Exciting News! New Forthcoming Book To Be Published About the Beverly Pottery

For about the last ten years, I have made it an objective to research and identify the total output of the Charles A. Lawrence Pottery (1829-1904) in Beverly, Massachusetts, circa 1866-1906. Very little has been published about this company, and as a result, a lot of the production has been forgotten.

This has been an exciting adventure and investigation, although certainly frustrating at times seeing that there was very little material to begin with, and as a result, the direction of this business was not always clear. But I am excited to announce this morning that I have completed a book exploring the life of Charles A. Lawrence and the history of the Beverly Pottery. The title of the book is The Beverly Pottery: The Wares of Charles A. Lawrence. 

The Beverly Historical Society is publishing the book, and it should be available in the next few months through the museum's bookstore, the museum's website and Amazon. Well over 100 photos are illustrated in the book, including dozens of examples of pottery from all types of production. Almost all of these pieces have never been published before, many of which are hardly known because they are 1) owned by small museums, 2) have been tucked away by museums for decades with no record of their existence so the only way to find them is by physically going through the storage areas, and 3) have been privately owned for decades. However, I am extremely excited over this book. I cannot wait to finally see all of this information in print. I honestly feel that the C.A. Lawrence Pottery was among the most important potteries to operate anywhere in New England in the 1800s, although this business also had a national appeal during the period.

While researching the history of this business, I was surprised to learn that some of the previously published material about Lawrence is actually inaccurate. I do not want to give this information away here, but for those of you who are familiar with this business, you will likely be very surprised to learn about some original documents preserving the life of Lawrence and his family owned by the City of Beverly.

Note: I will continue to post updates about the book on this website as they become available.

Beverly, Mass. Historical Society

The Beverly, Mass. Historical Society - The John Cabot (1744-1821) House

The Museum is Publishing a Book I Wrote About the C.A. Lawrence Pottery in Beverly

See Article for More Information

Please Stay Tuned...Much More to Come...