Moses Paige Pottery - Peabody, Ma: Flower Pots

Last spring, I came across an interesting flower pot at a local North Shore, Massachusetts flea market. It's not the type of flower pot that most redware and stoneware collectors think of when the idea of an earthenware flower pot is discussed. This particular pot was terracotta - and a form much more associated with European potters than American.

The woman who sold me the pot, had an idea of what it was, but she didn't know exactly. She told me to contact Connecticut potter Guy Wolf, who specializes in the reproduction of early English, Connecticut and Massachusetts type terracotta flower pots. She told me it was called a "Hartford" pot, but this information turned out to be inaccurate. It was actually what Guy Wolf described to me as a "Peabody" pot. He reproduces these described Peabody pots, which were modeled after a terracotta flower pot that was manufactured a century prior at the Moses Paige Pottery in Peabody, Massachusetts.

Massachusetts redware potter,  Rick Hamelin suggested to me what I had I already thought. The discovery was rare. There are not too many of these pots known to have survived. The clay was unglazed and porous, which made it much easier to break. I assume many of these flower pots spent the winters outdoors and that too, would result in cracking and damage.

Moses Paige Pottery Company Sign

Photo Courtesy: Peabody, Ma Historical Society

The woman whom I purchased the flower pot from, said she discovered it in a Southern New Hampshire barn. This discovery excited me very much. I believe it  was manufactured around the turn of the twentieth-century.

Moses Paige Pottery Flower Pot - Found at Flea Market
Peabody, Ma

Moses Paige Pottery Flower Pot Handle - Found at Flea Market
Peabody, Ma

I have not seen an example since. This is in-fact, the only surviving example I know of, but I assume there are more.

The Peabody Historical Society does not have an example in their collection. There are examples of lead glazed redware from Paige pottery, but no terracotta.

Moses Paige Pottery Circa 1900
Peabody, Ma

The Osborn Family name is the most well-known and largest name within the South Danvers (Peabody) and Danvers pottery scene of the eighteenth and nineteenth-centuries. The Osborn's were all Quakers. Around 1865, the Osborn Family factory changed ownership to Joseph Reed. Reed was a potter who worked under the Osborns, before buying the business from them.

A group of distinguished Massachusetts potters trained under Reed, that of which included - Charles Solares, Moses Paige, Benjamin Stevens, Amos Bodge and Jacob Steinbrecher. Charles Solares, a Portugese immigrant changed his name to Charles Lawrence (for marketing purposes) and founded the Lawrence Pottery in Beverly, Massachusetts. Steinbrecher moved to Lynn, Massachusetts and created his own shop. I am not familiar with Stevens or Bodge's work and what their career included after Reed's business.

Moses Paige came to Joseph Reed's shop from Winthrop, Maine to work. After only four years of working under Reed, Paige purchased the company. With the change of ownership came a change of name - and the company was no longer known as Joseph Reed Pottery. It became the Mose B. Paige Company.

Lura Woodside Watkins describes in her book, "Early New England Potters and Their Wares" the sight through her own eyes, of watching the potters working at the Mose Paige Pottery turning wares. She described a potter by the name of Edwin A. Rich (Vermonter) who turned the simpler formed wares in only a matter of two to three minutes.

The most notable potters who worked at the Paige Pottery were Moses Paige, Edwin Rich, James Crawford Porter - possibly of the Porter Family of potters of Maine and John Donovan - an accomplished traveling potter who worked at many of the factories in New England of this period.

Moses Paige's company worked well into the twentieth-century before it was purchased by a pair of Italian brothers. They were described by Watkins as not having the skill of their predecessors. The building eventually burned in the 1940s and with it, left the Peabody and Danvers tradition that began two centuries prior.

It is in my opinion that the pottery tradition of this area was the most influential of all New England redware communities. This idea is a discussion for another place and another time.

I was walking along the shores of the Merrimac River in Newburyport, Massachusetts yesterday evening. I was looking around Cashman Park- an area that is filled-in land. My father used to walk this same area more than twenty-years prior, finding all sorts of interesting early glass and ceramics. 

In my search, I found the following artifacts that resembled a small terracotta flower pot.

Terracotta (Pottery) Artifacts Found Along the Shores of the Merrimac River
Newburyport, Ma

The three parts were buried on top of each other. I initially only saw part of the pot, but I then saw a second half and then, the base appeared. At first glance I knew it was American made, hand turned and early. I thought to myself of where it may have been made. It appeared to be from around the turn of the twentieth-century, but there were no potters working in the Newburyport area of this time. It was a mystery at first. I knew immediately that it was not English, a country that was known for producing many terracotta flower pots. I could clearly see the finger prints and impressions of the potter on the pot. I was excited!

When I arrived home, I placed the three pieces together and they all matched perfectly. I couldn't believe it. What luck! It was at this moment that I realized I had discovered a small flower pot made at the Moses Paige Pottery in Peabody. 

Mose Paige Pottery Company Flower Pots
Peabody, Ma

Considering my discovery last spring was the only time I have ever seen one of these flower pots - I guess you could say I am very excited over this latest pot. I would have paid for it in this repaired condition, but the way I found it makes it that much more fascinating.

I would love to know the history of the pot. I assume it was used in Newburyport during the early 1900s. How did it end up on the waterfront? The filled in land was typically taken from trash. There have never been any homes within this area of the city. The area has always been open. I feel the pot was probably in the ground, whole at one point and this is where it most likely broke. Why did it end up in this area? Did someone throw this pot away, despite it being in completely useable condition? Did it fall from a boat in the river? Was it used at one point on the shores of the Merrimac? How did the pot travel from Peabody to Newburyport? Was it sold in Newburyport? Did the original owners buy the flower pot at the Paige shop in Peabody? I feel these are all very reasonable questions - and there are so many questions that can be asked.

Regardless of all this - I am very happy with the find. It will make a nice addition to my collection of Paige Pottery.

I have handled English flower pots and many examples from the companies working in New England at the turn of the twentieth-century...give or take a few years. The pots made in Peabody, are in my opinion, without a doubt - the finest skilled of any potter from this period

Moses Paige and his pottery company made a variety of form and style utilitarian household wares in Peabody - most of which were lead glazed. The terracotta examples are interesting and a rare study, due to the fact that terracotta is a medium that most American potters did not work in. It was typically either redware or stoneware. However, it is interesting to note there are eighteenth-century examples of terracotta that were produced in Salem, Massachusetts that have survived. Salem borders Peabody and was previously called South Danvers. There appears to be some sort of connection with potters carrying on the earlier potters' tradition. We may very-well be seeing this occurring more than a hundred years prior in Charlestown, Massachusetts. It's all a cycle and what becomes old - eventually becomes new again. This may be what happened with Moses Paige and his choice of terracotta production.

More research to follow...