Keeping Food Fresh

 

QUESTION: When I was a youngster, my family had an ice box in the kitchen. I remember when we first got it. My grandmother was in awe and my mother was overjoyed, for she could now keep food fresh for up to a week. Before that, she had to go to the grocers just about every day. Recently, I saw a beautifully restored old ice box at an antique show. Can you tell me who invented this food cold storage unit and when it first appeared in homes?

ANSWER: Before the mid 19th century, people depended on holes in the ground and spring houses to keep food cold. For the most part, people smoked meats and fish to keep them longer.

The traditional ice box dates back to the days of ice harvesting, which peaked between the 1850s and the 1930s, when manufacturers introduced the gas-powered refrigerator into American homes. However, the ice box became such a part of American culture that older people often refer to their refrigerators as ice boxes. But the real story of the ice box began in 1802.

Back then, an American farmer and cabinetmaker, Thomas Moore, needed to figure out a way to get his butter to market in solid chunks rather than a melted mass. He experimented with various methods until he came up with an ingenious solution—the ice box. His first design consisted of an oval cedar tub with a tin container fitted inside with ice between them, all wrapped in rabbit fur to insulate the device. Later versions included hollow walls that were lined with tin or zinc and packed with various insulating materials such as cork, sawdust, straw or seaweed. He placed a large block of ice in a tray near the top, so cold air could circulate down and around the tin storage compartment. Moore used his device to transport butter from his home to the Georgetown markets, allowing him to sell firm, brick butter instead of soft, melted tubs like his fellow vendors.

By 1830, Moore refined his design by making a wooden cabinet, similar to a large dresser, of hardwoods such as oak or walnut. As with his earlier versions, he lined the cabinet with zinc or tin, packed with insulating materials such as straw, flax, sawdust, cork, mineral wool, or charcoal. He tried each material to see which worked best, eventually settling on zinc.

Moore added several storage compartments inside the cabinet, with doors to each, including the ice compartment. He placed a drainage hole in it so that melted water, collected in a tray, could be emptied daily. Other ice box makers added spigots for draining the ice water.

The user had to replenish the melted ice, normally by obtaining new ice from an iceman, who delivered it by horse and wagon. The design of the ice box allowed perishable foods to be stored longer than before and without the need for lengthy preservation processes such as canning, drying, or smoking. Refrigerating perishables also had the added benefit of not altering the taste of what was preserved.

Until the late 1820s, cabinetmakers made ice boxes to order. But by the 1840s, various companies appeared including Sears & Roebuck, The Baldwin Refrigerator Company, and the Ranney Refrigerator Company began to mass produce ice boxes. Historians consider D. Eddy & Son of Boston to be the first company to produce ice boxes in large quantities. During this time, many Americans desired big ice boxes. Such companies like the Boston Scientific Refrigerator Company, introduced ice boxes which could hold up to 50 lbs of ice. A survey of New York City residents in 1907 found that 81 percent of the families surveyed owned some form of ice box.

Depending on the condition, an antique wooden ice box can be worth a lot of money. Many restored ice boxes now sell for as much as $2,000 to $3,000. It’s even possible to buy a restored antique wooden ice box that has been converted into a refrigerator or wine cooler with modern refrigeration equipment.

The usability of an antique ice box determines its actual market value The ice box’s age, size, condition, material, authenticity and provenance all contribute to its value.

Even a properly restored or professionally refinished ice box can be a good buy. While a restored or refinished model can sell for as little as $2,000, extremely rare ice boxes in good condition can cost as much as $10,000.

With those prices, it’s a good idea to make sure an ice box is worth it. Early ice boxes didn’t feature top-quality structure, so quality will vary. It’s important to check the wooden surface closely to detect signs of deterioration, such as visible cracks, chips, scratches, and warps. All of these add to the originality of the ice box. Reproductions are common, and many get sold as antiques.

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 "In the Good Ole Summertime" in the 2024 Summer 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 Smallest Olympic Souvenirs

 

QUESTION: In 1996, I attended the Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. During the games, I acquired about 100 Olympic pins through purchase and trading. Can you tell me how the tradition of collecting pins began and what the market is like for Olympic pins today?

ANSWER: You certainly seemed to have amassed quite a number of pins during the Atlanta Games. Today, pins come in all shapes, colors, and sizes and represent a myriad of people, activities, and events at the Games. With the start of the Summer Olympics in Paris this week, it seems appropriate to take a look back and see how pin collecting began.

Pin collecting has become a sport unto itself. But it wasn’t always like that. The Olympic pin tradition began with small cardboard badges worn by athletes and officials at the first modern Olympic Games held in Athens, Greece in 1896. Athletes from competing teams traded them as a gesture of goodwill. At the 1908 Games in Paris, designs of pins grew as specific groups like judges, coaches, and reporters got involved. 

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) issued the first pins to be sold to spectators at the 1912 Games in Stockholm, Sweden. Today, the pins created for the 1940 games,  cancelled because of World War II, are highly sought after by collectors.

In 1968, the Mexico City games featured the first butterfly-clutch pin fastener, which  became the standard for Olympic pins. But it wasn’t until the 1984 Summer Games in Los Angeles, California, that trading pins became a tradition. Sponsoring companies, such as Coca-Cola, set up official trading stations to market their own pins. Because the pins were small and affordable, fans quickly seized the opportunity to bring home keepsakes for themselves. At the 1984 Los Angeles Games, some 17 million pins circulated among fans, participants, media representatives, and officials.

Pins began as a pre-social media form of communication that gave fans a reason to start a conversation with each other. The individual country Olympic committees, sponsors, bid cities, media outlets, and many others issue these colorful enameled pins today. Hundreds of thousands appear at each of the Games. 

Pins are generally manufactured in limited numbered editions, and collectors seek out those produced in the smallest quantities or from the earliest Games. These also include pins issued by the various cities competing for a chance to host the Olympics. 

Some of the most popular ones to collect are those from the smaller countries, such as Bahamas, Senegal, and Lebanon. At the games, fans pin those they’ve collected onto a hat or the strap holding their Olympic credentials. As one fan walks by another, they look at each others’ pins and often one will ask where the other got a particular pin. From there, it’s onto trading and acquiring more pins. As the Games continue, fans try to either gather as many pins as possible or become selective as to the type of pins they want to collect.

The unwritten rule has always been to trade like pins for like pins. Of course, rules are meant to be broken and that’s the fun of it all. At the last Olympic Summer Games, fans were on the lookout for pins from Tokyo, the city to host the next Summer Games. At this Olympics, they’ll be on the lookout for pins from Los Angeles.

Somewhere in the host city, pin collectors representing pin collecting clubs from all over the world congregate to trade pins and stories. It won’t be any different in Paris. Also, hundreds of vendors set up tables to sell pins of every design and origin. Most of these cost about $5 each, so amassing a lot of them can cost a small fortune. The majority of people, however, acquire their pins by trading ones they have for ones they want. 

Some collectors have over 30,000 pins in their collections. They’re always on the lookout for pins from the 1936 Berlin Games, a hot commodity in the pin collecting realm. 

While it may seem that the only people trading pins are fans and athletes, everyone involved with the Olympics, from the members of the IOC to newspaper reporters, volunteers, judges, and coaches, all get involved.

It used to be that all a person you needed to do to begin collecting pins was to show up at the Olympics, find some pins and start trading. But today, beginning collectors can find thousands of pins online and while the fun of trading may not be there, the ability to collect just about any pin, even the important ones, is there—for a price.

Pin collecting is affordable and don’t take up much room, so they’re ideal for anyone just starting out in collectibles. Searching the Internet for  “Olympic collectibles” will undoubtedly result in links for collecting pins. 

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 "In the Good Ole Summertime" in the 2024 Summer 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.

Country Furniture with a Folksy Flair

 

QUESTION: I recently attended an auction in central Pennsylvania. Included in the many lots were several pieces of attractively painted furniture. I was particularly drawn to a couple of what I thought were blanket chests, decorated with folk art motifs. But when they came up for bid, the auctioneer called them bridal chests. I’d like to know more about type of painted furniture. What is the origin of folk-art painted furniture? 

ANSWER: Handpainted folk art furniture was highly influenced by cultural traditions brought to America by immigrants. 

The peak of handcrafted folk art painted furniture ran from the 1790s to the 1880s. There weren’t any real art schools and not all that many fine artists in the early 19th century. Many talented individuals became commercial painters and worked with special skill on furniture, signs and other useful objects.

From the 1870s on, Mennonites from Poland, Russia and Prussia settled in the Dakotas and Nebraska, bringing their tradition of grain painting on light wood with them. The Mennonites decorated large wardrobes, dowry chests, tables and sofas with these patterns, and also embellished furniture with small floral motifs from the old country.

English cabinetmakers who settled in many parts of the country helped spread the style for painted English neoclassical chairs based on the designs of George Hepplewhite and Thomas Sheraton.

But the do-it-yourself idea, too, started early in the 19th century when young girls learned how to paint furniture and wooden boxes with watercolors. Cabinetmakers varnished the decorated pieces which featured landscapes, figures, fruits, animals, and flowers.

Itinerant painters and craftsmen lent their artistic expertise to the production of painted furniture pieces such as chairs, settees, armoires, cabinets, chests, benches, and other functional pieces. Many of these were European emigrants who brought many distinct regional styles and art forms to America.

By the early 20th Century, painted furniture began to have an impact on American culture and design. Classified as folk art or peasant art, these painted pieces became especially popular.

German immigrants used furniture painted in the German folk style, such as chairs, storage chests, tables, schranks, dressers, benches, and trunks. German folk furniture was utility-based, simple country furniture that remained significantly less influenced by the national and international design trends. Painter decorators drew inspiration from local tastes, preferences, history, culture, traditions, and heritage. Folk furniture was handmade using elaborate joints, often involving painting and carving to depict animals, scenes of daily life, geometric shapes, bears, and birds. Furniture makers used locally available woods like spruce, pine, beech, oak, birch, ash, and maple.

As elsewhere in Europe, national and international art trends targeted the wealthy. However, some elements filtered down to the provincial regions, influencing the works, skills, and tastes of local artisans. Since Germany had abundant forests, local artisans used a variety of woods to produce unique furniture.

Most of these pieces were distinctive of a particular region and period. Since Germany had a long and complicated history, the style and design of German folk furniture items varied depending on a piece's period and area of origin.

With the advent of the Renaissance in the early 16th-century, most European nations saw significant changes in the design and style of furniture. However, the cabinetmakers of provincial Germany remained largely unaffected by the Renaissance, producing unique Gothic-style furniture.

The Renaissance brought new forms of furniture, including the bridal trunk. Bridal trunks became a standard throughout Europe. The provincial German population would often personalized these bridal trunks with hand-painted designs.

Today, thanks to the popularity of painted furniture in antiques stores and the American trend for relocation, a piece from one section of the country may turn up in another.

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 "In the Good Ole Summertime" in the 2024 Summer 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.

Up to Snuff

 

QUESTION: I’ve been fascinated by antique snuff boxes for some time. Most are a bit above my budget, but I’d like to purchase one or two soon. However, I know little about snuff and the origins of these decorative little containers. When did people start taking snuff? And where and where were the first snuff boxes made?

ANSWER: Snuff was a type of smokeless tobacco made from finely ground or pulverized tobacco leaves. Users snorted or "sniffed" it into their nasal cavity by inhaling it lightly after placing a pinch of it either onto the back of their hand, by pinching some between their thumb and index finger, or holding a specially made "snuffing" device.

Friar Ramón Pane, a missionary who came to the New World with Christopher Columbus in 1493, was the first European to witness the inhaling of snuff by the Taino people of Haiti. Until then, tobacco was unknown to Europeans. But by the 1650s, artisans were making small boxes the snuff dry.

Traditional snuff production consisted of a lengthy, multi-step process, in tobacco snuff mills. The selected tobacco leaves were first cured or fermented, which gave it the  individual characteristics and flavor for each type of snuff blend. Many blends of snuff required months to years of special storage to reach the required maturity. Fine snuff consisted of varieties of blended tobacco leaves without the addition of scents. Varieties of spice, piquant, fruit, floral, and mentholated soon followed, either pure or in blends. 

Each snuff manufacturer usually had a variety of unique recipes and blends, as well as special recipes for individual customers. Common flavors also included coffee, chocolate, Bordeaux wine, honey, vanilla, cherry, orange, apricot, plum, camphor, cinnamon, rose and spearmint.

The 18th century witnessed an increase in the use of snuff, especially among the English and French aristocracy. Because it was a small, fine substance, it needed a vessel to contain it. Both snuff and the little boxes that contained it became important expressions of class. Originally made for daily use, snuff boxes became important symbols of personal representation. Snuff taking had become an important marker of social status.

Although men could ingest other forms of tobacco, both men and women could take snuff. Tobacco would often be used by men while socializing in coffeehouses, thus becoming linked to public masculinity.

Taking snuff could be unpleasant, especially if there were a crowd in a room. In the act of ingesting it, a person had to remain dignified. Society considered it rude for snuff takers to make excessive noise making or reaction. Like tea or coffee consumption at this time, it wasn’t only about the substance being ingested: but the ingestion itself that had to adhere to society’s rule.

The manufacture of snuff boxes became a lucrative industry when taking snuff was fashionable. Snuff boxes ranged from those made of horn to ornate designs featuring precious materials made using state-of-the-art techniques. Since prolonged exposure to air caused snuff to dry out and lose its quality, manufacturers designed snuff boxes to be airtight containers with strong hinges, generally large enough to hold a day's worth of snuff. The wealthy kept larger snuff containers, called mulls, on their dinner tables for use at dinner parties. These could be quite elaborate and often included rams horns decorated with silver or in some cases a depiction of the head of a ram.

In the early 18th century, French jewelers created snuff boxes of gold set with diamonds, amethysts, and sapphires. By 1740, specialized artisans took over the production of these ornate tabatières, which they engraved, chased, and enameled. 

The shapes of these boxes weren’t limited to rectangular boxes. Porcelain containers resembling little trunks were popular, as were ovals, but tabatières shaped like shells were more rare. And while the materials used to construct a box were often enough for its decoration, sometimes artisans hand painted these snuff boxes, depicting everything from miniature landscapes and bucolic scenes to tiny portraits or cameos of their owners.

Miniatures often adorned the lids of snuff boxes. These could be scenes from various mythological, Biblical, or pastoral settings, but portraiture was the most common decoration, especially on those boxes given as gifts. It was usually men who adorned the portraiture present on the jewelry of women.

Silver snuff boxes became associated with Sheffield, England, where silver-plating had been perfected on these small containers in the late 18th century. By the early 19th century, the silver industry had blossomed in Birmingham, England, where snuff box makers such as Samuel Pemberton, Nathaniel Mills, and Edward Smith produced oblong containers with images of castles and abbeys on their tops and sides.

Birmingham was also a center for papier-mâché snuff boxes, which manufacturers hardened using several layers of enamel. A market for these inexpensive boxes developed in the United States, so Birmingham box makers began decorating their wares with portraits of U.S. naval heroes and victory scenes from the War of 1812, often using engravings by such renowned American artists as Gilbert Stuart as their source material.

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 "The Art Deco World" in the 2024 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.

What's All the Fanfare?

 

QUESTION: I was digging around in my mother’s attic the other day and discovered a flat box containing two very beautiful fans. I imagine these must have belonged to her mother or grandmother. What can you tell me about them? Do they have any value?

ANSWER: Fans have been around for a long time. As a piece of functional art, they go back as far as ancient Egypt. 

The Egyptians saw them as sacred instruments used in religious ceremonies. They also became a symbol of royal power. But it was the Chinese who evolved the fan into a complex, decorated instrument. The Japanese took the fan one step further and produced a folding version, supposedly based on the folding wings of a bat. When Marco Polo returned to Venice, he brought with him fans made of vellum, paper, swan skin with blades of gold, silver, and inlaid mother-of-pearl.

The original purpose of hand fans was to create a breeze, but they had many other uses. They could be used as protection against rain, as a tray for offering or receiving refreshments, and to hide bad teeth. European women would use fans to hide their faces during mass.

By the 18th century, the folding fan had come into its own in Paris. Delicately hand-painted floral motifs, on a structure of decorative sticks, came into common use. In fact, any wealthy lady worth her salt had to have fans as accessories to her wardrobe.

These wealthy women developed a whole language of salutations and signals around their fans. For instance, carrying a fan in the left hand signified "desirous of acquaintance" while allowing it to rest on the right cheek meant "yes" and on the left "no." Drawing a fan across the forehead meant "We are watched" and drawing a fan across the eyes meant "I am sorry." Opening a fan wide meant "wait for me."

Dropping a fan meant "We could be friends." If a lady fluttered her fan, it meant “I am married.” But if she placed the handle of her fan to her lips, it meant "kiss me."  An open fan held in the right hand in front of the face—the ultimate form of seduction— meant "follow me"

The blades of these delicate instruments could be of carved ivory or tortoise shell inlaid with precious inlaid metals and elaborate jewels. Less expensive fan sticks were usually of sandalwood or fruitwood. These rococo fans were the finest ever made, and many fo the designs took the form of stylized art.

By the latter part of the 18th century, fans had gained popularity as a fashion accessory in the upper circles of American society. While fan makers imported finer sticks, they made their own wooden ones.

The earliest fans made in any large quantity in the United States were paper souvenir fans depicting historical scenes. as well as current events. Lithographers portrayed views of New York's Crystal Palace, 1853, the Philadelphia Centennial in 1876, printed in black on a cream background, and the World's Columbian Exposition in 1893.

By the late 19th century, fans displayed images of nearly every product. Every department store and every manufacturer advertised on fans, including such products as coffee, milk, bread, carpet sweepers, restaurants, cafes, theaters, sewing machines, etc. 

Before the advent of air-conditioning, funeral parlors gave out fans t mourners. These were as much to keep mourners cooler in warm weather as they were to wave the stink of the corpse away. These mourning fans became a social necessity. Manufacturers often fashioned them in black materials to coincide with the black clothing worn during recognized periods of mourning. Of course, it didn't hurt to print the name and address of the mortician on the guards of a cheap wood fan.

Fans are still relatively inexpensive—except the jewel-encrusted ones—so they’re ideal to collect, especially for the novice collector. Many sell for $5-$20 online. Some of the most sought after fans came from the E.S. Hunt Company, later called the Allen Fan Company. In 1868, Hunt patented the process by which he assembled the fan sticks and the fan leaf in one step. This included folding or creasing and gluing the leaf to the fan sticks at the same time under pressure. This was America's first fan to appear and unfortunately folded, like its fans, in1910.  

Serious fan collectors often prize the simpler fans with printed leaves and plain sticks and guards. Many of these simpler folding fans provide a glimpse of particular times in history. Some once served as records of special occasions, such as births and marriages. Often fans celebrated military and naval victories. And some did the same for national holidays. Collectors find such a quantity of fans that many specialize in one particular subject, such as advertising fans. Unlike many other delicate antiques and collectibles, folding fans have survived for decades and often centuries in superb condition. 

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 "The Art Deco World" in the 2024 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.

A Silver Alternative

 

QUESTION: As I was browsing a weekly flea market, I came upon a curious silver vase—at least I thought it was silver. But when I picked it up, it felt like glass and was much lighter than silver. The dealer said it was Mercury glass. I never heard of such a thing. Can you tell me more about it?

ANSWER: As the Industrial Revolution gained momentum, the growing middle class wanted inexpensive alternatives to the silver objects owned by the wealthy. One of those alternatives was Mercury glass, first made as an inexpensive silver substitute. Soon it evolved into an art form of its own.

First produced in the late 18th century, Mercury glass was a handblown, double-walled glass with an interior coating of silver-colored metal compounds. It took many forms, including candlesticks, compotes, candy dishes, plates, goblets, wig stands, curtain tiebacks, and doorknobs. Some critics condemned it for looking too much like mirrored glass and too little like silver, which was what people liked about it.

Produced originally from around 1840 until around 1930 in Bohemia, now the Czech Republic, and Germany, it spread to England in 1849 when Edward Varnish and Frederick Hale Thomson patented the technique for silvering glass vessels, and continued to be made there until 1855.

Mercury glass, also known as silvered glass, contains neither mercury nor silver. It's actually clear glass, mold-blown into double-walled shapes and coated on the inside with a silvering solution containing silver nitrate and grape sugar, heated, then closed. Sealing methods included metal discs covered with a glass round in England, or a cork inserted into the unpolished pontil scar on the bottom in America. In the beginning a few Bohemian makers tried to line their pieces with a mercury solution, but they stopped using it due to expense and toxicity. However, this is where the name originated.

Companies in the United States, including the Boston and Sandwich Glass Company, New England Glass Company Union Glass Company, and the Boston Silver Glass Company, made silvered glass from about 1852 to 1880. The New England Glass Company displayed a variety of silvered glass articles, including copper wheel engraved goblets, vases and other tableware at the 1853 New Crystal Palace Exhibition.

Bohemian Mercury glassmakers decorated their pieces with a variety of techniques including painting, enameling, etching, and surface engraving. Antique historians believe it to be the first true "art glass"---glass made for display and for its artistic value rather than for everyday use.

The peak of Mercury glass’ popularity came in the mid-19th century. Back then, high-quality European and American-made pieces were lightweight, had graceful forms, and came decorated with acid-etched fruit or floral motifs, cut glass designs, and sometimes paint. Young girls, working on assembly lines, painted vases in particular with their own designs of swans, daisies, or leaves. Makers intended the details on their pieces to be equal to the finest decoration on other forms of glass and china.

After briefly falling out of favor, Mercury glass reappeared around 1900 in the form of Christmas ornaments and gazing balls, as well as blown fruits and flowers. Today, most serious collectors concentrate on antique forms, like curtain pins, salt cellars, or pedestal-footed silvered vases.

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 "The Art Deco World" in the 2024 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.