A little over one month ago, I posted a story to this website about a nineteenth century green glazed red earthenware jar that was recently found in a circa 1860s house in Dundas, a town and urban district near the port city of Hamilton, Ontario, which is located on the western tip of Lake Ontario. The jar's history really seemed to speak to me because of the industrial history that this area retained from around the turn of the nineteenth century through part of the twentieth century: http://www.earlyamericanceramics.com/2024/05/an-early-green-glazed-red-earthenware.html.
Nevertheless, that jar was consigned to Miller & Miller in New Hamburg, Ontario, where it sold today as part of a larger sale of advertising, pottery and historical objects: https://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/178724094_early-american-semi-ovoid-redware-jar.
The auction house described the jar as "American, likely New York State, circa 1820s-1840s. An exciting recent discovery of this early American double-handled red earthenware jar in an 1860s homestead in southern Ontario. Noted Massachusetts-based researcher and author Justin Thomas advises that several aspects of this jar share characteristics from archaeological discoveries from multiple potters' sites in western New York state, more specifically the West Bloomfield area. A lovely green glaze with features including a tooled rim, beefy high-arched lug handles and five incised lines around the shoulder."
Interestingly, among the potters which very little is known about today who operated in West Bloomfield was Wheeler Griffin (1784-1851); he ran a red earthenware business from about 1812-1825. Alvin Wilcox (1801-1862) trained under Griffin in the 1820s, eventually acquiring the business in 1825, which he then operated until around the time he died in the early 1860s.
The reason that I suggest Griffin's name is because I studied the archaeology that was collected in the 1970s at the site of the Wheeler Griffin and Alvin Wilcox Pottery business in June of 2023, which is kept today in a storage building, as part of the Rochester Museum & Science Center in Rochester, New York. In theory, Wilcox must have learned some forms and glazes from Griffin, whereas this seems to be somewhat of an unusual glaze color for Western New York. However, the color of the green glaze on this jar was recovered on various forms at the site the Griffin and Wilcox Pottery. The form does not seem refined enough for Wilcox's production, although it is somewhat similar to some jars made at the nearby Nathaniel Rochester (1752-1831) Pottery in West Bloomfield, which makes me wonder if this is a product of Griffin's production, seeing that he was in business at the same time as Rochester.
Furthermore, the jar sold reasonably for $225 plus the buyer's premium. This jar will also be published in my forthcoming two-volume Western New York book, titled, America's Great Awakening and Migration: The Red Earthenware of Western New York.
Note: For the rest of the pottery in today's sale - see the auction catalog: https://www.liveauctioneers.com/catalog/331363_advertising-pottery-and-historic-objects/.
19th Century Green Glazed Red Earthenware Jar Found in Ontario
Please Stay Tuned...Much More to Come...
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