Nancy Goyne Evans
Everyday Things: From Rolling Pins to Trundle Bedsteads

Through the years scholars have paid little more than minor attention to the ordinary products and activities of the furniture craftsman, aside from the body of material interpreted as folk art. Formal furniture and objects crafted from fine cabinet woods have dominated the pages of published works. Nevertheless, original documents that illuminate the period of handcraftsmanship in America before 1850 are filled with references to the objects, implements, and fixtures of everyday life in the domestic setting. Because of the wealth of material available, this study will explore only a limited number of selected topics, some more broadly than others. Principal among these are wooden objects associated with the kitchen and adjacent facilities, furniture for sleeping, boxes and selected storage furniture, and equipment used in the fabrication of cloth and other household textiles.1

Kitchen Furniture and Equipment
Two of the most common pieces of furniture associated with the kitchen during the period covered by this study are the table and the rush-bottom slat-back side chair, both identified in craftsmen’s accounts by their intended place of use. At least one written reference and a variety of visual images hone in on a critical feature associated with the kitchen table, the absence of stretchers. In October 1802 Silas Cheney, a cabinetmaker and chair maker of Litchfield, Connecticut, made special note of a customer’s order for a “Citchen table with Crecher.” The request suggests that bracing of this type was unusual in kitchen tables (fig. 1), a circumstance borne out by illustrations of the period that focus on this area of the home. One particularly relevant visual reference is John Lewis Krimmel’s sketch of a young woman ironing (fig. 6). The absence of stretchers on tables that served as stand-up work surfaces offered convenience for the feet and protection for the shins.2

Prices for kitchen tables were modest, the dimensions and choice of material determining the exact cost. Of the documents used in this study that itemize kitchen tables, approximately one-third name the construction material. The records range in date from the late eighteenth century to the late 1830s and in geographic origin from northern New England to the Middle Atlantic region. Pine was the popular choice. One example was combined with “whitewood,” probably yellow poplar. Cherry was the second most popular choice, with maple named occasionally. An account entry for September 9, 1822, in the records of Job E. Townsend of Newport, Rhode Island, describes another selection: “a Kitchen Table Burch frame and a Pine Top.” The same year Silas Rice of Middletown, Connecticut, acquired a kitchen table with a butternut top from Elizur Barnes. Decades earlier in 1770, Samuel Williams built the wealthy Philadelphian John Cadwalader a sturdy “Oak Top Kitchen Tabble.”3

In terms of size, more kitchen tables are identified as “large” than as “small.” Actual dimensions, given only occasionally, range from two feet, three inches, in the bed to “5 1/2 feet long.” The working surface and/or storage function of a table was enhanced by the addition of a fall leaf and a drawer. The single leaf, also called a “flap” or “wing,” was relatively common; two leaves were rare. When the leaf was not in use, the table often was positioned with the closed board at the back.4

Aside from providing a working surface to pursue household chores, the kitchen table served at times as a family dining center, especially in the cold winter months when the kitchen frequently was the warmest room in the house. A notation of 1830 in the accounts of Elisha H. Holmes of Essex, Connecticut, to a “Kitcheon dining table” serves to confirm this function. Although many kitchen tables likely were painted, there is little mention of finish in period records. A few documents identify stain and varnish as a protective surface.5

A group of seating pieces, designated “kitchen chairs” in records, can be identified from their unit costs as slat-back side chairs (fig. 2). In general, valuations range from three shillings to 4s.6d. Major General Henry Knox paid Stephen Badlam, Jr., of Dorchester Lower Mills (Boston) 3s.8d. in 1784 for each of six kitchen chairs ordered at the shop. By comparison, other woven-bottom chairs, namely those in the banister-back and fiddle-back (vase-back) patterns, cost consumers an additional 1s.6d. or more. A Windsor side chair was priced still higher. For orientation purposes, it is well to note that the decimal-based currency system adopted by the new United States in the late eighteenth century usually equated the dollar with six shillings in the old-style currency of the country. Many craftsmen, however, continued to use the pound as the monetary unit in their records well into the nineteenth century.6

A small group of kitchen chairs whose valuations exceeded 4s.6d. or five shillings was embellished. Customers may have requested the addition of another “back,” or slat, to the basic three-slat structure, ordered turnings of more ornamental character than standard (fig. 2), or contracted for something more than a common stained or colored finish. When Erastus Holcomb ordered “six citching chairs painted green and varnished” in 1820 at Oliver Moore’s shop in East Granby, Connecticut, he paid six shillings (one dollar) per chair. Conversely, low prices in kitchen chairs sometimes reflected the lack of finish on the wood or the absence of the woven bottom, the work left to the customer or a handy neighbor. The quality of rushwork in a woven seat was another factor that influenced cost. William Barker’s work for Jabez Bowen, Jr., at Providence in the 1760s indicates that a “fine bottom” cost two-thirds more than a standard one. It was a fact of life that rush-bottom chairs had to be returned to the local chairmaker or bottomer on a regular basis for seat repair or replacement. This circumstance more than any other gave the plank-seat Windsor an advantage, permitting the new construction to sweep the vernacular seating market by the American Revolution.7

Special kitchen seating appears in records from time to time. In January 1822 True Currier of Deerfield, New Hampshire, sold an area resident “a kitchen chair with rockers & arms” for one dollar. A customer of Philadelphia cabinetmaker David Evans also made an unusual request. Shortly after the end of the Revolution, George Bringhurst ordered “a Pine Bench for [the] Kitchen 2 or 3 Seats.” The long form probably was backless with board ends cut out in an ornamental pattern to form feet (see fig. 21).8

Closets, shelves, and storage furniture, such as cupboards and dressers, were critical in the colonial and federal kitchen to hold equipment for meal preparation and dining and the paraphernalia associated with other activity in the area. Storage furniture had open shelves or enclosed compartments, or combinations of the two features. When Joel Bartlet made alterations to his house in Newbury, Massachusetts, in 1749, Skipper Lunt charged him five pounds for “making [a] cuberd in ye new kit[c]hen.” The price was a pound less than Lunt’s charge for a chest of drawers or a set of cane-back chairs. The exact purpose of Abigail Bursley’s storage unit purchased almost ninety years later from Moses Parkhurst of Paxton is noted in the craftsman’s accounts: “To one crockery cupboard.”9

With the kitchen in constant use, the need for furniture repair was inevitable. Moses Ingersol was indebted to Elisha Hawley of Ridgefield, Connecticut, in 1794 for making a cleat (probably a foot) for his cupboard. In Barre, Massachusetts, Luke Houghton responded to customer needs in the 1820s by putting a back on a cupboard for the widow Abigail Wheeler and two “turns” for doors on a similar storage piece for Doctor Anson Bates. At about the same date Miles Benjamin, a cabinetmaker of Cooperstown, New York, made a new cupboard turn for one of his customers.10

The accounts of five craftsmen who worked in central and eastern Pennsylvania sometime during the fifty-year period between 1790 and 1840 shed considerable light on the popularity of the kitchen cupboard, or dresser, in a region inhabited by individuals of both English and German background. Among them Jacob Bachman, Friedrich Bastian, John Ellinger, Abraham Overholt, and Peter Ranck produced dozens of examples. Collectively, their records add dimension to the study of the form.11

The records identify a few cupboards with glazed doors in the top section. Overholt produced an eighteen-dollar “dish cupboard with 24 panes” in 1827 for Magdelena Gross. A related Pennsylvania cupboard is in the left background of figure 17. Rather than hinged to swing out, the doors were made to slide. The interior shelves hold china cups, pewter plates, glassware, and crockery. Many dressers were of open construction, as indicated in the modest pricing of some examples. Lewis Miller’s sketch of an incident that occurred in 1809 in York, Pennsylvania, illustrates the general form of the open dresser (fig. 3). As explained by Miller, members of the Rupp family of butchers were driving a young steer through the streets when it bolted and charged through the open door of Jacob Laumaster’s kitchen knocking over the dresser. The visual account of the calamity provides an unusual opportunity to examine the contents of the furniture form: a row of spoons secured in slots at the front edge of a shelf probably was made of pewter; lighting devices, comprising a candlestick and a dish-type lamp, were stored on the flat top of the projecting cornice; earthenware for everyday use located on the open shelves consisted of plates, cups, bowls, a cream pot, and a covered sugar bowl; two-tined forks and knives may have had bone or wooden handles; a coffee mill still pitching through the air probably rested on the deep top surface of the lower cupboard along with the large crock at the left, which may have held preserves.12

Many dressers were painted. Overholt mentioned brown and red (reddish brown). Although he did not specify the wood used for his painted cupboards, many of his contemporaries relied on yellow poplar, the wood identified in Bachman’s account with Evans. Overholt also produced many “walnut kitchen dresser[s]” and charged substantially more for them than the painted cupboards.13

Mention of two special-purpose cupboard forms occurs in the accounts of both Pennsylvania and New England craftsmen. Householders who purchased milk or cheese cupboards may have placed them in a buttery, or dairy room, located in a cool part of the house. The cupboards likely were deep, with open fronts and shelves of shallow vertical depth to accommodate the large milk pans used to separate cream from fresh milk or to store and cure the large cylinders of cheese the housewife and family members made from milk curds. Overholt noted in 1804 that he “made a milk cupboard for Christian Gross and painted it brown” at a charge of £2.12.6.14

Several records mention bench-mounted food-processing equipment. In 1834 William Clark of Lebanon County, Pennsylvania, purchased a “Sasuage Bench” from John Ellinger for $1.50. William Rawson of Killingly, Connecticut, filled a customer order in 1840 by making an “Apple paring Bench.” When Israel Houghton provided a similar piece of equipment at Petersham, Massachusetts, he described it as an “aple paring masheen.” “Machine” was a word applied to a range of simple hand-operated mechanical devices in an era before other power sources were employed.15

Laundry Equipment
The two principal domestic activities centered in the kitchen and adjacent areas were laundry and food preparation. Either could employ considerable equipment, as identified in early records.

Doing the household laundry required a substantial amount of water, which had to be carried from a well or other water source to a stove or hearth where it was heated. Pails, or buckets, of stave construction bound around with wooden hoops and fitted with carrying bails attached at opposite sides to the tops of staves of extended length were the common vessels for this task (see fig. 4). Other pails held a general supply of household water or were used as scrub buckets.

Cabinetmakers as well as handymen-carpenters supplied householders with pails, some purchased in pairs. Families also called upon local woodworkers for repairs when bails and bottoms required replacement. Other pails were repainted. Joseph Griswold of Buckland, Massachusetts, recorded in 1818 that he painted several pails blue and another red. Red also was the color requested by a customer of Allen Holcomb a few years later in central New York, with the further instruction that the interior be painted white. Another customer paid Holcomb fifty cents for “painting 2 pails yellow & inside white.”16

The actual process of washing clothes required tubs, vessels larger than pails and also of stave construction. The word “trough” was an alternative term. Cedar is mentioned specifically as the material of some tubs. F. Andrew Michaux, Jr., in extensive observations made from 1806 to 1809 when studying the forest trees of North America and their uses, commented on the “superior fitness of this wood for various household utensils,” principally pails, wash tubs, and churns. He further noted that “the hoops are made of young cedars stripped of the bark and split into two parts.”17

Most wash tubs were elevated above floor or ground level for convenience of use. The usual support was the wash bench, a piece of equipment mentioned frequently in craftsmen’s accounts. The substantial range in price suggests that material, size, and construction method could vary considerably. David Evans, a cabinetmaker of Philadelphia, made the family of Charles Shoemaker a “Large Wash bench 6 foot Long” in 1791 and charged the head of the household 7s.6d., a price that exceeded a day’s pay for a journeyman woodworker at the top of his trade. Another woodworker identified the support for a wash tub as “a washing Stuell.”18

Soaping, soaking, scrubbing, rinsing, and, frequently, boiling in a kettle were tasks associated with the laundry. Laundresses frequently had both hard and soft soap available for the job. The “Soap Tub made of white pine” purchased in 1823 by a customer of Samuel Douglas near Canton, Connecticut, apparently stored soft soap. When Abraham Overholt of Pennsylvania noted in 1822 “I made a washboard for Jacob Lederman,” he identified a critical piece of equipment used in most households to scrub clothes. His charge was fifty cents, the common price recorded from New England to Pennsylvania. Clothes heavily soiled might require the assistance of a pounder, precisely identified by Job Danforth of Providence as a “pounder to pound Cloaths.” An alternative term was “wash pounder.” Both Silas Cheney of Connecticut and Daniel and Samuel Proud of Providence pinpointed the usual fabrication method of the implement as turning.19

A popular item from the beginning of the nineteenth century was a piece of equipment identified in craftsmen’s records as a washing machine. Some accounts note repairs; other modest charges appear to identify simple attachments to be mounted on standard equipment. When the price of a new machine approached or exceeded ten dollars, something out of the ordinary was indicated. In general, the form was that of a tub or box, open or closed at the top and fitted with some type of manual mechanism to introduce agitation. In 1800 Philip Filer of upstate New York priced his eleven-dollar “woshin mill” the same as his best bedsteads. Several years later in Connecticut Oliver Moore sold a “washing Mashine” for as low as $5.75, although he sold it “without irons,” that is, without the metalwork that was part of the operating mechanism. As Nicholas Low, a New York City merchant, developed his upstate property at Ballston Spa in the early 1800s, his on-site agent contracted with local craftsmen to furnish a new hotel. In a letter to Low dated November 6, 1803, George White noted that Elihu Alvord, one of the artisans employed on the job, “also has a patent for making Washing Machines @ $10. each Sayd to answer very Well.”20

Once the clothes were washed, rinsed, and wrung, they were ready to be dried. In good weather they could be placed out of doors, where they were hung on clotheslines, draped on bushes, and/or spread on the grass. Clothespins are named in many craft records, although the term can be ambiguous, as indicated in the records of several woodworkers. Two separate entries in the account book of Allen Holcomb of New York state describe the dual meaning of the term “clothespin.” On October 26, 1824, he sold Doctor Hailman “45 Close pins to hold Close on a line” at two cents apiece. There is little question that these were small turned or shaved cleft sticks of the type illustrated in figure 5. A decade earlier Holcomb turned “24 Nubs for Clothes hangings” for another customer. These were pins turned with round tenons at one end for insertion into a pinboard mounted on the wall to store cloaks and other garments. Further clarification of the use of pins on the wall occurs in two accounts: Jonathan Gavit of Salem, Massachusetts, described nubs as “pins . . . to hang Cloaths on”; Joel Mount of Juliustown, New Jersey, spent part of a day in 1846 “putting up close pines.”21

Of all the accouterments for the laundry, the one mentioned most frequently is the “clotheshorse,” or “frame,” also referred to occasionally as a “clothes screen.” The lone reference to a “clothes ladder,” which appears in the accounts of James Francis of Connecticut for March 17, 1797, probably identified a similar piece of furniture, since stiles and rails of open construction are common to both clothes frames and ladders. The function of this piece of equipment, regardless of the terminology, is described succinctly in an item dated August 26, 1766, on a sheet of accounts drawn by Nathaniel Kinsman of Massachusetts: “To a hors to dry Cloths.” During periods of inclement or severely cold weather, the laundry was dried indoors, at which times folding frames for drying were a necessity. Frequently wet laundry was scattered from the kitchen to the attic. A highly specialized type of clothing frame mentioned by David Hall of Connecticut is represented by a group of four “Stocking boards” sold in 1793 for two shillings.22

The incidence of clothes frames in craftsmen’s accounts describes a broad geographic spread. In Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Dolly Wendell paid Joseph Cotton nine shillings ($1.50) in 1800 for “a Close horse & Hinges.” At two dollars, Humberston Skipwith of Mecklenburg County, Virginia, paid slightly more for his clotheshorse in 1819. Although records identify some clotheshorses of small size, of greater interest are the frames that consisted of three or four panels, described as “folds,” “falls,” or “wings.” The term “folds” was the most popular. The accounts of Miles Benjamin, of Cooperstown, New York, mention a “double clothes Horse.” Whether the folds were of larger size or greater number than usual is unclear, although at three dollars this was the most expensive frame listed anywhere.23

Records list painted clothes frames, and when a color is named, it is usually white. Silas Cheney of Connecticut sold a horse of this finish to Oliver Wolcott in 1802 for six shillings (one dollar). At Hartford Daniel Wadsworth paid more than two times that amount to Benoni A. Shepherd for his white frame. When requested, both cabinetmakers also produced cherrywood clothes frames. The only other cabinet wood associated in records with this frame is birch. Job E. Townsend of Rhode Island made one in 1823 for seventy-five cents. In New York state Philip Filer sold “Stuf for [a] Closehorse” for twenty-five cents, a savings to the consumer of $1.75 over the framed price.24

Ironing followed washing during the week, preferably when the hearth or stove was in use for another purpose, such as baking, so that the flatirons could be heated at the same time. The critical piece of furniture for this task was the “ironing bench,” “table,” “board,” or “folding board.” In December 1800 Reubin Loomis of Connecticut made note of “puting up a bench to iron on” at the small charge of 2s.6d. (forty-one cents). Later in Maine, Paul Jenkins recorded a job of making an “ironing tabel 2 drass” (drawers) for Captain George Lord. The price at $2.84 reflected the cost of constructing a frame with four legs and providing drawers for storage. Illustrating this type of table are the plain examples visible in figure 6, a drawing made by John Lewis Krimmel in the Delaware Valley near Philadelphia. Whether the extended ironing surface at the left represents the table top or a long board laid over the top is unclear. The extended table top in the right background probably is a loose board.25

The laundress shown in figure 6 is using a flatiron. A trivet to support the hot iron is at the right and a flatiron grown cold at the left. The tables are covered with old blankets or flannel and a top sheet. Many housewives reserved a set of table covers especially for ironing. The wooden laundry basket on the floor is made of angled, butted boards with handholds at the ends. Another drawing by Krimmel clearly delineates a row of flatirons stored on a kitchen shelf high above the hearth. Some flatirons had cast metal handles; others had wooden grips. Abner Haven of Framingham, Massachusetts, replaced two wooden flatiron handles in 1820 for the family of Captain John J. Clark, charging seventeen cents for each.26

References to the ironing board identify various forms, from a large board to lay on another flat surface to a large board fixed or hinged to a table. The variety is described in Philadelphia records, where no less than five leading cabinetmakers active in the late eighteenth century recorded this form in their accounts. Both William Wayne and Thomas Tufft produced a “large Ironing Board.” David Evans gave the dimensions of a similar board in 1787 as “6 foot by 3 foot 8.” Earlier he had described “an Ironing Board & Pine table” made for another customer. A further indication of a board and table combination occurs in Daniel Trotter’s work for Stephen Girard, a merchant prince of the city. Although Trotter billed the two items separately, they were posted together under the same date. An order to William Savery in 1771 from Philadelphian John Cadwalader describes the most complex unit, and again the cabinetmaker priced the two units separately: “To a Kitchen Table 4 foot by 2 f[oot] 6 I[nches] with a Drawer 1.0.0 / And fixing the Ironing Board to it 0.2.6.”27

The folding board, its physical appearance not further described, appears in several accounts from northeastern Massachusetts. The price, which varied from five shillings to nine shillings, was modest. Elias Hasket Derby, the leading merchant of Salem, bought his board in 1784 from Samuel Cheever. Daniel Ross sold a board a few years later at Ipswich. In 1799 Isaac Floyd of Medford provided Boston merchant Benjamin H. Hathorne with a folding board at the same time he supplied a kitchen table.28

Baking Equipment
Perhaps no piece of household equipment is mentioned as frequently in craftsmen’s accounts as the trough for making bread. Of four terms that emerge from records, “bread trough” is the most common by far. That name was used in more than sixty percent of the fifty documents in the study that list this equipment. “Dough trough” was next in popularity, representing twenty-eight percent of the sample. “Kneading trough” accounted for a modest twelve percent of the sample, and one document identified a “baking trough.” In terms of regional preference, “bread trough,” “kneading trough,” and “baking trough” were found almost exclusively in New England and New York state records, whereas “dough trough” was the choice in the greater Delaware Valley, comprising eastern Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware.

Most bread troughs appear to have been simple boxes with steep canted sides, frequently made of butted boards, and designed to stand on a table. Prices ranged from less than fifty cents to about two dollars, suggesting that size, material, and construction method could vary substantially. A small group of troughs was priced higher. Abraham Overholt of Bucks County, Pennsylvania, described one of these as “a dough tray table . . . painted . . . red” and charged three dollars. He used brown paint on other examples. Friedrich Bastian of Dauphin County identified the same equipment as a “Doe troft with feet” priced at four dollars. Even more expensive was Hiram Taylor’s “Dotraugh l[a]rge size at five dollars” sold in 1836 in Chester County.29

The supported bread trough illustrated in figure 7 would appear to fit Taylor’s description. Remnants of reddish brown paint remain on the dovetailed box, frame, and lid. Among other references to the bread trough are several that mention a “cover” or “top.” One had a stained finish. A customer of John Austin in Methuen, Massachusetts, purchased a “meal Chest” in 1772 when he acquired his “Bead tropp.” William Mather of Whately sold a “sifting stick” together with a bread trough.30

The “process of making household bread” was described succinctly in the early nineteenth century in the first American edition of Abraham Rees’ Cyclopaedia: “To a peck of meal . . . add a handful of salt, a pint of yeast [or other leavening agent], and three quarts of water . . . ; the whole being kneaded in a bowl or trough . . . will rise in about an hour; . . . then mould it into loaves, and put it into an oven to bake.” For forming the dough into loaves, the housewife might find “a Bord to roal Bread on” a convenient piece of equipment. Many householders had a large brick oven constructed as part of the fireplace. Other ovens were located in a separate building out of doors.31

The large size and high temperature of the bake oven necessitated the use of a long-handled implement called a “peel” to insert and remove baked goods. An alternative term for this equipment was described by Elizur Barnes of Middletown, Connecticut: “To peal (or b[r]ead shovel).” The example with arched head illustrated in figure 8 is more ornate than common. The complete furnishing for a bakehouse, possibly for commercial use, is itemized in the accounts of Daniel and Samuel Proud of Providence under the date 1779. Charles Boller purchased four bread peels, including a large one. He then paid the Proud brothers for “putting on a lock to bake house,” supplemented by “making a Lage Led [large lid] to a Chest for the Bake house” and “an Oven led for [the] bake house.”32

To store baked bread householders purchased a plain, utilitarian “bread box,” or “bread chest,” for a modest sum. More popular was the “bread tray” used in serving. Although some references to a tray likely identify the bread trough, others refer to a low open box (see figure 12). Dovetailed and butted construction was available. In 1821 Titus Preston of Connecticut sold a “bread trey without dovetailing” for four shilligs (sixty-six cents). Handymen could purchase “Stuff for [a] Bread tray” for self assembly.33

On February 15, 1813, Oliver Moore of East Granby, Connecticut, recorded the sale of a bread tray to “The state of Connecticut” for $1.50. As East Granby was the site of the Newgate Prison, the tray appears to have been purchased for use at that facility, more likely by the warden than by the inmates. An alternative term and form for this serving piece, as recorded by Allen Holcomb in central New York, was “Bread Boat.” The cost was a modest fifty cents.34

A piece of baking equipment mentioned with some frequency in craftsmen’s records is the gingerbread board, also called a gingerbread “mold” or “print.” Use of this accessory was reserved for the ginger-flavored confection rolled on a board rather than the cakelike variety. Rees’ Cyclopaedia describes typical ingredients as flour, sugar, pounded almonds, ginger, licorice, powdered aniseed, and rose water. When mixed to a paste, the cook was directed to “roll it, print it, and dry it in a stove.”35

The cost of a gingerbread board varied, depending on size, material, and degree of incised or carved decoration on the printing face. Unfortunately, craftsmen’s accounts reveal nothing about the nature of the decoration. A “Cake board” purchased for twelve cents in 1819 from Nathan Cleaveland of Franklin, Massachusetts, was a simple affair compared to the “gingerbread mould” acquired in 1802 by a customer of Daniel Ross in Ipswich for more than four dollars. A few years earlier a client of Job E. Townsend of Newport, Rhode Island, ordered a “Dubble Gingerbread Print” for which he paid only 1s.6d. (twenty-five cents).36

The rolling pin was an essential piece of equipment for rolling out paste for sweets and dough for pies. The form was a cylinder, sometimes swelled slightly through the center and formed into small handles at the ends. Early pins (see fig. 9) have short thick knoblike handles. Before ball bearings were introduced to this implement, the palms of the hands conveyed motion to the pin. Eighteenth-century European prints illustrating the kitchen sometimes include this activity. Several craft records identify the fabrication method. In 1825 Increase Pote of Maine charged a customer twenty-five cents for “turning one Roleing pinn.” Some customers purchased “a Roleing Board” with their rolling pin.37

Pie making is little mentioned in woodworking accounts, primarily because the fabrication of baking dishes was the province of the potter. On two occasions, however, the papers of the Norris family of Philadelphia describe the rolling board as a “Pye Board,” and one is identified as “large.” Thomas Tufft, a cabinetmaker of the city, supplied the equipment along with a rolling pin. Pies in great quantity and variety—fruit, vegetable, custard, and meat—were a diet staple of the American family, assuring that the rolling pin and board were in constant use. Harriet Beecher Stowe described how at baking time, and especially at the Thanksgiving holiday, “butteries and dressers and shelves and pantries were literally crowded with [a] jostling abundance” of baked pies and cakes.38

Butter and Cheesemaking Equipment
Many families, even those living in close proximity to an urban area, kept one or two cows to provide fresh milk for family use and to convert the surplus into butter and cheese. Milking was a twice-a-day chore. Milking stools, often three-legged, and milk pails were kept handy by the back door or in an adjacent milk house, which also might be furnished with a “milke hows tabl.” Alexander Low of Freehold, New Jersey, constructed a table of this description in 1806 and charged his customer sixteen shillings ($2.66). In southern New England Elisha H. Holmes, Job E. Townsend, and Philip Deland produced milking stools for twenty-five cents or less in the early nineteenth century.39

Fresh milk was placed in low, broad milk pans to allow the cream to rise for skimming to make butter. The remaining curds were used for making cheese. Although many documents mention the butter churn, repairs to used churns were more common than new equipment. Two Massachusetts craftsmen, Philip Deland and Samuel Davison, priced their churns from $1.50 to three dollars. Deland described his two-dollar churn as “first rat[e].” A typical churn of the colonial and federal periods is illustrated in figure 10. It is an upright tapered cylinder constructed of staves bound with hoops. Although making butter was a relatively simple task, a poorly made churn could produce disastrous results. Martin Weiser of York, Pennsylvania, bought butter from Claus Hufschmit after his wife gave up and concluded that her churn was “bewitcht.”40

From time to time householders called upon a local woodworker to freshen the appearance of their churn with a new coat of paint, a job that cost between ten cents and twenty-five cents as recorded by Josiah P. Wilder and Gaius Perkins in northern New England and John Ellinger in Pennsylvania. The most common repair was replacement of the “dasher,” or “dash” as it often was denominated. This interior mechanism creates the agitation necessary to obtain butter. When in 1794 Job Danforth of Providence made a new dasher for a customer’s churn, he also supplied a “cover,” sometimes called a “top.” A further request directed to woodworkers, particularly by householders in Pennsylvania, was for boxes and molds to form, store, and print butter. For example, Abraham Overholt of Bucks County recorded on January 19, 1804: “I made a pair of walnut butter boxes and a butter mold for Henrich Kindig.”41

Cheesemaking often went hand-in-hand with processing butter if a family had sufficient milk. Records occasionally mention the sale of a cheese tub, as for example the one supplied for $1.25 in 1816 by Chapman Lee of Massachusetts. The usual request was for a cheese press or repairs to one already in use. The cost of a press varied broadly—from as little as sixty-two cents to $3.50—suggesting that the mechanism could be relatively simple or complex. Several craftsmen calculated their charge for a cheese press based on actual working time, although it is unclear who supplied the materials, the craftsman or the consumer. In 1774 Samuel Hall, a cabinetmaker, house carpenter, glazier, and farmer of Connecticut made a charge of 1s.9d. (twenty-nine cents) for “half a days work making a chees press.” Twelve years later John Paine, a jack-of-all-trades on Long Island, calculated a full day’s labor for making a press at only 2s.6d. (forty-one cents).42

Sophisticated presses were available by the early nineteenth century. In 1807 Robert Whitelaw of Vermont made his first ledger entry for the sale of “a pattent Cheese press” priced at a substantial six dollars. Whether he was the patentee or purchased the rights to manufacture the press is not indicated.43

Utensils for Food Storage, Preparation, and Serving
Salt and sugar for cooking, baking, and preserving were available from merchants and shopkeepers. Although a family might have a significant quantity on hand in a storeroom or other location for butchering and preparing foods for winter use, having small containers of both salt and sugar in the kitchen was more convenient for day to day use. Craftsmen from New England to Pennsylvania made salt boxes. At seventy-five cents, a container made by Peter Ranck of Lebanon County, Pennsylvania, was priced somewhat higher than those acquired from other craftsmen, including Philadelphia cabinetmaker Samuel Ashton. Most boxes probably were plain painted, and some were made to hang on the wall. A few examples from the German-settled regions of eastern Pennsylvania bear striking ornament (fig. 11).44

The hinged-lid, hanging salt box made in 1796 for Margaret Miller (fig. 11) is part of a small group of ornamented wooden objects associated by signature or motif with decorator John Drissel of upper Bucks County. A woodworker of the region provided structural interest by fashioning an ornamental backboard and lid. The undecorated box likely sold for less than one dollar. In rural Pennsylvania few craftsmen earned that much for a day’s labor, which usually extended to ten or twelve hours, more than enough time to complete a box of this type.

Sugar was available in large quantities in granular form, although most householders made do with loaves of sugar molded in hard cones. Records describe both sugar boxes and “suger boles.” The bowls were turned and may have had a lid to protect the contents from flies and other insects, as the use of window screens was rare. To remove chunks of sugar from the cone to pulverize it for use, a householder needed a special implement easily fabricated in most woodworking shops. In Rhode Island, where sugar refining was a substantial business, William Barker, Daniel and Samuel Proud, and Job E. Townsend all sold sugar “mallets.” In New York state Philip Filer referred to the same implement as a sugar “pounder,” and in Chester County, Pennsylvania, Hiram Taylor sold sugar “mashers.”45

Craft records list more pestles than mortars, suggesting that the pestle was more susceptible to damage or easily misplaced. Accounts identify turning as the fabrication method, and most prices fell between ten cents and twenty cents. A “pestle for Morter” priced in 1788 at two shillings (thirty-three cents) by Samuel Wayne of Philadelphia appears to have been made of a costly wood, such as lignum vitae. Both lignum vitae and maple mortars were available in 1798 at the Providence estate sale of William Barker. The business records of Philip Deland of West Brookfield, Massachusetts, indicate that the mortar and pestle met several needs in the kitchen. In 1834 the craftsman sold a “spice mortar and pestle.” Seven years later another customer called for a “salt mortar and pestle.” One craftsman produced a cover for a mortar.46

A somewhat unusual piece of kitchen equipment listed in craft records from Maine to Philadelphia is a chopping box, also termed a “trough,” “tray,” or “board.” David Evans of Philadelphia identified at least one use for this item in a day book entry dated 1782: “a chopping Box for mincing meat.” Records mention both cherry and oak as the construction material. John Cadwalader of Philadelphia appears to have purchased his oak board as an accessory to his oak-top kitchen table purchased at the same time.47

Two entries in the accounts of Elisha H. Holmes of Essex, Connecticut, suggest that little in the routine of daily life escaped the purview of one’s neighbors. On October 9, 1826, a Mrs. Hill purchased a chopping box for fifty cents from Holmes. One month later to the day William Williams visited Holmes’ shop and bought his wife “1 chopping Box like Mrs Hills.” Holmes still sold chopping boxes for fifty cents in 1829.48

Lime or lemon juice was an ingredient in punch, a popular drink that also contained citrus zest, sugar, water, and either rum or brandy. To extract juice easily from the fruit the preparer needed a pair of squeezers, variously called “lemon,” “lime,” or “squash squeezers.” Several references to squeezers dating to the 1740s occur in the accounts of Solomon Fussell of Philadelphia. Turning was the common fabrication method, and the price was low—about one shilling or slightly more—for a long period. Daniel Ross, a craftsman of Ipswich, Massachusetts, made a “Lemmon press” for a customer. “Press” may have been an alternative term or the description of a squeezer mounted on a low stationary frame to accommodate a bowl to catch the juice.49

Although coffee was not as popular a beverage as tea, it was common enough that the coffee mill, used for grinding coffee beans, occurs with regularity in the visual and written documents used in this study. The calamity that occurred in York, Pennsylvania, when a steer bounded into the Laumaster kitchen upsetting the dresser, as sketched by Lewis Miller (fig. 3), reveals the presence of a coffee mill in the household. Miller sketched another mill, complete with handle, hopper, and box, on the mantelpiece of the kitchen in the York Hotel. Still another mill appears in the right foreground of John Lewis Krimmel’s painting, Quilting Frolic (fig. 17).50

References to coffee mills in craft documents focus almost exclusively on repairs because many new mills used in America through the mid-nineteenth century were imported from England. Several notations cover general repairs. During the 1790s Daniel Ross of Massachusetts supplied a new handle for a mill, and Job Danforth of Rhode Island replaced a box bottom. One day in August 1799 Isaac Floyd of Medford, Massachusetts, was busy “Making wood for [a] Coffee mill” for a local customer.51

References to miscellaneous appliances for kitchen use serve to broaden an understanding of the equipment and gadgetry available to householders before factory production made these and related items commonplace. The appearance and mechanism of some items are more easily perceived than those of others. “Sticks to stur toddy” are identified in the accounts of Daniel and Samuel Proud of Providence and Elizur Barnes of Middletown, Connecticut, the price in the six to eight cent range. Toddy is a drink made of spirits and hot water sweetened. Stirring sticks probably took varied forms. One privately owned seven-inch example that by tradition was used for toddy is made of ash. The slender cylindrical shaft flares at either end to form a small bonelike protuberance.52

The “Stick to fill Sasages” in the accounts of the Proud brothers of Providence perhaps approximated the form of the toddy stick, the bulges at the ends serving as tampers. At seventy-five cents, the “egg beating machine” sold by Thomas Boynton of Windsor, Vermont, possibly had some moving parts. Considerably more expensive was the “Cage to press Currens in . . . $1.75” made in 1814 by Nathan Lukens in or near Philadelphia for a member of the Richardson family. The word “currant,” as used here, is unclear. It may identify a fresh or dried grape, although it more likely refers to the edible berries of a shrub of the genus Ribes whose juice was used for making jelly and jam.53

Perhaps more easily identified is the “Cabbage box” purchased in 1835 from the shop of John Ellinger of Lebanon County, Pennsylvania, by Daniel Ulrich. Sauerkraut, or finely cut cabbage fermented in brine, was a favorite vegetable among the Pennsylvania Germans. Ulrich’s cabbage box may have served to receive the shredded vegetable for transfer to a large fermentation tub. The process calls to mind an incident recorded at York, Pennsylvania, in 1806 by Lewis Miller in his sketch book. Anthony Ritz and his wife were in the cellar of their home tending to a batch of sauerkraut near a small window with an open grate. Passing by in the street above was John Lohman who “through the little window made his water in the tub, without knowing it.”54

Records identify a container for storing knives and other flatware as a “knife box” or “tray.” Of the two terms, box was the more common. When two expensive mahogany examples are eliminated from the survey, the price range extends from thirty-three cents to $1.38. Moses Parkhurst of Massachusetts made the box valued at thirty-three cents in 1819, possibly spending less than half a day because his next posting for the same customer is a charge of $2.50 for “2 1/2 Days work.” The box valued at $1.38 was made by Isaac Ashton of Philadelphia in 1793. Because the majority of boxes and trays recorded in documents cost one dollar or less, it appears that all were of the same open form (see fig. 12), the cheaper ones of butted construction, those of higher price dovetailed and possibly divided by a central arched partition with a hand slot. A box of this description stands on the table at the left in figure 17, part of its flatware already laid on the cloth. By contrast, the brown-painted pine example illustrated in figure 12 has a high back with a central hole for hanging on a wall or other flat surface.55

As early as 1732 a turner from London advertised hardwood bowls at Philadelphia. Turning was an alternative to the laborious task of hand whittling. The turned applewood bowl illustrated in figure 13 is attributed to Felix Dominy and descended in his family of East Hampton, Long Island. Although the bowl measures about nine inches in diameter, it probably is smaller than the “large Wooden bowl” listed in the accounts of both Robert Whitelaw of Vermont and Philip Deland of Massachusetts, priced at thirty-four cents and fifty cents, respectively. At sixteen shillings ($2.66), John Sanders of upstate New York paid a premium price in 1820 for his “knot bowl” (burl wood). Bowls made of common wood could be painted, as indicated in the accounts of Allen Holcomb of Otsego County.56

In an era before matched cooking ware or even stamped metal lids were available, cooking vessels were covered with inexpensive turned disks of wood, usually identified as “pot lids” or “pot covers.” In 1818 Abner Haven of Framingham, Massachusetts, priced “a lid to an Iron kittle” at six cents. Similar equipment identified as “Tops for Kettles for Kitchen” cost Samuel Larned considerably more while he was serving as a diplomat at Lima, Peru, in 1832. Another use for wooden lids, as noted in 1834 by Moyers and Rich of Wythe Court House, Virginia, was as “Milk covers.” Complementing the array of lids available were wooden spoons and sets of measures.57

For serving prepared foods or beverages household members could use a “Tea Bord” or “Tea Waiter.” Dimensions are specified occasionally, as for example in 1789 when Jonathan Kettell of Massachusetts sold a “Tea Board 2 feet 1 Inch.” In a 1751 public notice John Tremain of New York suggested that customers might want to “find their own Stuff” (material) when ordering tea boards or other cabinetwork from his shop. Serving trays are depicted in both figures 17 and 28, although their oval form suggests they could have been fabricated of japanned sheet iron, a popular alternative.58

With utensils and vessels in constant use, repairs were an ongoing concern in most households. Wooden handles were particularly vulnerable. Those for beverage pots—coffee and especially tea—top the list. Most replacement handles cost one shilling to three shillings, except for those placed on silver vessels, which often cost more. New handles for silver tea and coffee pots in two Virginia families in 1790–1791 cost six shillings apiece. A “kink teapot handle,” possibly one with a reverse-curve profile, cost even more when purchased from Joshua Delaplaine by Doctor Brownjohn of New York City in 1741. A complement to a new teapot handle purchased in Newport, Rhode Island, just before the Revolutionary War, was a “Nub for the Top.” Ephraim Haines of Philadelphia turned pot handles, whereas some other artisans made them by shaving and shaping blanks.59

Caution should be exercised when interpreting references to knife handles because some identify a knife used as a tool rather than as a table utensil. An account book entry made in 1812 by Alexander Low of Freehold, New Jersey, is straightforward: “to 10 handels for knives & forkes” at three shillings the lot. Elisha Hawley of Ridgefield, Connecticut, identified the fabrication method when he recorded “turnin five nife handles” in 1793. Occasionally a craftsman produced a “knife handle with ferel.” There also are references to repairs to a special knife identified as a “Chopin Knife Handle” in several accounts, including that of Lemuel Tobey of Dartmouth, Massachusetts.60

Craftsmen also made handles for utensils employed directly in cooking. References to the chafing dish, a type of double boiler, occur with frequency in accounts. In 1758 Joseph Symonds of Massachusetts replaced a “chafn desh handel” for a customer at a charge of 2s.6d. (forty-one cents). Sometimes a wood turner produced a batch of handles to meet the needs of a metalworker or hardware merchant. Other records identify several long-handled kitchen tools. Most common is the “dipper,” occasionally referred to as a “ladle.” The work varied from “putting [a] handle on [a] dipper” to producing an all “wooden dipper,” such as the “first rate” one that Philip Deland sold for twenty-five cents. A related tool is the skimmer, whose bowl is more shallow than that of the dipper. A member of the Almy and Brown firm at Providence was indebted to William and John Richmond in 1799 for providing a “Scimmer handle” at thirty-seven cents. In 1827 Nathaniel Knowlton of Maine recorded “toaster handles.”61

A boon to the housewife in daily household activity, especially the preparation of meals, was a clock, whether it stood on a shelf or on the floor near the kitchen. In the immediate work area a simpler time gauge for monitoring short tasks was the double glass filled with sand (see fig. 14). Although this device measures prescribed periods of time, usually an hour, the experienced housewife could identify shorter periods by observing the level of sand in the top or bottom glass. A cage, frequently of turned wood, protected the glass from damage. A device of this type is identified in the accounts of George Short of Newburyport, Massachusetts, in 1815 as “a time glass frame”; the charge was seventeen cents.62

The nature of activity in the colonial and federal kitchen and its adjacent storerooms assured there would be problems with rodents. Compounding the situation during the warm months was the necessity of leaving the windows and doors standing open without benefit of screens, which still were uncommon. Although household cats performed good service, inexpensive wire traps would have been a welcomed addition. In at least one instance a local woodworker was called upon to build a better mousetrap. Doctor Hazard of Newport, Rhode Island, engaged Job E. Townsend in January 1819 to provide “a Mohogony Mouse Trap with 12 holes & springs” for which he paid two dollars.63

Equipment for Household and Personal Cleanliness
The water bench identified in the accounts of several craftsmen may have been indistinguishable from the wash bench, a common piece of laundry equipment. Use of the term may focus on the alternative function of the furniture as a stand to hold buckets of water to fill general household needs—drinking, cooking, hand washing, dishwashing, scrubbing, and the like. John Ellinger of Lebanon County, Pennsylvania, charged from two dollars to three dollars for his water benches. In Bucks County Abraham Overholt painted a bench brown. The buckets used to store water probably were no different from those in the laundry (see fig. 4). A sketch of a “Scrub Woman,” made by the Baroness Hyde de Neuville during a residency in the United States with her husband in the early 1800s, clearly delineates a stave bucket bound with hoops supporting at the rim a scrubbing brush of flatiron form. At Philadelphia Solomon Fussell kept a supply of hog bristles, which he used to make the scrubbing brushes he sold during the 1740s for 2s.6d. apiece.64

References to brooms and mops occur with frequency in craft records. The material of the broom head is identified as broom corn. In 1821 Luke Houghton of central Massachusetts charged thirteen cents for a “corn broom.” The price was higher in some shops. A decade earlier in Connecticut James Gere sold a corn broom for twenty-five cents. The common form of broom at the time was a cylindrical pole with the sweeping material wrapped around one end and tied to form a cylindrical head (see fig. 17). By contrast, mops often were purchased incomplete. A woodworker provided the turned handle, sometimes called a “stick,” and the purchaser completed the mop by attaching woolen scraps or yarn. Albert Greene purchased mop handles at two different times during the 1820s from John Proud of Rhode Island.65

Although craftsmen list brushes as items of trade, few identify their specific function. Like the mop, some handles were sold separately. Elizur Barnes of Connecticut produced “2 Brush handles 6 feet Long” for a business customer in 1822. Purchases made in 1834 by Peter Gansevoort in Albany from Stephen Van Schanck included several cleaning utensils: “1 Sweeping Brush” for one dollar, “2 Dusting Brushes” for seventy-five cents, and “2 Dust Pans” for fifty cents. At Beverly, Massachusetts, Isaac Flagg supplied Robert Rantoul with a pair of shoe brushes a few years earlier. The Providence business accounts of Almy and Brown identify a “wisk Broem” purchased from William Barker.66

One use for water stored on the water bench was dishwashing. Three times a day water for this task was heated on the hearth. Families, usually large already, often were extended at mealtime by the presence of apprentices and hired help. Tubs for washing and rinsing dishes probably were commonplace. Other equipment seldom is identified. In 1789 Stephen Collins, a Philadelphia merchant, paid Robert Mullen, a carpenter, fifteen shillings for “making a Bottel and Plait Drenor.” Equipment of this general description still met the needs of the domestic household some thirty years later when Elizur Barnes charged a Connecticut customer twenty-five cents for “putting Leggs to [a] Bottle Drainer.”67

The lone reference to a soap dish and wash bowl, which Philip Deland supplied a family in Massachusetts in the early 1840s, appears to identify objects made of wood. By contrast, a common entry in woodworker’s records is the “towel roller.” The price was modest. In the early nineteenth century David Alling charged thirty-one cents at Newark, New Jersey, George Landon recorded 31 1/4¢ at Erie, Pennsylvania, and Robert Whitelaw asked only seventeen cents at Ryegate, Vermont. Perhaps more expensive than any recorded towel roller is the relatively ornate example with scalloped top in figure 15. In place of the usual turned cylinder, or roller, this rack has a roll shaped to paneled form through the use of a drawknife. John Lewis Krimmel, a Delaware Valley painter, delineated a different roller pattern in one of his early nineteenth-century sketches. Two shaped vertical boards with sweeping ends top and bottom support between them a roller that is removable via an open slot in one of the vertical panels.68

Spinning, Quilting, Weaving, and Related Equipment
Although imported textiles were available in abundance throughout the period covered by this study, records indicate that woodworking craftsmen fabricated a substantial amount of equipment used in the production of domestic cloth and needlework into the second quarter of the nineteenth century. As early as the 1720s Jacob Hinsdale built “Great,” or wool, wheels for his rural neighbors in Harwinton, Connecticut. By the 1750s Robert Crage could offer residents in the vicinity of Leicester, Massachusetts, a range of equipment for home spinning. John Green’s purchases of February 9, 1757, included “a foot wheel” (also known as a “spinning,” “flax,” or “linen” wheel), “a woollen wheel,” and “a Clock Reel,” a device used to wind spun fibers into skeins for storage or ease in handling.69

During the dark uncertain days preceding the Revolution, urban craftsmen also offered spinning and related equipment. Wright and McAllister of New York City, located “at the Spinning-Wheel, nearly opposite St. Paul’s Church, Broad-Way,” encouraged the public to support American manufactures. In 1775, Philadelphia cabinetmaker Francis Trumble advertised to hire several journeymen spinning-wheel makers and solicited suppliers for “500 setts of stocks and rims for spinning wheels.”70

John Lewis Krimmel sketched some of the apparatus of spinning in the early nineteenth century (fig. 16). Clearly delineated from the front and side is a flax wheel, also called a “foot wheel” because the treadle mounted between the three legs activates the wheel by means of foot action and a cord. Mounted on the plank, or table, immediately behind the wheel is the low spinning mechanism consisting of a U-shaped flyer, a slender cylindrical bobbin, and a multi-disk-turned whorl, all drawn in detail at the lower left. As the flyer revolves it twists the thread being spun and leads it to the bobbin where it is wound. The flyer is set in motion by means of a continuous cord that forms a loop around the wheel rim and the whorl of the spinning mechanism. The tall turned pole next to the spinning mechanism is part of the distaff. It supports near the top the distaff cage, an apparatus wound around with unspun fiber, which the artist has sketched separately. Two views of a winding wheel appear at the right in the sketch. The size of the box supporting the wheel and the vague suggestion of a dial below the nave appear to identify the apparatus as a clock reel. Spun fiber to be measured into skeins was wound around the outside of the cylinders at the arm tips as the wheel was rotated. The clock recorded the revolutions.

As late as 1820 the United States census of manufactures pinpoints pockets of settlement where spinning was still firmly entrenched in the economy of the home: central New York state, north central Pennsylvania, south New Jersey, south central and western Virginia, central Georgia, and various locations in the newly settled regions of Kentucky, Tennessee, Ohio, and Indiana. Although the country was experiencing a nationwide recession at this date and many craftsmen reported that business was dull, there were a few bright spots. James W. Moore, a wheelwright who constructed flax and cotton wheels, reels, swifts, and bedsteads in Rutherford County, Tennessee, stated that “there has been a greater demand for articles in my business than heretofore [and] sales have generally been productive.” Uzziel Church produced a comparable line of equipment in his two-man shop in Union County, Indiana. He reported that sales were “verry good and Ready.” Artisans in all areas also responded to a steady demand for repairs to equipment already in use.71

Although the wool wheel is considerably larger than that used to spin flax or cotton, the mechanism is simpler and the cost was more modest. The accounts of Jonathan Dart of New London County, Connecticut, are revealing on this point. Large and small wheels made in his shop in 1796– 1797 were priced at eleven shillings to thirteen shillings and twenty-one shillings, respectively. In a Massachusetts record the material of the wheel, large or small, is identified as oak. At Boston, painter Daniel Rea, Jr., noted on several occasions that he had painted a spinning wheel “mehogony Colour.” When householders ordered a new wheel from the local woodworker the charge, like those for other products, was posted to his account, the balance satisfied periodically by payment in cash, services, labor, barter goods, and the like. In 1818 George Landon noted a special arrangement with one of his customers in Erie, Pennsylvania: “Ebenezer Graham . . . is to have a big wheel Maid by the last of february for wich he is to Give 3 1/2 Bushels of weete or $4:50 in Cash.” Amos Purinton of Weare, New Hampshire, sold many spinning wheels to peddlers, who carried them disassembled to eager consumers throughout the state.72

Two other pieces of spinning equipment, the swift and the quill wheel, filled critical needs when converting skeins of yarn to manageable form as balls or wound bobbins for use in knitting and weaving. The common swift had a collapsible horizontal reel mounted on a short vertical shaft with a screw base for clamping to the edge of a table or other flat surface. Householders often purchased their swifts in pairs. Elisha H. Holmes sold “1 pr of winding swifts” in Connecticut in 1827 for fifty cents. In a letter dated at London in 1766, Benjamin Franklin wrote to his wife in Philadelphia saying that he was sending their daughter “two little Reels,” and he explained further: “The Reels are to screw on the edge of a Table, when she would wind Silk or Thread. The Skein is to be put over them and winds better than if held in two Hands.” The quill wheel looks like a large spinning wheel; however, the simple mechanism at the front holds a bobbin, or quill, to be filled with yarn for weaving. The price usually was slightly more than that of a clock reel. In 1813 Abner Haven of Massachusetts sold “a quil wheel” for $1.50, the same price charged by James Whitelaw in Vermont a few years earlier.73

The records of a few craftsmen identify frames for executing needlework as well as small looms for weaving tapes. The accounts of Jeduthern Avery of Bolton, Connecticut, and Philemon Robbins of Hartford list a “Lace fraim,” each priced low at twenty-five cents and fifty cents, respectively. Of more frequent mention is the embroidery frame, also identified by Robbins as a “Tabourret frame” and by others as a “tambour frame.” At Litchfield Silas Cheney supplied Sarah (Sally) Pierce, proprietress of a successful girl’s school, with a number of embroidery frames, including one fitted with a stand priced at eight shillings ($1.33). Cheney identified another frame as cherrywood. Philadelphia records name mahogany as the material of some frames and Daniel Trotter and Thomas Affleck as two cabinetmakers who produced them.74

Small hand or table looms appear to have been uncommon. A reference to a “Garter Loom for Miss Salie” (probably a member of the Taliaferro family) in an unidentified Virginia account book of the 1760s and 1770s is the only one to specify a function other than tapemaking. The modest price was 1s.6d. (twenty-five cents). A turned tape loom made by the Proud brothers of Providence a few years later was priced about the same. Tape looms made by Jacob Hinsdale and John Wheeler Geer of Connecticut for about five shillings appear to have been more elaborate, perhaps open boxes formed of butted boards.75

An item rarely mentioned in records is the “thread stand.” Nathan Cleaveland of Franklin, Massachusetts, listed one in 1828 priced at sixty-two cents. The notation calls to mind several journal entries made by Edward Jenner Carpenter while serving an apprenticeship in Greenfield. On September 18, 1844, he noted: “Mr. Buzzell was up here tonight & turned some ivory feet for a spool stand that he is making for the Mechanics Fair, it is going to be a nice one.” Further entries followed during the course of a week. Finally on Friday evening, September 27, following the fair, Carpenter wrote: “the spool stand that Buzzell made sold for five dollars. W. F. Davis bought it.”76

Evidence of the purchase of quilting frames and repairs to equipment in use covers a broad area extending from Vermont to the Delaware Valley and likely beyond. Just as broad was the pricing of the equipment, from as little as 16 1/2¢ to well over two dollars. The accounts of Jacob Bachman of rural Pennsylvania, which record the sale of new frames during the seven years from 1830 to 1837, list three price levels—fifty cents, one dollar, and $1.50. Obviously, size, finish, material, and the fabrication of a special support structure had a bearing on the cost. Other records provide confirmation. Job Danforth of Providence sold a frame in 1806 for 8s.3d. ($1.36), although he priced another described as “Small” at only fifty-eight cents.77

Of particular interest is an entry in the accounts of Ezekiel Smith of Massachusetts for repairs to a quilting frame accompanied by the notation “mending your Chears [chairs] Backs.” The two items were priced together, offering a strong suggestion that use of the frame was interconnected with the chairs. Frames not fitted with their own supports sometimes were balanced on the backs of chairs when in use. Either the lengthwise or crosswise bars could be made longer for this purpose. By contrast, the quilting frame illustrated in figure 17 was constructed to rest on its own supports. Neither the lengthwise or crosswise bar extends far enough beyond the corner joint to provide adequate support on a chair back. In addition, two holes pierce the tip of the short crosswise bar, indicating that when the frame was used the tips of the short bars were placed over slim extension pieces at the tops of four standards. The accounts of Thomas Boynton of Vermont confirm that the individual pieces of quilting frames were referred to as “Bars.” The records of an anonymous Boston woodworker also identify special seating purchased for use around a frame in June 1758, when John Avery acquired “a quilting fram[e]” and “2 stulles” for four shillings.78

The happy scene depicted in figure 17 apparently is true to common practice of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. A frolic, or general merrymaking, attended by neighbors, friends, and family often was the climax of a group working session for spinning or knitting fibers, processing harvested foodstuffs, or completing a task, such as making a quilt. Refreshments, music, and dancing were common accompaniments. Jacob Hiltzheimer, a businessman and street commissioner of Philadelphia in the late eighteenth century, noted in his diary that he attended at least two frolics. One was a “cider frolic,” the other a celebration associated with a house raising in Market Street.79

Weaving equipment was large, bulky, and expensive, and beyond the means of many families. Nevertheless, craftsmen’s accounts provide good evidence of the construction and repair of looms for domestic use. The records of four craftsmen in locations extending from Maine to Pennsylvania describe a price range of $6.50 to nine dollars for the loom. James Geer of Groton, Connecticut, was explicit in identifying the construction material of his looms as chestnut. Thomas Boynton of Windsor, Vermont, recorded making “a bench for a loom,” a simple affair for which he charged twenty-five cents. Many other business accounts record repairs to looms and the supply of small accessories essential to the weaving process.80

Householders set up their looms in any of several areas in the home or on the property, depending on family size and availability of space: the attic, a spare room, an ell or attached shed, and even a freestanding building. The probate records of Ebenezer Tracy, Sr., a cabinetmaker and chairmaker of eastern Connecticut, describe a “weaving house” in the estate division. The estate inventory further lists a loom and accessories along with a quill wheel, five wool wheels, three linen wheels, and a clock reel. Raw material on hand included fifty pounds of flax and three pounds of wool.81

Bedsteads, Children’s Furniture, and Low Stools
A majority of documents consulted for this study contain references to furniture built for repose and sleep. The discussion is limited to bedsteads of moderate cost, thus eliminating frames of higher price made to accommodate expensive hangings or constructed of fine cabinet wood. As explained by Thomas Sheraton in The Cabinet Dictionary (1803), the term “bed” in a general sense “includes the bedstead and other necessary articles incident to this most useful of all pieces of furniture,” namely the mattress, linens, blankets, outer covers, and pillows. Like the bedstead, mattresses varied widely in quality, from cases filled with straw to those made of flock (fabric fragments, frequently wool, cut up and used for stuffing), feathers, and curled horsehair. Although it was expensive, Sheraton endorsed the hair mattress because of its “elastic nature, which prevents from sinking so as to perspire.” He also had some special words of wisdom often repeated today: “And all such persons, who by a relaxed habit have contracted weaknesses in the back, should be particular in avoiding soft beds.”82

A popular design was the low-post bedstead (see fig. 18), its corner supports often formed with a combination of blocked and turned elements. An alternative term for this frame—“common bedstead”—was used less frequently. Probably deriving directly from British terminology was the name “stump bedstead,” as found in the accounts of William Rawson of Killingly, Connecticut, and in a bill prepared by James Linacre of Albany. A rarer term is “short-post bedstead,” which appears in the accounts of Peter Ranck of Lebanon County, Pennsylvania. Also belonging to the low-post group is the frame identified as a “toad back bedstead” in the accounts of Reubin Loomis of Connecticut in 1806. The name derives from the particular design of the headboard, which has an arch across the top and deep U-shaped cutouts forming long fingers at the joints with the head posts. The profile appears to have been duplicated several decades later in the backs of painted fancy chairs, where it is termed a “frog back.”83

The cost of a low-post bedstead varied substantially—from less than one dollar to well over seven dollars. Several factors influenced price. Many, if not all, higher priced bedsteads came equipped with a sacking bottom, as suggested in several records of Philadelphia origin. For instance, Nathan Trotter paid six dollars for a “Low-post Bedstead & bottom &c.” in 1821. When acquiring low-post bedsteads several decades earlier, John Cadwalader and William Wallis paid eighteen shillings ($2.97) and nineteen shillings ($3.13), respectively, for “Sacken & Lacing” and a “Bottom & line.” A sacking bottom served in place of bed slats to support the mattress and bedding. It consisted of a stout, coarse cloth attached by means of lacing, or cord, to small, turned, regularly-spaced “pins” (also called “knobs,” “nubs,” and “buttons”) mounted upright on a ledge inside the frame. An alternative support structure is illustrated in figure 18, which has a drilled frame to receive a rope bottom. The rope lacing was drawn taut by means of a T-shaped wooden implement with a cleft shaft called a “bed key.” Several appear in craftsmen’s records. In the 1820s Elisha H. Holmes of eastern Connecticut and Miles Benjamin of central New York supplied customers with inexpensive bed keys.84

Choice of wood also influenced the price of a bedstead. In 1798 a customer of Daniel Ross in Massachusetts chose birch and paid $2.33 for his “Common” frame. A “best curled maple” low bedstead purchased in 1822 from William Jones in Delaware cost five dollars. Although James Gere identified a “common bedstead 2nd Quality” priced at two dollars in 1826, the Connecticut record provides no indication of how quality was determined: choice of wood, simplicity of design, or another factor? Paint was the finish on many bedsteads, and a range of colors was available. Two are listed in Connecticut records. In 1800 Silas Cheney made a low bedstead painted red (reddish brown); five years later Solomon Cole painted a similar frame green. Both cost fourteen shillings ($2.31). Size and headboard design were other factors that determined price. The pointed-top panel in figure 18 took less time to saw to form than a headboard with curves.85

A frame only slightly less popular than the low-post bedstead was one built with a joint in the long side rails near the headboard and supported at that point by an extra pair of feet and a cross brace. The popular name for this frame was “turn-up bedstead.” A few woodworkers in Connecticut used the alternative term “joint bedstead.” As its name implies, the turn-up bedstead was built to fold up against a wall to clear floor space for other activity. Two of its basic components, the corner posts and the headboard, were similar to those in the low-post bedstead. Unlike the press bedstead, which also is jointed, the frame usually did not fold into a wall closet or box. It could be concealed from view, however, through the use of a cover made of fabric or other material.86

The price range and average cost of the turn-up bedstead was similar to that of the low frame. The picture can be enlarged somewhat based on craftsmen’s accounts. A few frames had high posts at the head. In 1825 Elisha H. Holmes made one at Essex, Connecticut, for $4.50. A similar bedstead made by Elizur Barnes in 1822 for a customer in Middletown also had “Buttons,” identifying it as a frame to be fitted with a sacking bottom rather than a rope support. Oliver Moore’s “joint bedstead with he[a]d posts turned” may have had high posts. When charging another customer for “helping your Father to turn bed posts,” the East Granby craftsman noted that the task required “one days work in my shop in ye labour.”87

The turn-up bedstead, like other frames, could be made in single or double widths. Philemon Robbins produced a single one at Hartford in 1834. A rare account entry was penned at Northampton, Massachusetts, in 1805 by Harris Beckwith: “to A turn up Bedsted and Box.” The low charge of three dollars indicates the furniture was made of common wood to be painted. Abner Taylor of Lee noted an alternative finish a decade later with an account entry for “a Bedstead to turn up Stained.” Space requirements in the home changed from time to time, leading one customer of Job E. Townsend in Rhode Island to pay him for “Altering a Bedsted to turn up.” When not used for sleeping, the bed could be folded out of the way. This convenience may have been foremost in the mind of a consumer billed by Job Danforth at Providence in 1803 for “a Turnup Beadstead for one of your men.” Hired men and journeymen commonly occupied quarters on the premises of their masters—in the attic, in a shop loft or shed, or in another outbuilding. Wherever bedded, economy of space likely was critical.88

Trundle bedsteads appear with frequency in craftsmen’s records—as many as the combined total for low-post and turn-up frames. Although the price range was broader than that for the other two bedsteads, the average cost of the trundle bedstead at $2.60 was still only seventy-seven to eighty percent that of the larger frames. The term “trundle” actually identifies the small wheels at the bottom of the posts, which are part of the furniture’s basic construction (see fig. 19). Dictionaries cite “truckle” as an alternative term for both the wheels and the bedstead and pinpoint the unique feature of this frame: “a low bed on wheels, that may be pushed under another bed.” Reubin Loomis of Connecticut and Charles C. Robinson of Philadelphia were two of a small number of craftsmen who used the word truckle instead of trundle. Abner Taylor of Massachusetts described the frame as “a Bunk or trundle bed stead.”89

Eighteenth- and nineteenth-century diaries, letters, and journals often describe the trundle bedstead as a sleeping place for children, although the earlier function of this piece of furniture was broader. In the Middle Ages and later students often occupied trundle frames in the chambers of their tutors. The inexpensive frame also provided a place to bed servants, who in early practice frequently slept in the same chamber with their master.90

A few accounts identify special features or unusual circumstances connected with the purchase of the trundle bedstead, as for instance Philemon Robbins’s record of a “trundle bedstead with sides” made in 1834 at Hartford. Another Connecticut craftsman, Titus Preston of Wallingford, billed Jared Allen ten shillings ($1.65) in 1804 when he “finished a trundle bedsted of your timber.” Other documents and extant frames address the support structure for the mattress. Hiram Taylor of Chester County, Pennsylvania, and Samuel Douglas of near Canton, Connecticut, described trundle bedsteads with “board bottoms.” Figure 19 illustrates an alternative support system with rails drilled to accommodate a rope grid. The accounts of David Evans of Philadelphia and the Waters family of Salem, Massachusetts, document the use of the more expensive sacking bottom, with its cords for lacing a stout cloth to the frame.91

Occasionally, records identify the construction material and finish of the trundle bedstead. In 1811 Saint George Tucker of Williamsburg, Virginia, paid John Hockaday for a “Colourd poplar Trunnell Bedstead.” Expenses for a set of casters, seven yards of cord, three yards of sail duck, thread, and labor for making the sacking bottom supplemented the charge. Several accounts identify painted surfaces. Those of Boston ornamental painter Daniel Rea, Jr., and Middletown, New Jersey, cabinetmaker Fenwick Lyell name green paint specifically. Customers of Silas Cheney in Connecticut and Abner Taylor in Massachusetts chose a stained finish for their trundle bedsteads.92

Furniture repairs accounted for a substantial amount of a craftsman’s working time. In the case of the trundle bedstead one of the repetitive tasks was the replacement of the wheels, or trundles. Two early references from the 1750s appear in the Massachusetts accounts of Robert Crage of Leicester and Peter Emerson of Reading. Samuel Hall provided “trundles for a Bidsted” in Middletown, Connecticut, preceding the Revolutionary War. Use of the trundle bedstead continued during the early nineteenth century, when Alexander Low of Freehold, New Jersey, and other craftsmen continued to supply new wheels to these frames. Some bedsteads sustained more extensive wear and damage. Perez Austin of Canterbury, Connecticut, provided new timber for a bedstead he repaired, and Isaiah Tiffany of Norwich added two braces to strengthen a frame.93

Until the Windsor took over the market in children’s seating following the Revolution, “little” chairs with rush or, more rarely, board bottoms were the choices available to consumers. “Little” was the preferred term for the child’s chair in craftsmen’s accounts, and notations such as that made by Robert Crage of Leicester, Massachusetts, confirm that the two words were synonymous: “To a Childs Little Chare 0.1.4.” The low price of Crage’s chair suggests that it was purchased as an open frame without the woven bottom and possibly without any surface finish.94

The business records of Solomon Fussell of Philadelphia provide a comprehensive account of early seating for children. The price of side chairs varied from 2s.6d. to 3s.6d., three shillings being the usual charge. Included in this range were a few chairs described by color: white, brown, and black. Two special designs were priced slightly higher. Fussell identified one as a “4 Slat” chair, which suggests that the standard back had three slats or possibly only two. At 4s.6s. the “rake back” chair was the most expensive. The raked design introduced a bend to the cylindrical back posts just above the seat to create an inclined back for greater comfort. To produce the rake Fussell employed two-axis turning, a labor-intensive procedure reflected in the cost.95

Fussell offered another piece of seating furniture to his customers described as a “Childs Table chair” priced at five shillings to 5s.6d. The modern term is “highchair.” In the late eighteenth century “dining chair” became the common name for this tall seat, especially as Windsor construction began to dominate the market. As descriptive terms, the words dining and table focus on the chair’s place of use rather than the now common tray, which was a later, nineteenth-century innovation along with the foot rest. The tall chair was built to the appropriate height to permit the child to join family members around the dining table at mealtime, as confirmed in an account entry made by Samuel Durand of Milford, Connecticut, dated January 24, 1815: “To 1 Chair for Child to Sit at table.” The charge was six shillings.96

A few documents identify rush-bottom rocking chairs for children. Some chairs were built to form originally; others were converted for rocking at a later date. After the Revolution when the Windsor began to dominate the vernacular seating market, open-frame construction is identified in records through price (usually in the range of four shillings), terminology, or other internal evidence. At Hartford in 1834 Philemon Robbins described his product: “To 1 flagg seat childs chair with Rockers.” The cost was sixty-eight cents (four shillings).97

The seats in children’s rush-bottom furniture required refurbishing or replacement periodically. The replacement cost with material and labor was about nine pence (twelve cents). Although the charge was modest, the recurring maintenance in rush-bottom seating gave the plank-bottom Windsor a decided edge with consumers. Paint helped stabilize a woven seat, although few householders appear to have opted for the extra expense. One of Oliver Moore’s customers in Connecticut decided on a positive course of action in 1820 and paid the craftsman for “puting a bottom in [a] small Chair and painting it twice over.” Sometimes the seats of new chairs were painted at purchase. Elizur Barnes charged seventy-five cents for “a Little Cheir Seat Painted.” The replacement of a chair seat sometimes prompted other repairs, as in 1758 when Isaiah Tiffany saw “to puting an Arm & bottom to a little Chair.”98

The “Small bord chair for child” or, as also described, “little chair with board bottom,” was salable well into the nineteenth century. The price varied from as little as fifty cents to just over one dollar. The most popular design was the “childs wood seat ch[ai]r with hole.” The geographic range of this form was broad— from Newark, New Jersey, to New Ipswich, New Hampshire. Extending the variety of board seating is the rare identification of a “Childs Banch” priced at 7s.6d. ($1.16) in the accounts of Silas Cheney of Connecticut. This simple piece of furniture may have had shaped board ends of the type illustrated in figure 21. The gocart was another special form requested occasionally. In the colonial and federal periods the word referred to a framework to support a child when learning to walk. Robert Crage of Massachusetts built “a goe Cart for a Child” in 1758 and charged 2s.8d. In Connecticut Samuel Hall repaired a gocart in 1789 by providing three new “trundles,” or wheels.99

Because most families were large in the colonial and federal periods, the cradle was an important form, as amply demonstrated in craftsmen’s accounts. Records offer little particular description of the open box on rockers, although many examples were of board construction, either butted (see fig. 20) or dovetailed. The “Post cradle” described in 1826 by Elisha H. Holmes of Connecticut was joined with mortises-and-tenons. Holmes also identified a “Round end cradle.” The accounts of two other craftsmen itemize a “Cradle with a Head,” or hood. Abner Taylor of Massachusetts substituted the word “top.” The only mention of a “swing,” or suspended, cradle is that in the accounts of Solomon Cole of Connecticut, and it was expensive at £1.14.6 ($5.69). The average price of a cradle on rockers, excluding two expensive examples, was two dollars to $2.50.100

Records provide a greater amount of information about the materials of cradle construction, identifying six basic woods—pine, yellow poplar, birch, gum, walnut, and cherry. Mahogany and cedar cradles priced at twelve dollars and ten dollars, respectively, hardly qualify as “everyday things.” A common price for a pine cradle was two dollars; yellow poplar was slightly more expensive. Jonathan Kettell of Massachusetts sold a birch cradle in 1790 for one pound ($3.30). David Evans made a gumwood cradle in Philadelphia shortly after the Revolutionary War. The walnut cradles in the sample originated in eastern Pennsylvania, whereas cherrywood construction was fairly broad, covering southern New England, New York state, and southeastern Pennsylvania.101

Stain and paint were common finishes on cradles. One stained example was made of “whitewood” (yellow poplar). Pine is identified as a painted wood, and records list several paint colors. The blue mentioned in three accounts dating between 1799 and 1802 probably was made from the pigment Prussian blue, which produced a vivid medium-light shade. The account books of two painters, William Gray of Salem, Massachusetts, and Daniel Rea, Jr., of Boston identify “Seder Colour” and “mehogony Colour,” both likely executed in imitation of wood grain. The only cradle repair work identified in records used in this study is rocker replacement. The need was widespread, as recorded from Freehold, New Jersey, to Dartmouth, Massachusetts.102

Cribs appear in craftsmen’s records in fewer numbers than cradles, and for the most part they were priced consistently higher. When an infant outgrew the cradle, there was the crib or the trundle bed. The tall crib could be drawn close to a mother’s bed. If one side were constructed to lift out or fall down, the mother had access to her child during the night without getting out of bed.103

Particular information about the crib’s appearance is sparse in records. Cherrywood is named as the material of construction in the accounts of Elisha H. Holmes of Essex, Connecticut, and Job Danforth of Providence. Daniel Rea, Jr., painted several cribs, one identified as green, an indication that less costly woods also were used in the construction of such forms. The addition of casters provided ease of movement within the bed chamber and other areas. One family purchased a “Double crib bedstead” from Holmes, although whether to hold twins or to serve another purpose is unknown. Modifications to a crib could extend its useful life, as in 1823 when the Ward family of Middletown, Connecticut, sought the services of Elizur Barnes to lengthen a crib. Perhaps the ultimate in pre-Victorian crib design was one built at Hartford in 1835 for Charles Goodwin by Philemon Robbins. The small bedstead had a sacking bottom and a “sett of hooks for vallance roods.”104

Crickets and footstools frequently are distinguished one from the other in records, although a close relationship is suggested in the item “a Cricket or foot stool” in the accounts of Abner Taylor of Massachusetts. Randle Holmes’s definition of a stool in the Academie of Armory & Blazon (1688) further notes the interchangeability of the two terms: “a kind of low footed stool, or Cricket as some call it.” Nevertheless, colonial and federal craftsmen appear to have made distinctions between the two, as confirmed in account entries and recorded prices. A tabulation of cost indicates that the average price of the cricket was about thirty percent less than that of the footstool, and the figure drops to about fifty percent when the price extremes in both categories are eliminated from the tabulation. Clearly, the cricket was simpler in design and likely smaller in size than the footstool.105

Even within their individual categories the cricket and the footstool could vary in appearance, as indicated by brief descriptions that accompany some account entries. Either stool could have a solid wooden top or an open frame for upholstery. The wooden top also could be concealed by stuffng. Carpeting, and more specifically Brussels carpeting, is identified in records as an appropriate cover. Not all tops were rectangular; oval is mentioned in at least one document. Paint, and in particular green paint, covered some surfaces. The varnish coat mentioned in other records probably covered woods such as birds-eye maple, curled maple, and mahogany, all of which are named in the records.106

Evidence suggests that crickets usually had turned legs. The casualty rate appears to have been relatively high, given the number of leg repairs mentioned in records. One unusual variation was the “Cricket with wheels” made by Philemon Robbins in 1835 for a Hartford resident. An alternative support to the turned leg was the panel end with an arch cut out at the bottom to form feet. The cricket shown in figure 21, which is representative of this group, is a particularly fine example because the cyma arches of the end panels are repeated in the apron at each long side. The construction is simple. Both aprons abut the side faces of the end panels at rabbets and are nailed in place; the panel ends are set at a slight cant. The top board is nailed to the top edge of the panels, the nails visible in single rows on the board top near either end. A plainer example appears in the right foreground of figure 17.107

Crickets and footstools, or “low stools,” functioned in various ways. Women used low stools to elevate their feet above floor drafts, and a mother could support a nursing child on the knee of a leg elevated on a low stool. The foot support also was a boon to the elderly. As early as 1718 John Gaines II of Ipswich, Massachusetts, charged a customer two shillings (thirty-three) for “a cricket for yr mother.” The low stool was synonymous with childhood as well. Children sat on crickets to pursue their lessons, work on their sewing, participate in devotions, or to listen to stories. The same stools were used for standing at the knee of a parent or teacher to recite or read aloud a lesson. The limited surface area of the stool discouraged fidgeting. In 1816 Job E. Townsend of Newport, Rhode Island, recorded that a Mrs. Kindel paid him one dollar for “making 4 Creekets for her Children.”108

Low stools served an expanded function in churches and meetinghouses. Parishioners often purchased low stools for use in their private pews. At Providence John G. Hopkins sold Albert C. Greene, Esq., “one pare of Crickets for pew.” Fenwick Lyell made “7 foot Stools for Pews” for the family of John J. Post at Middletown, New Jersey. A longer support was the foot bench, which could serve two occupants of a pew seated side by side. In 1837, George Merrifield of Albany constructed a pair for one dollar. The “pair [of] foot benches” purchased by the wealthy New Yorker Arthur Bronson in 1832 were out of the ordinary at seven dollars. Perhaps they were for use with his two eighty-dollar sofas acquired a few months earlier.109

Storage Furniture and Boxes
Adequate, convenient storage that was part of the built structure of the house was uncommon in the colonial and federal periods. Householders met this need in part by engaging local woodworkers to build any of a variety of cupboards and shelves where they would serve to advantage. Descriptions usually are brief, and few specific locations are identified.

Records name only the corner cupboard, or buVet, as a recognizable form. Presumably other units were rectangular. Common locations for corner cupboards were front and back parlors, where they held dishes and other equipment used in dining, tea service, and related activities. The “cupboard for your fire place” built by Titus Preston for a Connecticut customer also appears to have been located in a principal space, such as the parlor or kitchen. The “cellar” cupboard named by Enos Reynolds of Massachusetts may have stored preserved foods. An addition to a house provided a convenient opportunity to increase both living and storage space. In 1805 Robert Whitelaw of Vermont charged James Whitelaw seventy-five cents after spending “one day making a Cupboard in your New room.”110

Features noted occasionally in descriptions of cupboards are paneled doors, shelves, and locks. When Jonathan Loomis built a book cupboard for Captain Lucius Graves at Whately, Massachusetts, in 1815, he charged extra for the “trimming for Do.” The material of the common cupboard is seldom mentioned, and size usually is expressed as “large” or “small,” when identified at all. An exception is the “pine Corner Cupboard” built by William Savery of Philadelphia for John Cadwalader in 1771. The storage piece stood five feet, six inches high and measured two feet deep from the center front. The cost was £2.10. A common cupboard repair was rehanging the doors.111

Hanging cupboards are difficult to discern in craftsmen’s accounts. Only in notations such as “a job of work putting up Cupboard” is this form distinguished from others. Perez Austin of Canterbury, Connecticut, provided a few additional particulars in his accounts for February 1831. The craftsman spent half a day “making a paniel Cubboard Dore.” This was followed by almost another “half Days work Caseing & han[g]ing [the] Cubboard.”112

Bookshelves and bookracks are about equally represented in craftsmen’s accounts of the early nineteenth century. Prices ranged from under one dollar to over three dollars, although most racks were higher priced than shelves. Bookcases were still more expensive. The form of the bookrack is speculative. Given its price, it was more than a simple table-top unit and different from a standard set of shelves. Early in 1832 the Boston firm of Samuel Chamberlain and Son purchased both a set of shelves and a rack for seventy-five cents and two dollars, respectively. An entry “To Putting up Book Rack” in the accounts of Elizur Barnes of Connecticut indicates the storage unit hung on a wall. Perhaps it was a shelf-like framework with horizontal bars across the front similar to a plate rack to house books with the front covers visible.113

Housing books was just one of several named functions of hanging and wall shelves. Next in importance was a shelf to support a clock. References “to putting up clock shelve” range in origin from New Jersey to northern New England, demonstrating the widespread incidence of this practice. Paul Jenkins of Maine provided a “mahoganey shelf for [a] time piece,” and William Hook of Massachusetts supplied a “Brackit.” A patron of Thomas Boynton’s Vermont shop in 1841 commissioned “a flower pot shelf” and paid seventy-five cents. Decades earlier Nathaniel Kinsman of Massachusetts responded to a request for “a Bord for [a] mantle.” Whether the board replaced a damaged one or created a shelf where none had existed is unknown. The mantle shelf illustrated in figure 17 supports a pitcher, two books, and a vase of flowers.114

Other references describe the nature of the shelving or the place of installation. In accounts dating to 1792 Isaac Ashton of Philadelphia described a job of installing three corner shelves and two long shelves priced by the shelf at 82 1/2¢ and $1.23 1/2, respectively. A year earlier Job Danforth of Providence charged a householder for “puting Shelfs in your closet,” and a New York City resident sought the services of Peter Oldershaw to install kitchen shelves at seven shillings for the work and materials.115

References to the low chest with hinged lid and bracket feet occur in almost half the documents consulted for this study (see fig. 22). Based on the evidence, it appears that the low chest was the most common piece of movable storage furniture in the American home in the late colonial