STATE MUSEUM ANNOUNCES SIGNIFICANT STONEWARE DONATIONS

Release Date: 
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Contact Information: 
Contact: Office of Communications Phone: (518) 474-1201

ALBANY – A historically significant 1809 stoneware jar by Paul Cushman of Albany, from the personal collection of PBS’ Antique Road Show host Leigh Keno, is among several decorated stoneware pieces donated to the State Museum recently by Adam J. Weitsman of Owego.

A presentation piece that was likely created for a specific customer, the jar may be the first piece that was made in Cushman’s kiln. It was recently featured in an exhibition on Cushman at the Albany Institute of History and Art. The jar is stamped 36 times across its surface with “Paul Cushman’s Stoneware Factory 1809/half a mile west of Albany Goal (Jail).” Another inscription reads “C.Russell/Pott/Sunday/1809.” Russell was an Albany mason and may have assisted in building the kiln.

The jar and other donations received will be added to the Museum’s existing Weitsman Collection that includes over 100 pieces of decorated stoneware Weitsman donated in 1996. Weitsman began collecting stoneware during his teenage years and his collection includes many unusual forms of decoration. During the past 10 years, he has continued to acquire important pieces of decorated stoneware for the Museum. Many of the pieces acquired recently feature spectacular forms of decoration by 19th-century folk artists.

‘ ‘Weitsman has an eye for the unusual and a flare for identifying some of the most artistic examples of decorated stoneware,” said John Scherer, the Museum’s curator of decorative arts. “We are both delighted and fortunate that Mr. Weitsman has decided to build and showcase one of the most important collections of American decorated stoneware at the State Museum.”

The donations include a rare cylindrical water cooler, displaying a portrait of a Civil War general and his wife. It was made by potters Fenton & Hancock of St. Johnsbury, Vermont. The image of the general is almost an exact copy of a photograph of Asa Peabody Blunt (1826-1889), who served as a general in the Quartermaster’s Department stationed in Virginia during the Civil War. Blunt was a resident of St. Johnsbury, and the cooler was undoubtedly made as a tribute from the community and presented to him when he returned from the war.

Another stoneware jug acquired by Weitsman for the Museum was made by potter William Lundy of Troy, c. 1826, and depicts an amusing incised and cobalt blue caricature of a merman (male version of mermaid).

The Museum also received crocks acquired by Weitsman that feature some of the most unusual decorations to be found on stoneware. These are from potter William MacQuoid of Little West 12th Street, Manhattan. One piece displays a zebra and the other a camel. Another crock by this maker displays an American eagle and shield. A crock by MacQuoid’s predecessor, L. Lehman & Co., made in about 1860, is decorated with a Dutch or German-style church with a gambrel roof and round tower, complete with a weather cock. Little West 12th Street in Manhattan was a German neighborhood and the church may have stood nearby the potters’ factory.

Another New York City potter is represented by a two gallon water pitcher decorated with dashes of blue cobalt made by Clarkson Crolius Jr. (working 1835-1849). This joins several other pieces by Crolius and his father that were already in the Museum’s Weitsman Collection.

Recent additions also include a two gallon crock made by C. W. Braun of Buffalo, c. 1880, which is decorated with a portrait of a gentleman with a cowboy hat and mustache, who looks remarkably like Buffalo Bill. A humorous long-necked gooney bird graces a six-gallon water cooler made by M. Woodruff of Cortland, , c. 1865. This bird is often found on stoneware made in Cortland. This piece was acquired from the collection of Donald Shelley, former director of the Henry Ford Museum.

A highly decorated five-gallon water cooler, created by J. & E. Norton of Bennington, Vermont, comes out of the famous McKearin collection. It features examples of three types of decoration commonly associated with potteries at Bennington, Troy and Fort Edward -- a reclining deer, a house and a basket of flowers.

One of the most handsome pieces, added to the collection in May, is a six-gallon crock by N. Clark & Co., Rochester, c. 1850, decorated with a very detailed phoenix or vulture.

These items are just a sampling of pieces added to the Museum’s collection during the last two years. A catalog and exhibition featuring the Museum’s Weitsman Stoneware Collection is being planned for 2008.

The New York State Museum is a program of the New York State Education Department. Founded in 1836, the Museum has the longest continuously operating state natural history research and collection survey in the United States. Located on Madison Avenue in Albany, it is open daily from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., except on Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's Day. Admission is free. Further information about programs and events can be obtained by calling (518) 474-5877 or visiting the museum website at www.nysm.nysed.gov.

# # #