Still Exciting

Museums often share parts of their collection with other institutions upon request. Of course there are rules and regulations, standards to follow, and logistics to coordinate (shipping, insurance, text panels, etc).This loan agreement process makes exhibitions more exciting for recurring visitors. Plus the institutions involved have the best intention for the selected object to be featured in a special way for a limited time period.

Recently, George Washington’s Mount Vernon Estate, Museum and Gardens in Alexandria, Virginia borrowed a copper still from our collection at Stratford Hall to display in a new exhibit within the Donald W. Reynolds Museum Center.

Typically the gourd shaped still, complete with spout and coil, sits on an iron stand in the “outside kitchen” at Stratford Hall. Technically a still is defined as “an apparatus for distilling liquids, such as alcohols, consisting of a vessel in which the substance is vaporized by heat and a cooling device in which vapor is condensed.”

Liquor was, in fact, distilled on the plantation. It was simply part of life during the 18^th century. Crops were grown for the table, livestock raised, and goods produced… be it clothing, furniture, or shoes. Just imagine the possibilities of having a carpenter or blacksmith on site with the skills to custom design interior and exterior features for the property. This was, obviously, long before shopping malls or the Internet! Additionally, the Lees had access to the Potomac River and the world beyond where ships were capable of making deliveries from Europe.

William Bailey, a Pennsylvanian copper smith, likely created this still during the late 18^th or early 19^th century. We are truly grateful that upon its arrival to Mount Vernon a highly trained Conservator of the 21st century, Katherine Ridgway, performed numerous treatments to better the condition of the still and to preserve it for many years to come.

As you can see below, the still looks fabulous in its prominent display case. I hope you will visit both Stratford Hall and the Distillery exhibit at George Washington's Mount Vernon Estate to make exciting historic comparisons.

For further information on the distillery click this link:

http://www.mountvernon.org/visit-his-estate/plan-your-visit/distillery-amp-gristmill

and to learn more about the plantation click here http://www.stratfordhall.org/learn/plantation.php.

The curator takes Manhattan

Greetings from New York City (above, a view of Rockefeller Center ice rink from my hotel).  I am currently on a scouting trip to New York during Americana Week - the time in late-January when all the big auction houses have their sales and the major antique shows are running.  After arriving yesterday, I spent the afternoon at the New York Ceramics Fair and today it is the Winter Antiques Show and whatever else I may be able to squeeze in.  We're not bidding on anything at any of the major auctions, so this time it's just the shows for me.

So what exactly do I do at these shows?  Well, I talk to people and I look at things.  Those are the two main activities.  Before I left Virginia, I made a binder of information related to items that I'm looking for, including pictures and information gleaned from Lee family records like inventories.  This trip the focus is on ceramics and specifically items found via archaeology (above - like the rat's nest - or below ground).  If you've been to our new slave quarter exhibits, you know that we have archaeology on display.  Two fragments of white salt-glazed stoneware are on view (above) and I'm looking to find whole examples to display in the slave quarter rooms.

Talking and scouting yesterday led to this plate:  an English white salt-glaze plate with molded rim.  Can you see where these fragments might have fit?

I'm also looking for the more rare finds.  Like the Chinese export porcelain pattern we found in the rat's nest with a pair of crabs on it.  Or the agateware tea bowl found in the West Yard and now on display in our new Southwest Outbuilding exhibits.  No luck so far.  So I give out my card, gather e-mail addresses, and will send dealers pictures of the fragments so they can help keep a lookout for examples in the marketplace.  Keep your fingers crossed for me today and I'll be sure to report back if any interesting finds come my way.

Fun on the Farm: Perspectives from an Intern

Hi folks, my name is Townsend Hart and I’m a historic preservation and museum studies minor at the University of Mary Washington. I’m currently interning with both Gretchen Goodell (Curator) and Abigail Newkirk (Director of Interpretation and Education).

The objective for the internship is to research various objects belonging to Stratford and create interpretive proposals. Initially I planed to work on five objects in total, but some of the objects required more in depth and time consuming research. It has really been a learning experience and I’m thankful for the opportunity to do such involved, fascinating projects.

The first object I began with was the nursery fireback- marked with two cherub angels and the date 1745. I was able to find some interesting things about both this particular fireback as well as firebacks in general. For example, the fact that the Lee’s even had one greatly tells of their wealth considering firebacks were rare and only in the possession of the upper class at the time. To complete my research I looked through archival information (early RELMA notes, Lee family member accounts), books on iron works, and Robert E. Lee biographies.

The second object that I worked with was a handwritten book of Sermon’s attributed to Hannah Lee Corbin (originally dated to around 1780). My initial task for the book was to determine who actually penned the book because there is no name written. For this I completed a handwriting analysis comparing some letters written by Hannah Lee Corbin and her son-in-law George Turberville. Next I attempted to find a single original source...what a crazy experience this was! Google Archives proved to be an excellent resource. I was able to search an individual sentence and come up with original sources, many from 18^th century journals. If it was Hannah Lee Corbin who penned this, it really shows her moxie and intelligence.

I have loved getting to see the inner workings of a historic house museum first-hand. There really is no better environment to have this experience than at Stratford. I enjoy taking breaks to feed the horses, or Zander and Steve as I call them, but I highly doubt these are their actual names. I’m looking forward to making way on my next project: thinking of something cool for the coaching event in the spring as well as come up with some creative ideas for the interpretation of the coach house.

Setting up house

It is wedding season and I've been looking at a lot of wedding registries lately for a few friends who are getting married.  Most couples today register for "fancy" goods like china and expensive wine glasses, but also for "practical" goods like a dish drainer or trash can.  It got me thinking...when Thomas and Hannah Lee set up house at Stratford in the late 1730s/early 1740s, what did they need?  Granted, at that point they had young children and a household already, but I bet they needed new furniture and other items when they moved into the new digs.

Looking at the inventory taken after Thomas Lee's death in 1750 (excerpt above - click to zoom), you definitely see a mixture of fancy and practical.  A clock worth 10 pounds and a "Chandeleer" worth 21 pounds are listed along with "a Parcell of Cannisters," a coffee roaster, and "4 Water Glasses and other things" worth less than a pound combined.

Recently I've been trying to fill in our collection with the small, everyday sorts of things that I know would have been needed by residents of Stratford in their daily lives.  One of my most recent acquisitions for the collection is a small looking glass that would have been useful in a family bedchamber or upper servant's chamber.  We see low-cost looking glasses in the Stratford household inventory, like in the Blue Room inventory in 1775, where appraisers found "1 small glass" valued at 3 shillings.  Not every room in the Lee household would have had fancy, gilded and carved looking glasses (although some would have!).  Like our own homes, the rooms at Stratford would have been decorated in a hierarchy - the fancy public rooms with expensive furniture, the more intimate family rooms that you used on a daily basis, and the private service rooms that only the staff or family would see.

Now I just need to decide which way to go with my wedding gifts...


Looking glass image courtesy Pook and Pook.

Behind the scenes: the curator in winter

What does a museum curator do in the depths of winter when her museum galleries and historic house rooms are closed to the public? Research and writing, of course! The quiet of these weeks since the new year have allowed me to focus on some major tasks that often fall by the wayside during our busy seasons.

One of my winter projects has been the detailed planning for the room settings in the upcoming Southwest outbuilding (you may have seen a Facebook video talking about the building, and read more about the project here and here). I've been planning for object conservation, reproduction objects like trunks and a bed, working with a private collector who will be lending a table for the chamber, and discussing textile options with an historic textile scholar. 

 

I've also been working on an object list and furnishing details for the Northwest Stair Passage in the house (which Phil Mark, our Director of Preservation, has touched upon quite a bit in his blog posts). There's not much floor space in this stair passage, but a few key objects will be on display: a clothespress (for linen storage), a folding bed (for overnight guests or servants), and a close stool (a toilet for, well, personal hygiene).

Another of my goals this winter has been to catalog a backlog of objects that have been sitting waiting for a little bit of research. We had two pistols, for instance, that were found by our accounting staff in a vault in our administration building. 18th-century pistols, I should clarify. Were they accepted for the historic collection and just never transferred over? I've been working with a firearms dealer to help with the identification of the pistols, researching their makers and the marks on them.

Visitor Center Exhibits Get a Facelift

Gretchen reports:

The Lees of Stratford Gallery has received an update, with the final touches completed just this past Friday. We are very excited to be able to bring new interpretive information and objects into the gallery, which will hopefully please both new and returning visitors.

The update includes new object label text with more stories about the Lees and other residents of Stratford; added screening to our lights to cut down levels near light-sensitive objects; and new object mounts to make sure the artifacts are safe and secure.

Jenn from SurroundArt made over 60 mounts in the course of 5 days! For those counting, that just might be a mount-making record.

Kat Marshall put her skills to work cutting out all the new labels for the gallery.

Carlos from SurroundArt carefully rehangs the Lee family coat of arms on its new mounting system (much better than a single nail).

New objects in the cases include: fragments from a rat’s nest found in the Great House's attic (see here for my previous post); the original Hall chandelier hook; Arthur Lee’s writing box; a tureen and ladle from the Storke/Stuart period of Stratford ownership; an original pot hook and birdhouse from Stratford; buttons from Robert E. Lee’s uniforms and a vase used to hold flowers at his funeral.

And a big thank you goes to those donors who helped fund this project:

• 2009 Update Funding Provided In Part By David H. Walker, Tranquillity, Reedville, Virginia
  
• Conservation Funding Provided in Part By Mr. and Mrs. Peter Irving Channing Knowles II, Richmond, Virginia

Laura reports:

In addition to all these updates in the Lee Gallery, we added two new temporary exhibits as well. One exhibit showcases fossils from the Miocene era found right here at Stratford Hall, and the other exhibit presents visitors' photographs in front of the Great House. If you have any photographs of friends or family (historic or present-day!), please send them to me at llawfer@stratfordhall.org.

We did the work on these exhibits in-house, with the help of our collections staff--Gretchen, Sarah, and Kat--and with some mount-making brilliance by Carlos and Jenn at SurroundArt. We're very pleased with the outcome, and we hope you'll come to visit to see the changes in the Lees of Stratford Gallery, and the new temporary exhibits--"The Miocene Era"and "On the Way to Stratford." Let us know what you think.

There are always new things to see at Stratford Hall!

Kat and I figure out photo placement for "On the Way to Stratford." Lots of painters' tape!

A view of the partially-completed exhibit about the Miocene era. Come and see all the great specimens now on display!

A Real Rat's Nest

The term "rat's nest" makes you think about a real mess - be it a hairstyle or a messy room. But in our world, the term can be a welcome one, especially when the rat in question had such good taste in what she collected.

Like other historic houses, Stratford's Great House has hosted a variety of residents through its history - from the Lee family, to the enslaved and servant population, to later owners like the Stuart family, to domestic animals and so-called vermin and pests. One such resident (or series of residents) during the 18th century was a rat who moved around the house, collecting scraps of fabric, ceramics, glass, nails, animal bones, and a pewter button. Her nest was discovered in the 1980s in the attic above the Great Hall. We're not the first historic house to find a rat's nest. Curators love them - the contents can tell you so much about the lifestyle, furnishings, and foodways of a house's residents.

Black roof rats were the typical sort of house rat making such nests in 18th-century coastal Virginia. Rats at that time were venturing across the seas on cargo ships and setting up colonies where people and their foodstuffs were plentiful. The Lee family was importing goods on ships and would have brought these goods directly from the ship into their home, likely storing the crates, barrels, and boxes in the lower level storage rooms.

When completing work in the Great House in 1984, architectural historians Paul Buchanan and Charles Phillips located a rat's nest behind the paneling of the Great Hall and accessed it through the floor of the attic. Brave board member Ellen Hunter, who was then head of the House Restoration Committee, reached her hand into the small opening to remove some of the artifacts.

Right now I'm working on cataloging the removed artifacts. So far, nineteen artifacts have been examined, photographed, measured, and described. Large ceramic fragments and heavy wooden objects were found at the same time; possibly these were collected by a very strong rat or perhaps there is a human element at work here. I'll continue my research and let you know what I find out!

For more information, see Travis McDonald, Rat Housing in Middle Virginia: The Diffusion of Everyday Life.

Photo of store room by Terry Cosgrove.