6 NORTH SHORE BREEZE and Reminder 
Rust & Marshall's 
Old Cabinet-Shop on 
Town Landing, 
Manchester, Burned in 
1871—Located Where 
Police Station and 
Western End of Town 
Hall Now Stand. 
ee 
his home in 1778 and his furniture was of more than 
ordinary excellence. Others from the quaint old town 
were Daniel Harris, 1752; John Harris, 1767; Sewall 
Short, 1773; Oliver Moody, 1775, and his son, Oliv :r, 
1776, chairmakers. 
Beverly records the names of John Corning, 1734; 
Joshua Besson, 1750; and Benjamin Jones, 1776. 
John Tyler was a Gloucester cabinet-maker and was, 
perhaps, the foremost on Cape Ann in 1767, although 
Jonathan Goodhue in 1770 also took an active part in the 
industry with remarkable success. 
The following are names of the prominent cabinet- 
makers in Ipswich of those times: Thomas Dennis, 1703; 
his son, Thomas Dennis, 1706; John Brown, 1746; Wil- 
liam Caldwell, 1759. There was, also, another John 
Brown in Ipswich in 1758. Bernsley Wells worked in 
Ipswich at the same period and both were cabinet-makers 
of great merit. 
Marblehead cabinet-makers included Samuel Good- 
win, 1729; Matthew Severett, 1745; Samuel Striker and 
Michael Bowden, 1762; Joseph Potter, 1768; Francis 
Cook, 1762; Job Trask, 1780. Thomas Laskey, 1761, 
and Benjamin Klaskey, 1778, were chairmakers. 
Prominent among others in Salem whose work has 
perpetuated their names were James Symonds, 1714; 
Joseph Allen, 1740; John Lander, 1757; Deacon Miles 
Ward and Joseph Gavet, 1765. 
While many of the products of the early days of 
cabinet-making were intended for and suitable only for 
the simple needs of the yoemanry of that time, many 
beautiful and lasting articles ‘have withstood the blight of 
years and to this day they stand in many palatial homes, 
not only of Massachusetts, but of other states. An inci- 
dent showing that the furniture of that day was sent far 
and wide through the country, occurred during the heated 
secessional days and, while it} was amusing, it might well 
lave been serious. 
It is related that some of the furniture found a ready 
market in the South, especially New Orleans, from which 
city it was shipped up the Mississippi and thence to the 
portion of the country then known as the “great West.” 
On the occasion in mind pages of “The Liberator” weve 
used to wrap the furniture and these pages were blown 
about the streets of New Orleans by an unkind wind that 
arose at unpacking time. The incendiary pages of this 
combustible New England paper very nearly set fire to 
the emotions of the men of the most sensitive part of the 
slave-holding South and the packers were warned, we are 
told, that, if they hoped to find a further market for their 
goods in the Crescent City, an entirely different type of 
wrapping must be substituted for the paper filled with 
the writings of the abolitionists of the day. 
The furniture that was shipped to the South was of 
the cheaper grade and little of it is left to commemorate 
the period. Of a different type is the somewnat roughly 
made, but substantial table of the celebrated fortune teller 
of Lynn, Moll Pitcher. It is made with falling leaves, 
carbriole legs and hoof feet. It may be seen at the Essex 
Institute, where the courteous attendants are only too 
willing to tell visitors the story of the little table that 
stands in one of their alcoves, It was at this table, we 
are told, that Mistress Pitcher sat while receiving her 
clients. We picture her sitting there for hours at a time, 
divining by tea the fate of the men and women of rich 
and poor alike, who came by hundreds and in sober earnest 
for her augury. Few vessels set out upon the seas with- 
out first obtaining Molly Pitcher’s advice. In 1760 she 
was married to Robert Pitcher and she died in 1813. She 
was buried in Lynn, where ‘she had lived for so many 
years. (For a detailed account of the life of Moll Pitcia- 
er, see “Legends of the North Shore,” in some future 
issue of the.BREEZE. ) 
In those primitive days, cabinet-makers combined 
glazing with their better beloved work, as for instance 
Thomas Waldron of Marblehead, who advertised “Win- 
dow Frames, Chairs and 30 Feet 6f° Glass.” 
The even tenor of the cabinet-making era pursued 
its way unmolested for many years. ‘Then, came the 
great gold fever in 1849 in California which lasted many 
years and lured many New England citizens to seek this 
June 16, 1916. 
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