Clews Fruit Bowl & Stand, ca. 1825
GUEST:
This is an older piece of porcelain that my mother had. It came down through the family and she was having a yard sale and decided she didn't want it anymore. And I took a look at it, and it said "Lafayette" on it, and I had lived in Charlton, Massachusetts, and Lafayette had stopped at the Rider Tavern. And so I thought, "Well, this is kind of interesting." It had "Lafayette." And she said, "Well, if you really like it, you can have it." And she wasn't selling it for very much and, you know, when she gets done with things, they go out to the road, so I figured, "Well, I'd better take it now."
APPRAISER:
You're right that it depicts Lafayette, who, on this particular visit, traveled extensively. But this shows him arriving in New York for really the second time. He's coming in 1824. August 16, great event in New York. You can imagine the scene of celebration here as the Marquis de Lafayette arrives on his ship the Cadmus to be greeted by crowds, roaring cannon, and Robert Fulton and Livingston, the two principal dignitaries there to meet him. And he comes back, of course, as a great hero. He arrived in the first time during the War of Independence and became an American hero, despite the fact that Marquis de Lafayette was a Frenchman through that. So this is his victory tour, if you like. And somewhat ironically, the pottery was made... and it's pottery, by the way, it's not porcelain. There is a difference. It was made in England, who, if I remember right, were the losing side in the War of Independence.
GUEST:
Yes.
APPRAISER:
The company that made this, James and Ralph Clews, we can turn this one over and see their mark on the back. There it is impressed. Clews specialized in making blue and white transfer-printed ware, and a good deal of it was made to be sold in the American marketplace. This was an expanding market for Clews and other Staffordshire potters at the time. So some of it, like this, was made with American scenes, and this is a particularly popular one. It dates quite close to the year of the landing, which was 1824. It was probably made in the mid-to-late-1820s. Now, what did your mother have it priced at?
GUEST:
Less than ten dollars.
APPRAISER:
Less than ten dollars.
GUEST:
Should we tell her?
APPRAISER:
Oh, absolutely
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
She's going to see it, anyway. If this had been decorated with an ordinary scene, say flowers in the middle, it would be certainly in the high hundreds of dollars for a beautiful bowl and stand, which this is. We can set them up. But because it's decorated with Lafayette, and more importantly, because the form of it is so unusual-- this is a fruit stand and I think that the holes are there purely for decoration-- I think, and a couple of my colleagues debated this, in a good auction, it would be estimated for at least $3,000 and maybe as much as $5,000.
GUEST:
So I did well at the yard sale.
APPRAISER:
I'm wondering what else was in that yard sale.
GUEST:
And I think, "Mom, no, you can't have it back."
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