A square brown-glazed tea caddy is owned by Mr. James Terry, of New Haven, Connecticut, on the face of which is etched through a coating of yellow slip a rude design of a fruit tree with two birds at the base, and the inscription "Esther Smith, Her Tea Canister, September 6, 1767," (owned by the Yale University Art Gallery) and in the lower right hand corner the name of the maker, "Smith."
Joseph Smith, was born in 1721, was married in 1743, and it is not unlikely that this piece may have been made as a birthday present for a daughter, named for his sister Esther (b. 1727), who is known to have been married to Thomas Lacey in 1748.
Joseph Smith was succeeded by Thomas Smith (b. 1759), probably a son. A granddaughter of the latter, Dr. Lettie A. Smith, of Newtown, Pa., remembers seeing in her younger days some decorated plates belonging to her grandmother, which were inscribed with lines of poetry and dates written in English, and bore the name of Thomas Smith, the maker."
Examples of sgraffito from the Smith family pottery in southeastern Pennsylvania are well-represented in the Philadelphia Museum of Art, where some pieces are even considered among the earliest surviving examples of American sgraffito production known today.
Although, while visiting the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan last weekend, I carefully inspected a remarkable sgraffito tea canister, displayed in the Americana Wing, which also happens to be an object I have always admired. This canister is very similar to the example described and illustrated by Barber in 1903, once owned by Mr. James Terry in New Haven, Connecticut.
Terry must have been an early collector, seeing another object in his possession was mentioned and illustrated in 1893, when another book written by Barber, The Pottery and Porcelain of the United States: An Historical Review of American Ceramic Art from the Earliest Times to Present Day was published. I suspect that Terry must have known Albert Hastings Pitkin (1852-1917), another early collector who's pottery is owned today by the Wadsworth Antheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, Connecticut.
The Met's tea canister was also made by Joseph Smith, as found by the inscription somewhat hidden within the sgraffito, "Sally / 1769 / Joseph Smith."
According to the Met, "This earthenware tea canister is one of the earliest known examples of American pottery. Although it is decorated in the typical Pennsylvania German technique of sgraffito, the potter attempted to emulate English salt-glazed stoneware tea caddies of the 1740s and 1750s. This caddy, however is much larger than its English prototype, and the naive design bears little resemblance to that of the salt-glazed original."
Sgraffito Tea Canisters Made by Joseph Smith in Bucks County, PA
18th Century Sgraffito Red Earthenware Tea Canister
Made by Joseph Smith in Wrightstown, Bucks County, PA
Inscribed "Sally / 1769 / Joseph Smith"
Stands 7 1/2" Tall
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Photo Courtesy: Metropolitan Museum of Art
Information on Display with the Tea Canister
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Photo Courtesy: Metropolitan Museum of Art
18th Century Sgraffito Red Earthenware Tea Canister
Made by Joseph Smith in Wrightstown, Bucks County, PA
Inscribed "Esther Smith, Her Tea Canister, September 6, 1767"
Stands Around 7 1/2" Tall
See Article for More Information
Photo Courtesy: Tulip Ware of the Pennsylvania-German Potters
This is the Same Tea Canister as Shown Above
Published in Tulip Ware of the Pennsylvania-German Potters
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C. Sanford Bull, B.A. 1893
Photo Courtesy: Yale University Art Galleries
18th Century Sgraffito Red Earthenware Tea Canister
Made by Joseph Smith in Wrightstown, Bucks County, PA
Inscription Includes "1769"
Stands 8 1/4" Tall
See Article for More Information
Photo Courtesy: Winterthur
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