AFA Autumn 2018

Antiques & Fine Art 109 2018 In January 1796, David Wight Jr., and his father traveled from their home in Sturbridge, Massachusetts, to Boston. At the time, a lottery in support of Harvard College was under way, and the younger Wight wanted to buy a ticket. He urged his father to lend him $10 for the purchase. As Wight later recounted, his father “objected strongly against my buying one saying that I would lose the money,” but he relented, and they returned to Sturbridge with a ticket. The drawings began the following December and continued until January 11, 1797. A year after purchasing the ticket, Wight learned that he had won $5,000. He used a portion of his windfall to build a grand home in Sturbridge. Construction was completed by August 1799, and soon he and his wife, Susannah, began to furnish it. They apparently turned to Nathan Lumbard for at least three pieces of furniture for the new dwelling. These items—a desk and bookcase, tall clock, and stand—rank among the maker’s most decorative furniture. All have David’s distinctive signature, “D Wight Jr” written in pencil in inconspicuous locations, and two bear the date of 1800. On the desk and the stand, lively scrolling vines flowing out of inlaid urns dominate the design. The clock is more restrained, relying instead on a swirling patera within diamond stringing, a motif that also appears on the prospect door of the desk interior. After Wight’s death, in 1813, appraisers assessed the clock at $45; next was the desk and bookcase at $23, and nearly everything else fell well below $10. For the Wight family, the elegant clock, together with the ornately inlaid desk and stand, offered tangible proof of the family’s prosperity and refinement. Desk and bookcase, attributed to Nathan Lumbard and Ebenezer Howard, Sturbridge, 1800–1802. Cherry, mahogany banding, light- and dark-wood inlay, white pine. H. 80½, W. 43, D. 18¾ in. Inscribed “D Wight Jr” in pencil on bottom of lower right compartment of bookcase; unidentified “ET” incised within urn inlay on bookcase doors. Layton Art Collection, Inc., Purchase, Virginia Booth Vogel Acquisition Fund at the Milwaukee Art Museum (L1996.1a-c). Photo by John R. Glembin.