The Symonds-Osborn Story: A Puritan Masterpiece for a Quaker Home

This post is another preview of my forthcoming two-volume, 1,800+ page, tenth book, titled, An Early Industry of Household Wares: The Red Earthenware of Salem Village, Danvers, Peabody, Beverly and Salem, Massachusetts: http://www.earlyamericanceramics.com/2026/01/update-on-new-book-book-sent-to.html. 

While conducting research for the new book, I thought it was essential to include some information about this seventeenth century chest, which was previously published in an article written by Martha H. Willoughby for the the 2000 issue of American Furniture, titled, Patronage in Early Salem: The Symonds Shop and Their Customers: https://chipstone.org/article.php/458/American-Furniture-2000/Patronage-in-Early-Salem:-The-Symonds-Shops--and-Their-Customers.

"...As previously noted (in Chapter 3, Volume I), the Peabody Essex Museum owns a significant example of seventeenth century furniture manufactured by the Symonds family of Salem, Massachusetts. This master woodworking lineage eventually transitioned into the red earthenware trade, operating as potters in Salem from the mid-eighteenth century through about 1830, while also maintaining ties to the colonial industry in Charlestown, Massachusetts in the 1740s.

The chest’s provenance has been traced to Caleb Osborn and Hannah Trask—the daughter of Amos Trask and Hannah Goldthwaite. This lineage effectively bridges the Symonds family (see Chapter 8, Volume I) and the Goldthwaite family (see Chapter 5, Volume I) with the Osborn family, illustrating an intriguing relationship between Puritan and Quaker families in the late seventeenth century. Decades prior, Quakers had been persecuted (or oppressed) by the Puritans in Salem for their faith.

This piece likely descended through ancestors such as Samuel or John Osborne before entering the Trask family through marriage. By uniting these names, the chest serves as an important physical record of the interconnected lives of Salem’s seventeenth century master joiners and the area’s eighteenth century potters." 

The Symonds-Osborn Story: A Puritan Masterpiece for a Quaker Home

Late 17th Century Chest Made by the Symonds Family in Salem, Mass.

Made for a Member of the Osborne or Osborn Family

The Symomds Family were Puritans

While the Osborns were Quakers

See Article for More Information

Photo Courtesy: Peabody Essex Museum

The Chest Displayed Today at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Mass.

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