its kind. In fact, the lowly Windsor chair holds that honor.

One of the most graceful and usable of all traditional chairs, the Windsor is also the most successful piece of furniture in American history. Its origins, however, are English, dating back to the turned and joined stools of 16th-Century England. The name probably derives from Windsor, where a prolific chairmaker  produced and sold the chairs in the 18th Century. He sent them down the Thames River to London where people referred to them as coming "up from Windsor."

Wheelwrights rather than cabinetmakers made Windsor chairs in England. They remained farmhouse or tavern furniture for a long time. But here in America, homeowners embraced the Windsor as a sort of all-around chair. They could be stored in a hallway and brought into any room that needed more seating when guests arrived. They could be easily carried. And they could be brought outdoors to provide seating on the lawn on hot summer days. Even the most prominent members of Colonial communities used them. George Washington seated his guests on the East portico of Mount Vernon in 30 Windsor chairs.

As a piece of furniture, the Windsor holds historical significance. Thomas Jefferson sat in a bow-back. writing-arm Windsor while composing the first draft of the Declaration of Independence in late June of 1776. And when Benjamin Franklin and other members of the Continental Congress voted to secede from the mother country on , July 1, 1776 in Independence Hall, they sat in bow-back Windsors.

There are eight different kinds of American Windsors, including the low-back, or Philadelphia Windsor, named for the city where a craftsman constructed the first Windsor in the colonies, the comb-back, fan-back, bow-back, loop-back, arch-back or New England armchair, rod-back, and arrow-back. Each had its distinct use. Windsor makers socketed all parts together except for the shaped arms of the fan-back, arrow-back, and rod-back chairs. On these, they doweled the inner ends of the arms or screwed them to the back uprights.

Windsor makers preferred pine, whitewood, and basswood for seats, hickory or ash for spindles, maple. yellow birch, or beech for turned legs. stretchers, and supports, and hickory, oak, ash, or beech for hoops. bows, or combs. And because of this, makers gave their Windsors several coats of dark green paint. In the 19th century, small factory workshops produced Windsors of pine and maple. And even to this day, craftsmen still use the same time-tested techniques for constructing reproduction Windsors.

The most common form of Windsor is the bow-back with its elliptical seat and seven tapered spindles that pierce a semi-circular arm rail and bowed top rail.

I Scream, You Scream...We All Scream for Ice Cream

QUESTION: I have an old pewter or white metal cylinder form which stands about 8 inches tall and has three parts: a decorative molded top in the shape of a bunch of fruit, a long tube center that’s ribbed on the inside, and a screw-on base that supposedly belonged to my great-grandmother. Can you tell me what it is?

ANSWER: What you have is what’s known as a banquet ice cream mold, topped by a sculpted bunch of fruit with leaves. This type of mold, made of pewter, dates from the early 1900's and would have been used for parties or holiday gatherings.

Ice cream is a frozen dessert usually made from dairy products, such as milk and cream, often combined with fruits or other flavors. It’s origins can be traced back to at least the 4th century B.C.E. when people living in the Persia (in today’s Iraq and Iran) would place snow in a bowl and pour grape juice concentrate over it, inventing what has come to be known as the snow cone.

During the first century A.D. , Roman Emperor Nero had ice brought from the mountains and topped it with fruit. But it wasn’t until the reign of China's King Tang in the 7th century that the idea of icy milk concoctions became popular, a idea that would ultimately become fashionable in European royal courts.

Arabs were perhaps the first to use milk as a major ingredient in the production of ice cream. They sweetened it with sugar rather than fruit juices, and came up with ways to produce it commercially. By the 10th century, ice cream had spread to Baghdad, Cairo, and Damascus. Makers used milk or cream, plus some yogurt, and flavored it with dried fruits and nuts.

Charles I of England so loved his "frozen snow" that he offered his ice cream maker a lifetime pension in return for keeping the formula secret. But it was the Quaker colonists who first introduced ice cream to America in 1772. During colonial times, confectioners sold ice cream at their shops in New York and other cities and some of the founding fathers, including George Washington, Ben Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson regularly ate and served ice cream. First Lady Dolley Madison served it at her husband's Inaugural Ball in 1813.

In 1843, the U.S. Government granted Nancy Johnson of Philadelphia a patent for a small-scale hand-cranked ice cream freezer. Eventually, the creation of the ice cream soda by Robert Green in 1874 added ice cream's popularity.

Decorative molds, enhancing ice cream's presentation at the table, appeared at fancy parties in the late 19th century, a tradition borrowed from British molded puddings. The most notable of the American mold firms were Eppelsheimer & Co., Krauss Co. and Schall & Co. However, the first ones came from European makers. Makers used pewter, white metal or tin to create a variety of forms ranging from animal, human and bird figures to floral, architectural, and holiday-oriented themes that came in various sizes.
                               
Joseph Micelli, Sr., one of the country’s premier mold makers, sculpted them with remarkable details of animals, people, flowers, fruit and even vegetables for the Eppelsheimer & Co. of New York. Their molds have E & Co NY and the mold’s catalog number stamped on the bottom.
 
The molds produced by Krauss Company, also of New York, are distinguishable by their integrated mold hinges rather than soldered hinges. 

Ice cream molds are now highly collectible. The barrel banquet mold in question above sells for around $250, but smaller ones in the shape of individual bananas, pears, peaches, and other fruit and flowers sell for $30 to $70. From the outside, these molds often look plain, but inside they include minute details. While the barrel mold was meant to be unscrewed and lifted off, most ice cream molds, as with their chocolate counterparts, have hinges that allow them to be broken open to release the creamy confection.