Cooking for a family was labor-intensive in the 19th century. Each dish started with a living animal or fresh produce that had to be cleaned, cut, pitted, peeled, grated or chopped. Then it was combined with other ingredients and cooked over an open fire or in an oven.
The late 1800s was a time of invention and the problems of the housewife-cook were solved in many ways. Hundreds of different apple slicers were patented. There were also cherry pitters, can openers, green-bean slicers, ice-cream makers, mayonnaise mixers and many other useful, if sometimes strange, devices.
Most 21st-century collectors and cooks often don’t even recognize some of these tin or iron tools. The next time you see an unusual iron tool with a handle that turns gears, moves blades or clicks parts in odd ways, try to imagine how it could have been used.
Our favorites are cherry pitters, sometimes called “stoners.” They usually have prongs that push the seed out of the cherry and send the seeds down one path and the cherry down another. What a clever device to use when making a cherry pie. The manufacturer and the date are often embossed on the turning wheel. Value is determined by age, maker and how complex the mechanism is. The tools can sell from $35 to hundreds of dollars.
I have a pair of painted china bowls given to me 50 years ago by an English cousin who said they belonged to his mother. The bottom is stamped with a lion in a shield. The word “Bavaria” is above the shield and “Schumann” below it. What can you tell me about the maker?
Your bowls were made by the Carl Schumann Porcelain Factory, which operated in Arzberg, Bavaria, Germany, from 1881 to 1996. The mark on your dishes was not used until the 20th century. Schumann pieces are easy to find for sale on the Internet. Single bowls sell for $5 to $25.
I found a tin sign in an old garage. It’s printed with a picture of a nun holding a crucifix with an angel above her holding a crown of thorns. One thorn from the crown is stuck in the nun’s forehead. The mark on the bottom is “New York, C. Del Tufo, Roma.” Can you identify the person in the picture?
The picture shows St. Rita (1381-1457), a Catholic saint born near Cascia, Italy. She became an Augustinian nun after the deaths of her husband and twin sons. While in the convent, Rita developed a wound on her forehead attributed to a thorn from Jesus’ crown of thorns. Rita’s image has been painted by many artists over the centuries. Lithographed tin images of the saints were especially popular the United States in the mid-20th century.
About 30 years ago a friend gave me an American Indian doll she had owned since the late 1940s. The doll, 61/2 inches tall, is wearing a colorful patchwork dress and a black cloth headdress. She also has tiny beaded earrings and a necklace of three strands of tiny beads. The doll is made of some type of natural fiber and has hand-embroidered facial features. Clipped to her back is a handmade label that reads “Indian Doll, Florida Seminole.” Does this doll have value?
Your Seminole Indian doll is typical of those made in Florida in the mid-1900s. The tribe still makes and sells dolls like it. The doll’s body is handmade from palmetto leaves stuffed and stitched to form her body and embroidered to create features. The black-cloth headdress represents a Seminole woman’s hair, which would have been combed over a mantle and pinned to form a fan. Your doll, in excellent condition, could sell for $50 or more.
A while ago, you wrote about a roll-top desk made by the Fred Macey Furniture Co. of Grand Rapids, Mich., and the 1905 merger of Macey with the Wernicke Furniture Co. You said the new company was called Macey-Wernicke until 1907, when its name became Macey Co. How is Macey related to the Globe-Wernicke Co. of Cincinnati? I worked for the Fetter Co. of Louisville, Ky., from 1941 to 1975. Fetter used to buy Globe-Wernicke stackable bookcases by the railcar load and sold them to law offices.
The companies were related. Otto H.L. Wernicke founded the Wernicke Furniture Co. in Minneapolis in 1893 to manufacture his patented “elastic bookcases,” a system of wooden units with glass doors that could interlock vertically and horizontally. The cases became better known as stackable bookcases. Wernicke moved his business to Grand Rapids in 1897.
The Globe Files Co., founded in Cincinnati in 1882, introduced its vertical filing system in 1898. Otto Wernicke, seeking to expand his business, joined with Globe in 1904 to form the Globe-Wernicke Co. But while Otto apparently gave Globe-Wernicke the right to manufacture his patented bookcases, he did not work there. Instead, he stayed in Grand Rapids.
Then sometime around 1905 his original Wernicke Furniture Co. purchased the Fred Macey Furniture Co. Otto became an officer at Macey and started making his stackable bookcases there. Globe-Wernicke sued Macey in 1906 for using Wernicke’s patents. The litigation took years, and Globe lost.
Write to Kovels, The Herald, King Features Syndicate, 888 Seventh Ave., New York, NY 10019.
2006 by Cowles Syndicate Inc.
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.
1950s afternoon-dress pattern, short sleeves, button-down front, ordered through Women Magazine, original envelope, size 34 bust, $20.
Knight on horseback liqueur bottle, label reads “Imperial Knight Blackberry Liquor, 2 oz.,” marked “Occupied Japan,” $25.
Swankyswig glass, Bicentennial red tulip, 33/4 inches, $35.
Sen. Barry Goldwater Remco doll, wearing cowboy hat, Goldwater campaign pin on chest, 1964, 51/2 inches, $60.
“77 Sunset Strip” board game, “A Private Eye Mystery and Suspense Game,” photo of Efrem Zimbalist Jr., Roger Smith and Edward Byrnes, 1960, Lowell Toys, $95.
Watt mixing bowl No. 8, Apple pattern, 41/2 x 8 inches, $110.
Steel-bar chairs, deep curved backs, scroll arms, woven seat, tubular steel legs, D-form stretchers, 1980s, 40 inches, set of four, $650.
Rookwood vase, large bulbous sculpted and applied morning glories, 1882, 13 x 13 inches, $700.
Sampler, strawberries, pink, green, red, ivory and tan, “Mary Ann Otty, aged 11, 1824,” 16 x 13 inches, $875.
1940s game table, square top, folding side that opens to inlaid game board, slide-out supports, ebonized wood base, 22 x 22 x 29 inches, $1,000.
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