AFA Summer 2021

2021 Antiques & Fine Art 79 1. Adam Bowett, English Furniture 1660–1714: From Charles II to Queen Anne (Woodbridge: Antique Collectors’ Club, 2002), 199-202. 2. As quoted in Wendy A. Cooper and Tara L. Gleason, “A Different Rhode Island Block-and-Shell Story: Providence Provenances and Pitch Pediments,” in Luke Beckerdite, ed. American Furniture (Milwaukee: Chipstone Foundation, 1999), ftn. 11. 3. Ronald L. Hurst and Jonathan Prown, Southern Furniture 1680-1830: The Colonial Williamsburg Collection (Williamsburg, Virginia: The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation in assoc. with Abrams, 1997), 553–557. 4. Sumpter Priddy III and Joan A. Quinn, “Crossroads of Culture: Eighteenth-Century Furniture from Western Maryland,” in Luke Beckerdite, ed., American Furniture (Milwaukee: Chipstone Foundation, 1997), 142–144, 165. 5. Philip Zea and Robert C. Cheney, Clockmaking in New England 1725–1825: An Interpretation of the Old Sturbridge Village Collection (Sturbridge, Mass: Old Sturbridge Village, 1992), 29–43. 6. Colonial Williamsburg owns an Aaron Willard labeled clock with the name of Richmond clockmaker William McCabe on the dial #1930-174, and the Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts Craftsman database has examples of John McKee, Chester, S.C., clocks with Willard labels inside (see CWF # 2010-64 object file.) 7. Hurst and Prown, 155–159. 8. William Voss Elder III and Lu Bartlett, John Shaw: Cabinetmaker of Annapolis (Baltimore: The Baltimore Museum of Art, 1983), 141–143. Brot hers Aa ron and Simon Wil la rd of Roxbur y, a neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, revolutionized clockmaking in America in the 1790s. Whereas most other American clockmakers until that point had mainly worked in small shops, relying on outside artisans for specialized parts or skills, the Willards standardized and streamlined their clock production, and brought many of those specialists into a factory- like setting and community. The Willards created the first American clock manufactories, producing clocks and cases for the local, regional, and national markets. 5 Tall clocks with Aaron’s name on the dial and/or label inside the case, have been found as far afield as Richmond, Virginia, and Chester, South Carolina. 6 One example (Figs. 9, 10) has the name L. Lovell inscribed with a f lourish inside the case, suggesting a more local original ownership, possibly by Captain Lazarus Lovell of Hyannis and Boston, Massachusetts. The white enameled iron dial on this clock, first introduced in late-eighteenth-century England, was likely painted by one of Willard’s dial painters. This elaborate example has a mourning scene with the words “Sacred to Washington” on the moon dial and four women depicting the four seasons in the corners of the main dial. Willard clock cases tended to follow a standard format, allowing for a uniformity of production. The arched hood with the scrolled fret, the rectangular trunk door often ornamented with molding or string inlay, and the fluted quarter columns with inset brass stop-fluting, characterized the “Roxbury” style cases popularized by the Willards in America following British prototypes. A clock of similar date to the Willard example but of a very different case design descended in the family of Georgetown, D.C., cabinetmaker William King Jr. (Figs. 11, 12). Family history contends that King received the clock movement from a destitute clockmaker’s or retailer’s widow as payment for funeral services and that King made the case himself. King was a noted cabinetmaker and undertaker (a common role for cabinetmakers) in Georgetown during the first half of the nineteenth century, producing furniture for James Monroe’s White House, as well as private individuals (Fig. 13). A native of Ireland, King apprenticed with Annapolis, Maryland, cabinetmaker John Shaw before opening his own shop. 7 Indeed, the broken scroll pediment with delicate scrolled fretwork seen on this clock case relates to that on earlier Maryland cases, including some attributed to Shaw. 8 The movement is signed by Thomas or possibly William Brentnall of Sutton Coldfield, England, and cast into the back of the iron dial plate is “W C & J NICHOLAS/ Birmingham,” for neighboring clock and watchmakers William, Caleb, and Joshua Nicholas. Americans imported English component clock parts as well as entire movements throughout the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Like so many other decorative arts objects, tall case clocks were a product of their time and place. The people who created them, the patrons who purchased them, and the trade networks that allowed makers to obtain specialized components both locally and internationally, all influenced clock technology and design. Clocks are a timeless reminder of the people who had a hand in making or owning them and of their society. While some might view these clocks through a nostalgic lens, looking deeper into a clock ’s mechanism or c a se a llows us to understand these objects more fully and how they appeared to their makers and owners.  These clocks and many others are on view until December 31, 2022, in the exhibition Keeping Time: Tall Case Clocks, in the Iris and Mark Coblitz Gallery at the DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum, one of the newly expanded Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg. Tara Gleason Chicirda is the curator of furniture at Colonial Williamsburg.