February, 1908 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



53 



tensively carried on in many parts of New York State in the 

 Colonial period; and later, after many successful experiments 

 in home manufacture, it was quite extensively made in New 



An Ancestral Teapot 



York City. There were several prominent pewterers there 

 in the first half of the eighteenth century; among the names 

 most familiar in connection with treasured heirlooms are 

 those of Robert Boyle, James Leddel and William Brad- 

 ford. Following these was Francis Bassett, who had a 

 factory on Queen Street. A Francis Bassett trencher of old 

 x^merican pewter is now on exhibition in the Pennsylvania 

 Museum, in Fairmount Park, Philadelphia. It is marked 

 with his name, and with a series of small stamps — probably 

 borrowed from some European maker. It is claimed that 

 the marks are intended to represent a lion rampant, a pair 

 of scales, a ship, and a castle; but they are so worn and in- 

 distinct that their faint outlines can scarcely be distinguished. 

 The entire surface of the trencher is blurred and dented, in- 



cast in a bell-metal mold as early as the year 17 17." There 

 is an example of Bucks County manufacture in the Penn- 

 sylvania Museum — a quaint little sugar bowl with incised 

 decorations representing foliage and birds, with the mono- 

 gram "R. T." and "N. T." While this piece bears no date, 



A Pewter Tray, an English Decanter Slide and a Pewter Tankard Used 

 at Clean Drinking Manor, Md., During the Revolution 



its history can be traced back to the middle of the eighteenth 

 century, and it is claimed to have been in use in a Bucks 

 County family for one hundred and fifty years. The decora- 

 tions, evidently produced with a notched wheel, were, ac- 

 cording to family tradition, added at a later date by a 

 traveling peddler. 



In Philadelphia and vicinity there were many celebrated 

 pewterers during Colonial times and the latter part of the 

 eighteenth century; prominent among them were Thomas 

 Danforth, George W. and William Will, Robert and John 

 H. Palethorp, Parks Boyd, B. Barns, Christian I. Heavo 

 and Thomas Rigden. Famous old homesteads in historic 

 Germantown, as well as in the business section of Phila- 

 delphia, are noted for their associations with pewter manu- 

 facturing, while additional glory is accorded to some because 

 of the destruction of valuable pieces of pewter for forming 

 bullets for the American soldiers during the Revolutionary 



A Quaint Form of Mug 



dicating not only its great age, but also hard usage in 

 the past. 



One of the earliest manufacturers of pewter in Pennsyl- 

 vania was Bartholomew Longstreth, a resident of Bucks 

 County. John F. Watson, the historian, states in his "Annals 

 of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania" that this early pewterer 

 "made for the use of his own family pewter spoons which he 





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Pewter Shrine Service ; European Costumes Applied by Chinese Artists 



war. The old Metzger homestead of Germantown — which 

 unfortunately has recently been destroyed by the march of 

 municipal improvements — was at one time celebrated as the 

 "Pewter House of Germantown." It was here that Joshua 

 Metzger lived when interested in the home-made pewter in- 

 dustry, and where he lived when called to take up arms for 

 his country; and here his wife Elizabeth and his daughter 



