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Know Everything About The History of American Pottery
Many records
of the early American pottery do not many evidence to prove their
existence, but some of the written names and some pieces of the
potteries shows that the American potters were very skilled and
artistic. Some newspapers even showed that American used to imports
in quantity from England and from the Far East, which handicapped the
local potters.
SOME of the
earliest inhabitants of both North and South America were skilled and
artistic potters, and examples of their work are to be found in
museums; occasionally, they can be bought. In more modern times, in
the days of John Smith and Pocahontas, there were still potters at
work in America, and it would not have taken the European settlers
long to find a suitable clay from which to make domestic pieces. In
1641 there is a record of James Pride, a potter at Salem,
Massachusetts, and it is believed that others were operating in
Jamestown, Virginia. Of these first craftsmen, and many that followed
in their wake, there is a little to show except a written record of
some of their names. They made useful everyday wares that served
their purpose, were broken and discarded, and there was no particular
reason to treasure them.
The picture
changed little in the first three-quarters of the eighteenth century.
The Crolius and Remney families were established at Potters' Hill,
New York City; while at Burlington, New Jersey, Daniel Coxe made what
he described as 'White Chiney Ware'. Newspapers of the period show
that pottery and porcelain were imported in quantity from England and
from the Far East, and the local potters were left to make little
other than 'butter, water, pickle, oyster and chamber pots; milk pans
of several sizes; jugs, mugs, bowls, porringers, cups, etc.
Very little
has survived that can be dated positively as having been made before
1800, and in America. A bowl in the Brooklyn museum, of Pennsylvania
red earthenware incised with the date 1775 is outstanding; in the
same museum is a white pottery sauceboat, copied probably from a
Liverpool imported example, decorated with Chinese landscapes in
blue, made in Philadelphia. Examples of red clay domestic ware
include baking dishes, which are indistinguishable from their English
originals; likewise, Pennsylvania dishes with sgraffito decoration
closely similar to German country-made ones.
Salt-glazed
stoneware was made for suitable articles, and a tall round butter
churn by Clarkson Crolius Senior, made about 1800, belongs to the New
York Historical Society. At about the same date a pottery was set up
to make cream ware to compete with imported Wedgwood, gave it the
name of Tivoli Ware and advertised for orders and apprentices.
Authentic
pieces of the early wares are extremely scarce; as it was purely
utilitarian in purpose it was seldom, if ever, marked. The demand for
anything sophisticated was met from abroad, until in the early
nineteenth century, when conditions grew more settled in the land,
and manufactories were started to supply the home market on a large scale.
A man named
Andrew Duche, born in Philadelphia in 1710, made porcelain in about
1740. A small bowl with Oriental-style under glaze blue decoration
was discovered in 1946 and is assumed to be one of his experimental
pieces. It is in a private collection in the United States. Thirty
years later, two partners named Gouse Bonnin and George Anthony
Morris started a factory in Philadelphia, but it is doubtful whether
they made much true porcelain. The first successful commercial making
of the ware was again in Philadelphia and owed its inception to a
Quaker, William Ellis Tucker, who began to experiment in 1826.
Tucker's porcelain was of good quality and included tea sets, vases
and other pieces, many of which won awards at exhibitions in New York
and elsewhere. The factory closed in 1838.
The imports
from England and other Far East Asian countries left the local
potters only to make things like 'butter, water, pickle, oyster and
chamber pots; milk pans of several sizes; jugs, mugs, bowls,
porringers, cups, etc. But some of the potteries in different museums
of American states prove that they also made potteries in their own
styles and designs. |
