Bennington, Vermont's Source of Kaolin and Some Slip Decorated Red Earthenware

This is some information that will be included as part of my forthcoming eleventh book, titled, A Monumental History: Stories of Red Earthenware Production in Western Massachusetts, the Berkshires and Vermont, which will include contributions from multiple scholars, such as New York historian Warren Broderick: "Vermont’s nineteenth century stoneware businesses have received a significant amount of attention in publication over the past 100 years; however, Vermont also sustained a number of red earthenware potteries, which have been somewhat overlooked for the state’s prolific stoneware."

Interestingly, I recently posted a story to this website, titled, Florence B. Dickinson’s Two-Color Slip Decorated Red Earthenware Jar From Vermont, that discussed various types of slip decorated red earthenware believed to have been made at the Captain John Norton (1758-1828) Pottery in Bennington, Vermont in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. This is also a subject that exemplifies the information that I just cited from the forthcoming book.

In conversations earlier this week with Warren Broderick about red earthenware production in Dorset and East Dorset, Vermont, which was connected to some wares made in Bennington, where he told me in part: "I believe the clays found on the Dacey farm in North Dorset, Vermont were kaolin and related clays. This location would be in the so-called "Monkton Belt" that ran from Monkton in Addison County, Vermont south to Bennington, Vermont in hills just west of the Green Mountains. I remember we found the exact location in Bennington, where Christopher Webber Fenton (1806-1865) obtained kaolin and ochre for use by the U.S. Pottery Company. Both of those minerals can still be found there (as seen in the pictures posted below)."

This source of kaolin would have likely predated use at the U.S. Pottery Company and would have likely been a source of slip used on some red earthenware produced at the Norton Pottery in Bennington in the 1790s and early 1800s.

Bennington, Vermont's Source of Kaolin and Some Slip Decorated Red Earthenware

Source of Kaolin Clay in Bennington, Vermont

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Photo Courtesy: Warren Broderick

Source of Kaolin Clay in Bennington, Vermont

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Photo Courtesy: Warren Broderick

Late 18th or Early 19th Century Slip Decorated Red Earthenware Jar

Most Likely Made at the Capt. John Norton Pottery in Bennington, VT

There are a Small Group of These Jars Known Today

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Photo Courtesy: Vermont Historical Society

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