The black mark on the bottom of this Irish Belleek teapot indicates it was made between 1891 and 1926. It sold at Belhorn Auction Services in London, Ohio, for $132.
Belleek china is one of the best-known products of Ireland. Visitors and collectors have carried Belleek teapots and vases home from Ireland since the 1850s. Irish Belleek is easy to identify. The porcelain is thin and covered with a creamy yellow glaze that looks wet. Many say it resembles mother-of-pearl. But, best of all, there is a mark on each piece and the marks have changed through the years, so you can identify and date your Belleek. Each mark includes a picture of a harp, a tower, an Irish wolfhound, shamrocks and a banner with the name Belleek. The mark has changed a little in size and shape, but it’s easiest to notice the color. The mark was black (1891-1946), then green (1946-1981), gold (1981-1992), brown (1984-1992), blue (1993-1999), black again (2000), then green again (2001-2009). A very popular pattern has green shamrocks scattered on the creamy glaze. What a perfect teapot to use on Saint Patrick’s Day.
This yard-long print pictures the Selz Good Shoes lady. The picture, drawn by Howard Chandler Christy, was a shoe company premium in about 1920. Rich Penn Auctions of Waterloo, Iowa, recently sold it for $358.
Yard-long prints can sometimes be a yard wide, but those who collect these 36-inch-by-8-inch prints prefer the term “yard-long” or the original 19th-century name, “yard picture.” Just before 1900, lithography companies began making these skinny pictures as premiums they gave away for wrappers and 2 cents postage. The first were titled “Yard of Puppies,” or “Yard of Roses,” and pictured a grouping of dogs or flowers on a 36-inch-wide and 8-inch-high print. Later, beautiful women standing in long dresses were pictured on a piece of paper 36 inches long. Many included advertisements for companies or small calendar pads at the bottom. Mandeville & King Seeds, Diamond Crystal Salt Co., Selz Good Shoes and Pabst all gave out yard-longs. Subjects run from flowers to children’s heads to months of the year, but most seem to picture women. Most yard-long prints date from before 1920, although reproductions have been made. Value is determined by rarity and condition. A collector wants a print that has not been trimmed, the original metal band at the bottom and the calendar pad, if there was one.
This swinging figure, 64 by 19 inches, is from the
If you look up the definition of “folk art,” you’ll run into confusion. That’s because the meaning has changed since the 1920s, when the term gained widespread use, thanks to Abby Aldrich Rockefeller (1874-1948). She was a collector of crude but charming paintings, sculptures and other folk art. Her husband, John D. Rockefeller Jr., helped restore Colonial Williamsburg.
Abby’s fame and her art selections determined what followed in the world of folk art. The paintings she collected were done by untrained artists whose works lacked perspective, used bright colors and simple lines, and often did not flatter the subject. Carvings were large cigar-store figures, carousel figures or weather vanes. Also considered folk art in those early days were everyday items like furniture, embroidery, baskets and ironwork if they were homemade in regional styles by talented people. Many art experts thought these everyday items were just crude copies of upper-class originals. But collectors began to see value in the folk-art tradition. More and more objects were included in the definition: mourning pictures, scrimshaw, quilts, carved parts of ships, handmade store signs, carved eagles, woven coverlets, pottery animals and face jugs. A 1980s book on folk art extended the definition to include tattoos, gravestones, firefighting tools like decorated buckets and belts, and even machine-made, metal mechanical banks and windmill weights.
This carved oak desk was used by a U.S. congressman sometime after 1857. It was probably made in Boston. It auctioned for $10,158 at Sloans & Kenyon in Chevy Chase, Md.
Want to buy a House of Representatives seat? You could have in November at a Sloans & Kenyon auction in Chevy Chase, Md. But it was an old seat – or more correctly, a desk. The Doe Hazelton Co. of Boston made 262 desks for the U.S. House of Representatives as part of a remodeling project in 1857. Each was an individual desk in the Victorian style with a lift-lid, drawer, cast-iron inkwell and appropriate carving of stars and stripes, latticework and trim. The desk, 34 3/4 inches high at the back of the slanted top, was made to hold an open book or papers at the best angle for reading and writing notes. Each had a matching carved and upholstered armchair. When the House of Representatives was redecorated again, the old desks and chairs were given to representatives or sold. The desk that sold recently brought more than $10,000. A chair from the same era, made by Bembe & Kimbel, auctioned last year for $19,600.
This plate is from the original White House set of dishes used by President Abraham Lincoln. It sold recently at Cowan’s Auctions in Cincinnati for $14,100, even though it has a chip on the edge.
When Abraham Lincoln was president, his wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, bought a new set of dishes for the White House. Although there was the threat of a civil war, Mrs. Lincoln realized a state dinner would require more dishes than were in the set bought during President Pierce’s administration. Many of the set’s white dishes with gold-and-blue trim had been used and broken. Mrs. Lincoln went to New York City and ordered a set from E.V. Haughwout & Co., the same company that had furnished the Pierce set. The center of the dishes is decorated with an eagle holding a red, white and blue shield and a banner saying “E Pluribus Unum.” The edge is gold-and-white twisted ropes surrounding a border of purplish-red called “Soliferno,” a fashionable new shade at the time. The same pattern was ordered several times in later years as new dishes were needed. This explains why some of the dishes are unmarked, some are marked “Fabrique par Haviland & Co. pour J.W. Boteler & Bro., Washington” and some are marked “Theo Haviland, Limoges, France, J.W. Boteler & Son, Washington, D.C.” All of these dishes were used in the White House. But later, some souvenir plates were made with a border in a different shade of purple. These are marked “Administration Abraham Lincoln.” The souvenir plates sell for about $300 each. The authentic White House plates usually bring $4,000 to $6,000. At a Cowan Historical Americana Auction in December, a chipped 9 1/2-inch plate sold for $14,100.
This Raphael Tuck valentine postcard printed about 1900 is one of a set of 12 cards, each based on a sign of the zodiac. July’s sign is Leo, but the card mentions a stork, not a lion. The set brought $58 at an Alderfer Auction sale of postcards in Hatfield, Pa.
The custom of sending valentine cards is not new. It goes back to the 17th century. The English author Samuel Pepys mentioned valentines in his diary on Valentine’s Day in 1667. In those days, a valentine was homemade. By the 1750s, the handwritten note could be put on gilt-edged paper found in markets. A few commercial valentines could be found between about 1800 to the late 1830s, but it was England’s 1839 Penny Postage Act that made store-bought valentines popular. Each card could have a matching envelope and, in the United States in the 1840s, needed 5 cents postage. Elaborate, often hand-assembled cards were sold, and all sorts of unusual 3-D and mechanical cards were also made. But it was at the beginning of the 20th century that valentine postcards became so popular they were preferred to the earlier lacy styles. Chromolithographed cards were made by the millions in Germany and England. Raphael Tuck & Sons of England and, later, New York made many of them. Cards were sent to friends, relatives and, of course, sweethearts. “Vinegars” or “penny dreadfuls” were sent to disagreeable people who seemed to deserve them. Collectors today want all types of old cards. Save the most interesting new ones, too. Cards with cartoon figures, trains, cars, planes, phones or any modern item that in the future will help date the cards will be valuable. So will cards related to a political event or a war. But best will always be a card that expresses the valentine theme of love.
Silver-plated triangular pieces of metal were formed into this 5 3/4-inch-high cigarette box made by John Otaredze about 1935. Talisman Fine Arts of San Francisco sold it last year for $1,000.
“If you like it, buy it” is the motto of many successful collectors. But sometimes you can’t afford to. We saw an unusual cigarette box about 20 years ago at a small antiques show. It was made of triangular pieces of silver-plated metal stacked one on top of the other like a deck of cards. The stack was twisted into a spiral. There was a cover over the hole inside that held cigarettes. We didn’t need the box, but it was fascinating, and we really wanted to buy it. But it was $100 – too much money for our budget – so we passed it by. No one, including the dealers, seemed to know more than we did about the unusual, well-designed box, even though it was marked “Otar USA, Pats. Pend.” We have seen two more, and the price has been higher each time. But now the cigarette box’s history is known, and we realize what a bargain we passed up years ago. John Otaredze was a Russian immigrant who worked in the Santa Cruz, Calif., area from about 1920 until he died in 1939. He made and sold lighting fixtures, andirons, lanterns and other metalwork, but he is now best-known for his Art Deco-modernist metal boxes. He patented the design and marked each box. Last year, Talisman Fine Arts of San Francisco sold one at Trocadero.com for $1,000. The value continues to rise.
This figurine depicts Frederick Cook and Robert Peary clinging to the world while searching for the North Pole. The 1910 bisque vignette was made by Gebruder Heubach, a German firm. It sold at a Theriault’s auction in 2008 for $1,120.
Was it Robert Peary or Frederick Cook who first reached the geographic North Pole?
Collectors who try can learn many stories about the past through the collectibles of bygone eras. An originally inexpensive 1910 figurine showing Peary and Cook clinging to a globe is a clue to the pair’s history. Cook claimed he reached the pole on April 22, 1908. Peary claimed he made it there on April 7, 1909. Both stories are doubted today.
Later expeditions and investigations showed that some of the records and memories of the Inuits on the original expeditions were false. And the two explorers themselves appeared to be untrustworthy. Cook claimed his records of the expedition were lost. He also claimed to have climbed to the top of Mount McKinley, but later evidence showed he did not reach the summit. He was convicted and imprisoned for using the mails to defraud investors in an oil venture. Peary made false claims of discoveries in an 1898 expedition. In 1907 he said he discovered far-north Crocker Land, but later explorers proved the land did not exist. He was also faulted for mistreating the Inuits and for fathering a boy with a young Inuit girl.
There is still controversy concerning the two men, but the figurine makes it clear that in 1910 there was great interest in the explorers, the North Pole and the truth. Today credit for the first undisputed sighting of the North Pole usually goes to the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen, who flew over the pole in May 1926.
Phoenix Furniture Co. made this 60-inch-wide Arts and Crafts sideboard. The carvings were inspired by an earlier style. It sold for $4,200 at a Treadway/Toomey Galleries sale last year.
Grand Rapids, Mich., was the center of furniture manufacturing in the United States by the 1860s. It was the right place at the right time. The country’s population center was moving west. Homeowners were much closer to Grand Rapids than to New England. A new way of thinking about a house had evolved, too. By the second half of the 19th century, good stylish furniture was a sign of the good life. Women were to stay home and create a “proper domestic environment” for the family. Large houses had special rooms — a parlor, library, hall, bedroom, kitchen and dining room. Each required its own furniture — a dining table, hall tree or washstand. Often a parlor was furnished with a suite: a man’s chair, woman’s chair, four smaller chairs, a sofa and perhaps a table in the same style. It was now possible to make furniture with less-expensive machine-carved parts. The family furniture was a status symbol, just as a media room or the latest sports car would be today. Paintings were important, too, and so were small decorations like vases and figurines and the yards of fabric used to make drapes and upholstery. The Phoenix Furniture Co. started making Victorian-style parlor furniture for the middle and upper classes in 1876. In 1900, styles changed. Arts and Crafts furniture with straight lines and very little decorative carving was made for rooms with fewer sofas and chairs and uncluttered tabletops and shelves. Phoenix Furniture altered its style and made Arts and Crafts pieces, some with a touch of Victorian carving and trim. The company had already made the McKinley Chair with straight lines and a cane seat back in 1895. It was one of the first popular Arts and Crafts designs. Phoenix was acquired by Robert W. Irwin in 1911, but the Phoenix name and a picture of a Phoenix bird continued as a trademark on Irwin pieces until 1931. Irwin went out of business in 1953.
Do you recognize this 5-1/8-inch silver piece made by Paul Revere? It’s a tongue depressor with a fiddle-coffin handle. It auctioned in 2008 at Skinner in Boston for $14,100. Could that be a record price for a tongue depressor?
“What’s-its” are fun, but were rarely made by great artists. Paul Revere, the famous horseback rider who warned that “the British are coming,” made this odd silver piece stamped with his name. There was an economic depression before the American Revolution, so although Revere was a successful silversmith and goldsmith, he also earned money to support his wife and eight children as a copper-plate engraver who made illustrations for books, songs, menus and magazines. And he was also a dentist, political activist and soldier. After the Revolution, Revere was a hardware store owner and importer, and was active in charity work. He also owned a copper rolling mill and a foundry that made cannons, bells and other large objects. The unusual silver object stamped with his name probably was made between 1768 and 1775, when he was a dentist. He cleaned teeth and made false teeth carved from walrus ivory or animal teeth. The mystery object, a tongue depressor, may have been used by Revere in his dentistry practice. It sold for $14,100 at a Skinner auction in Revere’s hometown of Boston.
Q: My old wooden school desk has a lift-up lid and iron legs that could be bolted to the floor. It is the combination kind that was put in rows in a schoolroom. The desk was made with a flip-down seat for the student in front. That means unless there is some way to remodel the desk and remove the chair, it’s not very useful as a desk. Any suggestions?
A: Combination desks were being used in schools by the late 1890s. Some are still in use today. They were first made by the Grand Rapids School Furniture Co., founded in 1886. By 1899, the company had merged with 18 others to form the American Seating Co. of New York City. The earliest desks had cast-iron legs. In 1911, American Seating started using tubular steel for legs. Later improvements included adjustable height, swivel seats and a base that was not bolted to the floor. All of these features were in use by 1921 on the “Universal” chair. After World War II, chairs were made using new materials like plywood and plastic. The company is still in business. We have seen old desks like yours in children’s rooms. The flip seat serves as a book storage area, and a separate small chair is used with the desk.
Q: Please tell me what my 9-inch Griswold cast-iron skillet is worth. It belonged to my mother, who died a few years ago at the age of 97. The marks on the bottom include “No. 6,” the word “Griswold” in a circled cross above “Erie, Pa.” and the number 699. I don’t want my kids selling the skillet for $1 at a garage sale.
A: Skillets and other cast-iron cookware made by the Griswold Manufacturing Co. are collectible. Tell your children not to sell the skillet for $1. Griswold made cookware from the late 1800s until the 1950s. Skillets came in various sizes and styles. Yours, the No. 6 skillet, made using Griswold’s pattern No. 699, sells for $15 to $20.
Q: How is a spoon holder used?
A: A spoon holder looks like a vase. The spoons are put in the vase with the stems up. At a buffet dinner or when coffee or tea is served at the table from a large pot, the spoon holder and spoons are near the creamer and sugar bowl. Spoon holders, also called spooners or spoon trays, became popular after the Civil War. They were usually glass or silver. In later years, the spoon holder and spoons were passed around the table. They were out of style and no longer used by the early 1900s. Buffet dinners, introduced just before World War I and extremely popular by the late 1940s, brought back the idea. Some practical housewives used small vases or old spooners to hold silverware near the stacked plates on the buffet table.
Q: My Art Deco lamp is shaped like a nude woman. It is made of metal and glass. The name “Frankart” is on the bottom. Where and when was it made?
A: Frankart Inc. was in business in New York City from 1921 into the 1940s. It made mass-produced lamps, ashtrays, bookends and vases. Most designs featured a slim, nude, Art Deco woman made of green- or bronze-finished britannia metal or aluminum. The owner and chief designer for the company was Arthur von Frankenberg. The nude figures were the most popular, but the company also made golfers, cowgirls and animals. When Frankart went out of business, its molds were sold for scrap. Several other companies made pieces similar to Frankart’s. Although collectors often call all green nude-woman lamps by the name “Frankart,” a lamp must be marked with the Frankart name and patent number to be authentic. A Frankart lamp with original finish can sell for more than $1,000.
Tip: Use a soft-bristled paintbrush to dust lampshades.
Terry Kovel answers as many questions as possible through the column. By sending a letter with a question, you give full permission for use in the column or any other Kovel forum. Names, addresses or e-mail addresses will not be published. We cannot guarantee the return of any photograph, but if a stamped envelope is included, we will try. The volume of mail makes personal answers or appraisals impossible. Write to Kovels, Auction Central News, King Features Syndicate, 300 W. 57th St., New York, NY 10019.
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CURRENT PRICES Current prices are recorded from antiques shows, flea markets, sales and auctions throughout the United States. Prices vary in different locations because of local economic conditions.
Jackie Robinson Daily Dime Register Bank store display, die-cut cardboard, image of Jackie at bat, c. 1950, 10 x 14 inches, $510.
Madame Alexander Amy doll, plastic, blond, curler box, Alexander dress tag, box, 14 inches, $675.
Federal dining table, walnut, 3-part, 2 drop leaves, D-shape ends, 4-sided tapered legs, c. 1810, 42 x 20 inches, $785.
Pewter serving tray, waterlily center, dragonfly handles, Hugo Leven, c. 1898, 11 x 18 inches, $3,150.
The new full-color “Kovels’ Antiques & Collectibles Price Guide, 2009,” 41st edition, is your most accurate source for current prices. This large-size paperback has more than 2,500 color photographs and 42,000 up-to-date prices for more than 700 categories of antiques and collectibles. You’ll also find hundreds of factory histories and marks and a report on the record prices of the year, plus helpful sidebars and tips about buying, selling, collecting and preserving your treasures. Available at your bookstore; online at Kovels.com; by phone at 800-571-1555; or send $27.95 plus $4.95 postage to Price Book, Box 22900, Beachwood, OH 44122.
