From Hunting Tools to Folk Art

 

QUESTION: My grandfather was an avid duck hunter. To help him catch his prey, he used decoys. Some of them were rather plain but one was fancier than the rest, painted in full color and detail. Since I always admired them, he left them to me when he passed away last year. I still admire them and would like to know a bit about decoy history. Also, I’d like to possibly add to the ones he left me. 

ANSWER: Collectible decoys run the gamut from fancy ones made by famous carvers to plainer ones made by hunters, themselves. It all depends on how much you can afford to spend and what type of decoy—there are several—you want to add to those from your grandfather. But before you consider purchasing any, it’s a good idea to consider their history.

Long before English colonists arrived in America, Native Americans used natural materials like mud, fowl carcasses, and bulrushes to create imitations of birds for hunting. Later, colonists began to copy this technique. These imitations, or decoys, successfully attracted live birds, which the hunters would then kill or capture.

But the decoys used by Native Americans weren’t the detailed ones known today. Instead, they were approximations of the form and plumage of the type of birds being hunted. Hunters would weave bullrush into the shape of a bird or form a duck out of clay and stretch the skins of previous kills over the form. Often, they would weave feathers into the decoy and painted the heads and necks to match the colors of type of birds being hunted.

When Europeans first colonized North America, wildfowl filled the skies. Unfortunately, early settlers watched the birds fly over but didn’t know how to get them. In Europe, fowling was a sport for the landed gentry. Since ordinary people didn't own land for hunting, they never learned how to do it. Their guns didn't have the range or accuracy to bag high-flying birds, plus they had no bird-dogs to fetch their kill. 

Colonists copied the Native American's hunting technique, placing groups of decoys, called "rigs," in estuaries and marshes to attract birds. They made their decoys in two basic forms—floaters and stickups. Floating decoys attracted swimming gamebirds, such as ducks, gulls, and swans.  

Typically, they carved the bodies from a solid piece of pine or cedar, then hollowed them out to make them lighter to carry. They carved the heads separately and attached them with wooden dowels. Once assembled, they painted the decoys to match the hunted fowl. They added weights to the bottom of each decoy so they would sit low in the water without flipping over. Hunters made stickups in similar fashion, but made them to represent shorebirds such as sandpiper with legs added and pushed into the muddy shore.

During the second half of the 19th century, demand for game birds and their feathers exploded. Railroads enabled the fowl to be shipped quickly to markets. Victorian millinery fashions made heavy use of decorative bird plumage. Manufacturers produced decoys by the thousands to meet the demand. There were no restrictions on hunting, and market hunters collectively killed thousands of birds a day.

The Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918, between the United States and Great Britain, acting on behalf of Canada, specifically protected migratory birds being decimated by over-hunting. It made it illegal to pursue, hunt, take, capture, kill, or sell migratory birds. Plus the statute didn’t discriminate between live or dead birds and/or bird parts including feathers, eggs and nests.

Consequently, hunters had little need for thousands of decoys. In 1928, the U.S. Congress banned the hunting of shorebirds  Decoy carvers could still make and sell their products anywhere, but there was little need for them. By the 1950s, mass-produced plastic decoys eliminated the need for hand-carved decoys. And by 1960, hand-carved hunting decoys had become a tool of the past. Decoy carving had instead become a folk art. Many hunters discarded or burned their wooden decoys, which at the time seemed worthless. 

To make a decoy, a carver would form the general shape of the decoy’s body using a hatchet and then fine-tune it with a long drawknife. He or she—a few carvers enlisted the help of their wives—would create the head separately from a smaller block of wood using an axe, rather than a hatchet. Then the carver would whittle the head down with a jackknife and attach it to the body using nails or long spikes.

Finally, the carver would sand, prime, and paint the finished decoy in natural colors to lure fowl effectively. By the time of the Civil War, this technique had matured almost to an art form.

While carvers produced different species of decoys—duck, geese, shorebirds, and more, shorebird decoys tend to be more scarce.

Commercial hunters often owned hundreds of decoys, which they would set out in large numbers to attract as many birds as possible. As sport hunting became more prominent among the wealthy, some carvers began making fewer decoys but of higher quality for this new clientele. Sport hunters wanted decoys that were beautiful, not just useful. Eventually, some carvers began making decoys for purely decorative reasons.

Decoys varied in style from region to region, as the environment and species of a given area dictated their design. Decoys in Maine, for example, were often tougher and more rugged in order to withstand the rough waters of the area. Even within regions, decoy designs varied. Some makers built theirs to float, which would attract large fowl like ducks and geese. 

Another group of decoys included stationary “stickups,” which stood on legs in the ground. Still others were two-dimensional profiles also designed as stickups. Some of these stickups stood nearly four feet tall, and floating decoys could be just as long.

Duck decoys weren’t seen as collectors’ items until the 1960s. The market first started with small, niche groups of enthusiasts throughout the United States in the 1950s and 1960s who began collecting antique duck decoys. When Hal Sorenson of Burlington, Iowa, published a magazine called “The Decoy Collector’s Guide,” everything began to change.

Unusual poses (sleeping, swimming, and feeding) are more difficult to render. Such decoys are generally more valuable.

The list of carvers seemed endless, but some names stood out above the rest. Perhaps the most famous practitioner was Elmer Crowel, a masterful carver and painter who lived in Cape Cod, Massachusetts. His decoys generally had carved wings and glass eyes, and he often used a rasp to imitate feathers on the back of his decoys’ heads and on their breasts. In 2000, a preening Canada goose that he carved sold at an auction for $684,500, the current world record for a decoy.

Other notable carvers included Lathrop T. Holmes, who used a limited but expressive palette of colors. “Gus” Wilson’s attention to detail was almost unrivaled, while many of the approximately 10,000 decoys in 50 years made by the Ward Brothers of Maryland were purely decorative. Charles Perdew and his wife, Edna, were a team—he carved and she painted. And Ken Anger perfected the technique of using a rasp to make his decoys look soft and realistic.

In addition to hand-carved decoys, some of the high-quality decoys produced in late-19th-century factories are also highly collectible. The main factories included Mason, Victor, Dodge, Stevens, Peterson, Evans, and Reynolds. Most of these factories used either a duplicating lathe, an assembly line, or both.

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 50,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "Colonial America" in the 2026 Winter 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.

A Slide on the Ice

 

QUESTION: My father has been involved in curling since he was a teenager. Being of Scottish background, curling seems to be in his blood. Over time, he’s amassed quite a collection of curling memorabilia. And while I’m not as interested in participating in curling, I do love the idea of collecting its memorabilia. With all the recent attention that curling got from the recent Winter Olympics, how has the value of memorabilia been affected?

ANSWER: The key to smart collecting is discovering today’s sports-related souvenirs that could become tomorrow’s hot collectible. Spotting trends is the key, especially when a sport skyrockets to international acclaim as just happened with curling at the Milan/Cortina Winter Olympics. 

While most Americans aren’t familiar with curling, the widespread coverage of the sport at the recent games brought it to the forefront, along with the memorabilia that goes with it. Its colorful buttons, stylish pins and embroidered badges often appear at sports shows, flea markets and in online auctions.

Curling developed in 16th-century Scotland where it was played outdoors on frozen ponds or lochs. Simple equipment for the game included natural curling stones and primitive brooms. When slid across the ice by a player, the stone would quite often curve, or curl, as it traveled toward its target, a large bull’s eye. Players used brooms to brush snow and particles from the path of oncoming stones.

The first recorded evidence of the sport came from John McQuhin, a notary from Paisley, Scotland.  A challenge between a monk and a representative of the local Abbot took place on a frozen lake regarding throwing stones across its surface. Eventually, the first curling clubs formed. Curling spread across North America and Europe with Scottish immigrants.  In 1838, the Grand Caledonian Curling Club codified the first universal rules of curling.  Four years later, members demonstrated the game for Queen Victoria. She loved the game and allowed the club to use "Royal" in its official name, changing it to the Royal Caledonian Curling Club.

When Scottish immigrants came to America, they brought the sport of curling with them. It soon spread across Canada and the northern part of the United States. By the mid-19th century, curling clubs prospered in the states surrounding the Great Lakes and in New York City. The Victorians popularized the sport, and its popularity has grown even more today. 

The first official international competition for the sport occurred during the first Winter Olympics in Chamonix, France in 1924.  In 1932, the Olympic Committee downgraded curling to a demonstration sport.  On April 1, 1966, the formation of the International Curling Federation helped to further legitimize the game to once again gain an Olympic spot. Nearly 30 years later, on July 21, 1992, the International Olympic Committee finally gave full medal status to both men and women's curling. 

During the curling season which runs from October to March, it’s estimated that several million people play the game worldwide. In Canada, curling is the second most popular sport next to ice hockey. In the United States, it’s played in 25 states.

Although the game has undergone modernization with uniform equipment, sleek uniforms, and modern facilities with refrigerated ice, the traditions of good will and fair play continue. Curlers play to win but never to humble their opponents. A true curler would rather lose than win unfairly.

The spirit of camaraderie is what attracts many players to curling. At the close of tournaments, known as bonspiels, curlers often exchange their club buttons, embroidered badges, or pins for coveted like pieces from opposing team members. Each club’s piece is unique in size, shape, color and design.

In fact, many curlers also collect the sport’s hats, sweaters, and ephemera-related items. Each button, badge, or pin elicits lasting memories.

So what is this sport all about? Two teams of four players make up the game. The players are respectively lead, second, third and skip. Each player slides round stones across the ice. The stones are concave on the bottom and have a handle on the top. They are slid toward a fixed mark in the center of a circle, called a house. The circle is marked with concentric bands. The object of the game is to slide the heavy granite stones closest to the center. 

Each player delivers two stones alternately with his opponent, beginning with the lead of each team and ending with the skip, who is also the team captain. One point is awarded for each stone that comes to rest nearer the tee than does any rival stone. A team can score up to 8 points with the 16 stones delivered in an end, or inning, unless no stone is in the house or the nearest opposing stones are equidistant, in which case there’s no score. Important strategies of the sport include blocking and knocking out an opponent's stones.

A distinctive part of curling is the use of a corn broom, or brush, by the partners of the deliverer to sweep the ice in the path of the oncoming stone. This is a tradition carried over from the days when people played curling on frozen lakes. It was necessary to clear the snow to provide a path for the oncoming stone. Curlers still sweep today to remove stray ice particles and smooth the surface of the ice, thus assuring the stone a longer ride. 

Prior to the 1950s, most curling brooms were similar to household brooms. In 1958, Fern Marchessault of Montreal inverted the corn straw in the center of the broom. This style of corn broom was referred to as the Blackjack. Today, brushes have replaced traditional corn brooms at every level of curling.

A curler also uses a brush for balance during delivery of the stone and by the skip to indicate where the curler should aim. The ice is meticulously groomed to keep it completely level. Prior to a competition, a member of the ice maintenance crew sprays a mist of water on to the ice to create a pebbled surface that helps guide the stones. Each stone weighs an average of 40 pounds and cannot exceed 44 pounds. Its circumference cannot be more than 36 inches. The minimum height is 4½  inches.

Pins for curling events in different Olympics have saturated the collectibles market and are easy to find. However, curling pins aren’t limited to the Olympics.  Pins from other curling competitions are also popular with players and collectors.  Because of the sport's popularity in Europe, European and specifically Scottish pins are some of the most common. Canadian curling pins are also fairly easy to find.

Popular curling collectibles also include personalized curling ornaments and novelty items like curling stone keychains and coasters. Additionally, collectors value unique memorabilia such as custom curling signs and miniature curling stones.

Antique curling stones are another popular item. The oldest stones hail from Scotland.  These can be more difficult to identify as curling stones often have no trademark or logo. An antique curling stone can cost as much as a new one.

The value of curling collectibles can vary widely based on rarity, condition, and demand. Values have increased significantly in the last 25 years. Items like vintage pins and memorabilia from significant events can fetch from $10 to $30 each while unique curling stones can sell for $50 to $150 for vintage ones to $200 to $700 for those from the late 19th to early 20th centuries. A new 2026 Milan Winter Olympics Curling Pin is selling for $10 to $20.

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 50,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "Colonial America" in the 2026 Winter 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.

Away in a Manger

 

QUESTION: My grandfather left me a beautiful creche which he said his father brought over from Germany in the late 19th century. Can you tell me anything about this and if it is, in fact, German?

ANSWER: You, indeed, have a German creche. From its design, I’d say it dates from the 1890s, possibly a bit before. During the 17th century, Nativity scenes, promoted by the Capuchin, Jesuit and Franciscan orders, gained in popularity as a way for common people to express their joy during the Christmas season.

Nativity scenes gained popularity in the 17th century, promoted by the Capuchin, Jesuit and Franciscan orders. By the 18th century, three centers of crèche culture had emerged—Naples, Italy, Provence, France, and southern Germany and Austria.

Over the years, the Nativity has been portrayed in many ways. In America, the most popular form is the crèche, a word meaning "manger" or "crib" in French. Carved from wood—although some makers use ceramics, glass, straw, fabric, or even plastic—and painted, a crèche usually depicts the entire Nativity scene, including the manger, a star, angels, shepherds, kings and the Holy Family. Although most are miniature in scale, a few church crèches are almost life-size.

Although he didn’t originate the idea, historians credit St. Francis of Assisi with popularizing the Nativity scene. From Italy, the idea spread north across the Alps and finally came to the U.S. with German settlers.

Supposedly, a rich man, Giovanni Vellita, approached St. Francis in December, 1223, asking how he could serve God. St. Francis told him to build a simple, little stable just outside Assisi in the cave at Greccio. This was a time when the average man learned about his faith from the plays he watched, the songs he heard, and the art that lined the walls of the churches.

Much of the celebration of Christmas occurred in churches for a long time. The common worker, much less the very poor, weren’t given much of a place in these celebrations. St. Francis wanted to give the poor people a chance to celebrate. And so the story goes, as midnight approached that Christmas Eve, a great procession wound its way out of Assisi and up the hill to Greccio. Everyone came carrying candles to this new manger they had built for the Holy Child. They celebrated mass that night. Surrounded by an ox and a donkey and by the people of Assisi, all playing the parts of the shepherds and folk of Bethlehem.

Long after St. Francis died, the people of Italy continued to build stables for the Christ Child. Among wealthy Italian families, the simple manger became something incredibly magnificent, the grand Italian Presepio. Naples became the center of the biggest presepi workshops. By the 18th century, these crèches took up whole rooms, indeed, sometimes whole floors of great homes. People traveled from villa to villa to visit and admire these incredible displays, which often took months and a great deal of money to complete.

Sancta Maria Ad Praesepe, later to become the Basilica Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, contains the first recorded free standing set of creche figures, sculpted from stone by Amolfo Di Cambio in 1282. For some time after, nearly all the creches made were life-sized stone or wood. Those in Tyrolean churches had statues with elaborate Baroque costumes. At the same time, inexpensive Nativity scenes made out of painted paper became available to those who couldn’t afford carved figures.

Artisans construct crèches or Nativity sets from a variety of materials. The characters can be carved from wood, formed from wax, papier-mache, or clay, or hand painted on cardboard. They stand in or in front of buildings, ranging from Alpine stables and guest houses to romantic Roman ruins. Others have Middle Eastern-style structures with minarets and domes.

But the best—elaborate and intricately carved figures of wood—came from Bavaria. Their creators stained them with paint to make them lifelike. German creches , often called krippen, can also be made of cast metal, cast painted plaster, cardboard with painted or printed artwork, turned wood or clay. Each Christmas, in scenes made up of rocks, branches, evergreens and moss collected in the woods by the family’s children just before the holiday, the krippe is reborn. Christmas morning finds these scenes around the base of the family’s Christmas tree in what’s called a putz or tree yard.

For many, collecting crèches is an act of faith. Their crèches provide an expression of their Christianity. Mormons are great collectors of crèches. Creating a Nativity scene in a church has been a long-standing tradition among Catholics And there has been increasing interest in collecting Nativity sets among Protestants.

But mostly, people collect crèches because they’re personal, a reflection of intimate family life. They’re about humanity, not religious dogma or ritual. Moving Nativity sets from the church to the home has made them a popular art form.

Among collectible creches, those hardest to find today are those predating World War II.  Adolf Hitler had many of the German molds for creche figures destroyed. At the time, Germany was the premiere maker of creches. 

Nativity sets and crèches vary in value, from some worth over $1,100 to others worth just $5. But for many collectors, their value is intrinsic. They’re also easy to find and buy, which makes them fun to collect. At one point, the Ruby Lane site on the Internet had no less then 300 sets for sale.

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 50,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "Sacred Artifacts" in the 2025 Holiday 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.

An Unlikely Result of the Black Death

 

QUESTION: My family is German by descent. And being so, my grandfather assembled a collection of German beer steins. He left them to me. Rather then just have them sit on a shelf, I’d like to grow the collection. I don’t know anything about antique or even vintage steins and would like to know more before I purchase additional ones. How did steins originate? When were the first ones produced? And how can I tell if a stein has value? 

ANSWER: Those are all good questions. I’m glad to see that you’re interested in curating your grandfather’s collection rather then just packing the steins away or selling them off. 

Believe it or not, German beer steins have a very unlikely and surreal origin. Originally, the Germans produced beer steins to combat health issues that triggered the Bubonic Plague, also known as the Black Death which killed over 25 millions Europeans. Around the same time, hoards of flies began invading central Europe in the late 1400s. The fly invasion, combined with the plague, resulted in Germany passing sanitary laws that required all food and beverage containers to have lids to protect people from the insects.

Strict laws enforcing sanitation on the ingredients, transport, and quality of beer led to a great improvement in the taste of German beer. This made men value beer steins, thus wanting to own their own unique steins. The beer stein became a status symbol and display piece for German families each displaying its family crest.

Beer steins are a popular symbol for both Germany and beer. They come in all kinds of shapes, sizes, and materials, including earthenware, metal, pewter, wood, ivory, ceramic, porcelain, crystal, creamware, silver, and glass. Most have handles, a hinged lid and are decorated or hand-painted.

The decorative elements of beer steins may represent traditional motifs, regalia, a coat of arms, or depict a person’s occupation. Some are embellished with three-dimensional artwork and touch on a theme. You may also find a collectible series of beer steins with themed artwork or antique steins with engraved dates to commemorate a special occasion.

The earliest antique German beer steins date to the 14th century, a time when earthenware was being improved, Germany was making new and improved brews, and Europe was ravaged with the bubonic plague.

From the 14th to the 17th centuries, German potters added salt, cobalt oxide blue, manganese oxide purple, and chocolate salt glaze to their steins. To go beyond simple decoration, they applied relief decorative shields, as well as historical, figurative, and Biblical scenes.

Beer steins evolved as a result of the laws passed in several German principalities stating that covers had to be on all beverage and food containers. The laws, and others related to sanitary conditions, were in reaction to the fear that a recurrence of the bubonic plague, also called the Black Death, would be caused by several invasions of flies throughout Central Europe in the mid to late fifteenth century. Up until that time, most common folk drank beer from mugs made of porous earthenware or wood. The well-to-do and upper class drank from glass, pewter or silver vessels, called beakers or tankards.

Stein is a shortened version of the word steinzeug krug, which means stoneware, tankard, or jug in German. A stein was just one of a variety of beer drinking vessels. The word transformed into staene, meaning jug in Old English. The English version, stein, appeared in 1855. In common usage, stein referred to any beer vessel with a hinged lid and handle.

Germans originally drank beer in mugs, but once the sanitary laws passed, these mugs came with a hinged lid with a thumblift. This ensured the mug could not only stay covered but could also be used to drink out of using only one hand using the thumblift.

Once the 16th century began, regulations regarding the quality and transportation of German beer resulted in better tasting beer and a variety of steins. The improved beer brought patrons to taverns, as well as the desire to own a personal stein.

By the mid-17th century, German beer and stoneware beer steins were in high demand. The elite members of the German society wanted elaborately decorated steins made of silver, pewter, or glass which were made in Bavaria, Koblenz and Koln.

As personal steins became more popular, Germans wanted durable but inexpensive containers out of which to drink their clean beer. Stein makers began searching for better materials. Eventually, they created stoneware which proved to be a superior material that was chip-resistant and non-porous. It was the perfect component for a container that needed to meet sanitary conditions.

Artisans began decorating tankards with scenes depicting towns throughout southern and Western Germany, like Heidelberg and Rothenburg. They also created artistic scenes that captured biblical, allegorical, and historical events.

By the late 18th century, the covered-container laws had run their course, but because the Germans had covered their beverages for three centuries, lids became an integral part of all steins. 

The 18th-century trends continued to rise in popularity. The Bavarians had over 4000 breweries, and stoneware production increased into the late 1700s.

European porcelain started affecting stein-making in the 1720s, but these steins were expensive, so only wealthy Germans could afford them.

Just as steins improved, so did the beer. Most people considered beer to be an effective medicine. It was also safer to drink beer than water due to its sanitary production process.

As wars and rebellions decreased the wealth and power of the aristocrats, so stein makers began looking to the middle class as their target market and made products to fit their lifestyles.

Cylindrical pewter steins became popular, and especially those with stamped or engraved folk art designs. The wealthy still preferred porcelain beer steins with Baroque decorations. But by the early 19th century, most Germans preferred pewter steins for everyday use.

By 1850, beer steins featured Renaissance motifs and relief decorations. They also had inlaid porcelain lids. 

Stoneware became popular once again after 1850. Makers used molds instead of the expensive and labor-intensive handbuilt process. Although more affordable and convenient, the molded tankards were no longer considered authentic German beer steins, as they were being mass-produced.

Moisture-absorbing plaster molds helped porcelain stein producers make unique shapes and the lithophane scenes that are commonly found on the bottom of porcelain steins.

Classically trained artists from the Mettlach factory introduced Renaissance motifs into their line of relief steins. They experimented with clay and glazes, which led to colorful mosaic and etched beer steins. People loved these beautiful creations so much that even laborers were willing to spend their week’s pay for one of them.

The German beer steins produced from the mid-19th to early 20th century saw a resurgence in the popularity of stoneware steins decorated with Renaissance designs and motifs. These steins were made using clay from the Koln area, which has a distinctive white color. They were 

decorated in the Renaissance style, often having relief decorations and colored them colored them using a gray salt glaze, topped with lids of inlaid porcelain

The 20th century witnessed a decrease in Classical designs. Instead, people favored scenes depicting towns, social scenes, military commemorative, and occupational emblems. These kinds of motifs felt more common but personal to the individual. To meet the demands, pottery makers entered the scene and started making stoneware and glazed pottery beer steins.

The newest art style, Art Nouveau, grew a small but dedicated audience in early 1900, but by 1910, the political and economic landscape turned the stein-making industry upside down. World War I demanded that the materials used to make beer steins be converted for ammunition production. 

The first molded steins were made in the region of Westerwald by Reinhold Hanke. Once molds were used and beer steins were being mass produced, the beautiful highly detailed carved relief work of the early steins was no longer unique.

Beer steins come in a range of volumes, from one ounce to eight gallons. Steins most commonly fall in the 16.9-ounce range. Steins can sell for under $50 or over $5,000, but many sell in the $100 to $500 range.

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 50,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "Halloween Horrors" in the 2025 Fall 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.