The Democratization of Ice Cream

 

QUESTION: When I was a kid, my family had an ice cream machine. Just about every Sunday afternoon, especially when it was really hot, my father would get out the machine and make ice cream. And I helped. We made all different flavors, depending on the kind of fruit that was in season. My job was to crank the machine. Boy, was that hard because I had to keep going for at least 45 minutes. When I got tired, my dad would take over. I haven’t had homemade ice cream for a long time but recently saw an old ice cream maker for sale at a flea market. What can you tell me about antique ice cream makers. Are they worth anything or are they just junk?

ANSWER: There’s nothing like homemade ice cream. With electric ice cream makers, it’s easy to make it. But there’s a nostalgia connected to the old hand-cranked machines. 

Until the early 19th century, ice cream remained a rare and exotic dessert enjoyed mostly by the wealthy. Ingredients and technology, including ice harvesting and the invention of the insulated icehouse around 1800, plus the increased affordability of sugar made making ice cream at home for ordinary people more affordable.

In 1843, New Yorker Nancy M. Johnson applied for a patent for her hand-cranked ice cream freezer, called the Artificial Freezer. It had a movable crank that rotated two  adjacent broad, flat slates containing an array of holes, which assisted in churning the cream, making the mixture more uniform, while also making it easier to remove the ice crystals in the interior walls of the cylindrical container in which the spatulas fit. These metal spatulas, attached to a pipe called the “dasher,” were then attached to the handle crank protruding out from the Artificial Freezer. And by inserting a border into the container that held the mixture, Johnson made it possible to create two flavors at the same time.

She invented her ice cream churn to cut down on the time it took to make ice cream, which was originally a labor intensive process involving many steps. President Thomas Jefferson used an 18-step recipe. However, the resulting ice cream had to be eaten immediately since people had no form of refrigeration at the time.

The machine sold fast, but despite Johnson’s success with the Artificial Freezer, she sold the rights of her patent to William G. Young from Baltimore for $200. He then improved on its original design, and others soon followed with 70 improvements of their own. 

Smaller domestic ice-cream makers made from the 1880s usually had a metal inner pail fitted with a paddle attached to a crank handle, which sat inside a wooden bucket containing a freezing mixture of ice and salt. The user poured cream into the inner pail where it was beaten and churned as it froze.

The same year as Nancy M. Johnson filed her patent, London resident Thomas Masters created the Ice Cream Apparatus which featured interchangeable parts. The machine could be set up for home use, producing blocks of ice, ice cream, flavored ice, and cooling drinks and wine. Thomas added special churns to his ice cream maker to ensure a proper beating process, creating the smoothness and fineness necessary to ensure the ice cream and flavored ice didn’t separate. The Ice Cream Apparatus had separate ice preserving containers for butter, fish, game, etc., plus cold storage spaces for beer and wine.

To make ice cream with one of these antique ice cream makers, the user needed to pour the ice cream mixture into the inner pail where it was churned and beaten as it froze. When filling the bucket, the user needed to layer the salt and ice, going heavy on the salt between the layers.

Mixing ice with salt lowered the ice’s melting point, so even when the ice melted, its temperature remained below the normal freezing point of 0 degrees Celsius---32 degrees Fahrenheit.

After adding the ice cream mixture and closing the metal canister, the next step was cranking to help aerate and smooth the mixture. This also prevented the separation of the ice cream’s  ingredients.

Ice cream makers stamped with the designer’s or manufacturer’s mark have a higher value than identical items with no signature. Antique White Mountain ice cream makers, for example, carry the company’s name. The manufacturer’s mark verifies that the antique ice cream maker is genuine and not a copy.

More than anything else, demand determines the value of an antique ice cream maker.  A 170-year-old antique ice cream maker could be worthless if no one wants it. However, a 120-year-old ice cream maker could have a higher value if demand for it is higher.

Condition is also very important in determining the value of an antique ice cream maker. It needs to be checked for flaws, including cracks, missing components, and excessive wear. And while a minor nick may be negligible, a major crack on the bucket that holds the ice may lower the value considerably.

Antiques made in the early 1900s may be less valuable than those made in the 1850s. The reason for this is that the antiques from the 1850s are rarer than those made in the 20th century. More antique ice cream makers from the early 20th century that are in good condition are available than are well-maintained antiques from the mid 19th century.

The White Mountain brand dates back to 1872 when Thomas Sands made improvements to Johnson’s design and started his company in Laconia, New Hampshire. White Mountain antique ice cream makers currently available date to 1923 and sell for $100 to nearly $400.

Acme started making ice cream makers in the early 1900s. Going by the name “Acme Ice Cream Freezers,” the brand featured a metal can surrounding the ice cream canister. Models currently on the market range in price from around $20 to $125.

As long as an antique manual ice cream maker is in good shape it can still be used. However, those that are part of a collection shouldn’t be used to make ice cream. In that case, it’s better to let the more efficient electric models to the work.

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 "The World of Art Nouveau" in the 2022 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.

It’s What’s on the Reverse Side

 

QUESTION: Years ago, I purchased a banjo clock with an intricate scene painted on the clock glass. At several recent antique shows, I’ve noticed several other reverse paintings from the early 19th century. What is the origin of reverse painting glass? And when was the technique at its peak?

ANSWER: Reverse painting is done on the backside of the glass and has been done since ancient times. Though there are only some crude artifacts, art historians believe the process dates back to Egypt in 4 C.E.

During the Middle Ages in the 13th century, the art technique appeared in Italy. Shortly thereafter, the French and English also learn of this art-form.  By the 16th century Renaissance, reverse painting reached its peak. To meet the growing demand, glass artists on the Island of Murano in the Venetian Lagoon widely produced small reverse glass paintings to decorate church alters and for other religious purposes. Gradually they began to paint larger landscapes, portraits, and more, making Venice a center of the technique.  

Beginning in the mid 18th century, painting on glass became preferred by the Church and the nobles throughout Central Europe. By the early to mid 19th century, watchmakers used reverse painting for dials on their watches.

Reverse glass painting had been practiced in Europe for several centuries. In France, Rococo decorative arts influenced it. In Italy and Switzerland, landscapes and small figures dominated reverse glass painting. Persian miniatures inspired it in India, Syria, and Iran, drawing attention to Islamic religious themes. German, Italian, and Spanish artists specialized in allegories, regional costumes, and hunting scenes while iconographic painting influenced the technique in Eastern Europe. 

In America, reverse painting enjoyed its greatest popularity during the Federalist Period of the early 19th century. Old-country artisans in the colonial cities used reverse paintings to decorate clocks, mirrors and other items of the time. This art fashion reigned from about 1815 to 1850. Then, with the exception of a brief time before World War I when it enjoyed a comeback, reverse glass painting became all but extinct.

Before an artist can reverse paint on glass, all details must be known. Done with oil paint ground with shellac, varnish, or linseed oil. Often the colored pigments were back by a white ground which reflected light back through the paint and gave the painting a warm and brilliant color. The smoothness of the glass increased the painting’s richness and vibrancy. 

Not only is the painting done on the reverse side of the glass, it must be done in reverse, beginning with the finer details and ending with the background.

Subject matter was mostly religious with paintings done by peasants but also included allegorical subjects, heroes of the day, and landscapes. Many of these paintings, primitive in technique, included Vermillion red, blue, yellow. Religious scenes could be found in peasant homes. These had backgrounds embellished with floral decorations and scrolls. Early paintings had lots of gold but later ones just had accents. These primitive paintings had crude homemade wooden frames. 

During the reign of William and Mary in the 17th century, the frames of mirrors had moldings of glass painted with roses, tulips, and leaves touched with gold. Back in the 14th century, East India Traders brought courting mirrors from China. This type of painting became popular in Europe during the 18th and 19th centuries.

In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, secular subjects became popular, including portraits of women symbolical of spring, summer, fall, and winter, as well as portraits of kings and queens.

Reverse painting spread to America and was popular with the Pennsylvania German immigrants, who carried on the religious traditions. They also painted primitive portraits of famous Americans such as George Washington and Andrew Jackson. Copies of portraits of Washington by Gilbert Stuart were quite popular.

Still life was more popular than portraits in New England. Other subjects included naval battles, such as the Monitor and the Merrimac. Amateurs and itinerant artists painted these paintings, so they call into the folk art category.

One of the most common uses for reverse paintings was on clock pendulum doors. Popular subjects included a floral or fruit still life or a simple flag or eagle design. 

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 "The World of Art Nouveau" in the 2022 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 Strength of Iron with the Hardness of Stone

 

QUESTION: My grandmother collected all sorts of odds and ends of antique china. Among all the pieces she had were a half dozen plates and jugs that had a special quality about them. She called them her stoneware and said they were probably from the early 19th century. Three of them had the name “Spode” on the back or bottom. Two were pure white with no decoration while the others had Chinese scenes painted on them. Can you tell me anything about them and when they would have been made?

ANSWER: The pieces your grandmother called “stoneware” are actually “ironstone,” a form of china with the look of porcelain. Ironstone china is a hard earthenware similar to porcelain. Although it has the hardness and fine surface of porcelain, it’s opaque while porcelain is transparent when held up to a light. 

Josiah Spode II first made ironstone in 1805. But before that, Miles Mason had been experimenting with a china formula that reproduced the appearance of Chinese porcelain. In 1813, Mason’s son, Charles, took out a patent, listing it as an improvement on ironstone china. Both Spode’s and Mason’s ironstone were equally fine. The blue-white color of both of their wares, as well as their patterns, were  imitations of Chinese wares.

Spode used his ironstone as a way to copy Lowestoft patterns. Lowestoft was a soft-paste porcelain produced in Lowestoft, Suffolk, England, made from 1757 to 1802. It was mostly used for pots, teapots, and jugs, with shapes copied from silverwork or from Bow and Worcester porcelain. The English nobility had their initialed tableware made in China but getting replacements was a slow process, so they called upon English potters to make them.

While these pieces usually had no marks, they sometimes had the name “Spode” impressed in small letters on their bottoms. These patterns included crests and coats of arms and initials in shields with borders of small floral or leaf patterns or delicate ribbons.

One of Spode’s early ironstone patterns, commonly known as “Tree of Life,” is a design of the famille rose type, painted in blue, green, yellow, brown and pink. The mark appeared in black with the name “Spode” set on a rectangle of fretwork.

Patterns on Spode’s Lowestoft also included Queen Charlotte’s pattern, selected for Her Majesty’s visit to the Spode factory in 1817. Decorated in blue, it featured a butterfly border and a Chinese landscape in the center. It was a version of the old willow pattern that was popular on Chinese wares.

Though Spode copied many of his patterns from imported Chinese wares, he adapted others by making them more elaborate than their Chinese originals. Two types of old Chinese porcelain influenced Spode. The first was the old blue-and-white Nankin designs with pagoda and landscape and the butterfly border. The second was the famille rose design of the Yung Cheng period 1734. These patterns were in polychrome with gold and had floral and bird motifs. However, Spode didn’t use these patterns exclusively on his ironstone.

Spode marked the pattern numbers in red on his ironstone in addition to the factory mark. Lower numbers indicate an early production date, enabling pieces to be placed within certain years even if the exact date cannot be identified.

Eventually, Spode’s ironstone came in a variety of patterns. The Cabbage pattern featured a large leaf and flowers. Printed in blue, workers then filled it in by hand in blue, gold, rose, and Chinese red. Another early pattern, Peacock, features birds and peonies in gold and other colors in the famille rose style with a border known as India edge.

Landscape was Spode’s most Chinese looking pattern. It featured Chinese figures in blue and gold in the border with a landscape of water and buildings painted in colors in the center. Bang-up, first produced in polychrome, was a pattern of Chinese flowers. Ship and Star featured a pattern of a ship, buildings and figures set in a center cartouche and has a star border printed in brown.

The pattern known as George IV, was first made for the Coronation of George IV on July 29, 1821. The center of the plate has a design of Chinese still-life motifs with flowers and vases in blue, Chinese red, and gold with a heavy border.  

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 "The World of Art Nouveau" in the 2022 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.