Sotheby’s Americana Week Sales Surpass $19 Million

"It's raining Newport,” Essex, Mass., dealer Clark Pearce wrote his clients before Americana Week. With all the Townsend-Goddard furniture for sale at both major houses, nothing stirred more excitement than this previously undocumented mahogany high chest of drawers with four open talon claw and ball feet and a fully developed carved shell. It is dated 1756 and signed by Newport cabinetmaker John Townsend, who was 23 at the time. Lieutenant Colonel Oliver and Mary Arnold of East Greenwich, R.I., commissioned the piece that descended in their family for 255 years. Responding to an email and a snapshot, Sotheby's experts Leslie Keno and Erik Gronning first inspected the high chest last summer. Underbid by Leigh Keno, the case piece sold in the room to dealer G.W. Samaha on behalf of a collector for $3,554,500, an auction record for an American high chest of drawers. "In design and construction, it is a masterpiece beyond compare with its original finish, finial and brasses,” said Leslie Keno. Gronning's research on the early furniture of John Townsend, including this high chest, is slated to appear in the Chipstone's 2012 American Furniture journal.

Rhode Island High Chest

By divine providence, New York City was awash in Eighteenth Century Rhode Island furniture this year, with outstanding offerings at both Sotheby's and its rival Christie's. Collectors were captivated here by a previously undocumented high chest of drawers with four open talon claw and ball feet and a fully developed carved shell. Dated 1756 and signed by Newport cabinetmaker John Townsend, who was 23 at the time, the case piece was ordered by Lieutenant Colonel Oliver and Mary Arnold of East Greenwich, R.I., on the occasion of their marriage. It descended in their family for 255 years before selling in the room just over estimate to dealer G.W. Samaha bidding on behalf of a collector for $3,554,500, setting an auction record for an American high chest. Leigh Keno was the underbidder.

The chatter began last summer when Sotheby's American furniture specialists Leslie Keno and Erik Gronning received an email inquiring if they would be interested in seeing a treasured family heirloom; one, in fact, signed by John Townsend.

"Because there was no phone number, I wrote a fairly extensive letter to him including our history of selling signed Townsend furniture. When an email came back with a photograph, albeit one that looked like it was taken underwater, our jaws dropped," said Keno.

"We couldn't tell if the talons were open, but we could see the amazing shell carving on the skirt, the striped grain of the wood and what looked like original finish. We caught the earliest train and were met by two of the nicest people. The family knew that the piece was special, but decided that it was too valuable to have in a house with young children."

Keno says few finds of his career have been more exciting. "This high chest of drawers is a masterpiece beyond compare. The lines are perfect and it has original finish, finial and brasses. All the others have basically been refinished. Many have had at least one replaced talon. So this was a chance of a lifetime."

Collectors can look forward to reading more about the high chest of drawers, one of the two earliest known works by Townsend, in an article that Gronning is writing for Chipstone's 2012 American Furniture annual.

New Discoveries

This gold-inlaid and relief engraved Colt Model 1849 revolver is one of 22 examples made around the time of the New York Crystal Palace Exhibition of 1853. Colt created the firearms for exhibitions and presentation pieces to give to European leaders such as Emperor Nicholas I of Russia, as well as dignitaries whose business he cultivated. The firearm sold to a collector for $1,142,500, an auction record for a firearm.

With so many pairs of eyes looking over every lot that crosses the block during Americana Week, it is no wonder that discoveries are made.

One involved a circa 1760 Philadelphia mahogany chest on chest with ornate carvings attributed to Nicholas Bernard on its pediment, finial and prospect drawer. First owned by Richard Stockton, the case piece was retailed in the Twentieth Century by dealers C.W. Lyon and Israel Sack, Inc, and in 1950 belonged to the collector Norvin H. Green. This round, it nearly doubled its high estimate to sell to Quakertown, Penn., conservator Alan Miller for $230,500. Closely related chests on chests are in the collections of Winterthur and George Parker of Janesville, Wis.

During preview, Alexandra Alevizatos Kirtley, the Montgomery-Garvan associate curator of American decorative arts at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, discovered the inscription "G. Claypoole" and what appeared to be a letter with the number 8 on the inside interior of the shell drawer, Erik Gronning reported.

"It thrilled us because now we know the maker of this piece and that of its near mate at Winterthur. We will probably see an article on the maker soon," the specialist added. Asheville, N.C., auctioneer Andrew Brunk published his research on cabinetmaker George Claypoole in his article, "The Claypoole Family of Joiners of Philadelphia: Their Legacy and the Context of their Work" in American Furniture 2002.

Yale curator Pat Kane's discovery of an inscription on the back of a drawer of a mahogany block and shelled carved chest of drawers propelled it beyond its $6/10,000 estimate. Now confirmed as an Eighteenth Century case piece, probably from Rhode Island, it went to an absentee bidder for $122,500.

Boston Silver

Great Eighteenth Century American silver is always scarce and church silver of the era is especially desirable. Dorchester, Mass.'s First Parish Church, founded in 1630, sold 18 lots of silver dating from 1678 to 1855 for $1,721,313. Leading the group was this chased and engraved pair of cups made by Boston silversmith Jeremiah Dummer in 1701. William Stoughton, a governor of Massachusetts and benefactor of Harvard's Stoughton Hall, bequeathed the cups to the church in 1701. Estimated at $100/200,000, the pair sold to former Sotheby's silver specialist Ian Irving for $1,082,500.

"The only source for these really early pieces are church collections. It's almost impossible to find them in private homes, so it is a very exciting thing that they should come on the market," Sotheby's silver consultant Kevin Tierney said of 18 lots of silver — including beakers, tankards, a pair of standing cups, a two-handled cup and a baptismal basin — consigned by First Parish Church in Dorchester, now a neighborhood of Boston.

The site of the first town meeting and the founder of the first public elementary school in the United States, First Parish Church dates to 1630. Dorchester's fortunes have waned since then. After concluding that the church's historic meetinghouse needed $5.2 million for restoration and expansion and wanting to expand its community mission, First Parish Church decided to sell its silver, unused for much of the past century. Featured in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts' pioneering 1911 church silver display, the Dorchester collection had been on loan to the MFA since 1938.

The centerpiece was a pair of magnificent standing cups embellished with gadrooning and engraved with the arms of Governor William Stoughton, who bequeathed the cups to the church in 1701. Made by Jeremiah Dummer, the vessels sold within estimate to former Sotheby's silver specialist Ian Irving of Ian Irving, Ltd, for $1,082,500.

"It was in completely different condition when we sold it. It was laid down on Masonite and had substantial in-painting and paint loss,” Russ Carlsen of Carlsen Gallery in Greenville, N.Y., told Antiques and The Arts Weekly. Carlsen Gallery cataloged this portrait as American School, selling it in the rough for $71,300, including premium, in November 2010. Sotheby's, which attributed the painting to Ammi Phillips, confirmed that the work was restored and relined: "The focus of the restoration, apart from the work in the neck and shoulders, is from right to left across the bottom, beginning in the dog and running to the right through the feet and pantaloons, and through the background beneath the figure to the lower right corner.” Restored, the painting fetched $806,500. "Our buyer rolled the dice and it paid off,” noted Carlsen.

Irving stepped up again to claim the following lot, a pair of Seventeenth Century beakers made by John Hull and Robert Sanderson Sr, for $459,500. Thomas and Alice Lake gave them to the church in 1679, not more than a year after they were made.

Other highlights included the Ebenezer Withington cup, made by William Cowell Sr of Boston around 1710 and sold to an absentee bidder for $62,500; the Deacon Hopestill Clap tankard, made by Jacob Hurd of Boston circa 1748, brought $43,750; and the Sarah Preston tankard, made by Paul Revere Sr of Boston around 1745, realized $34,375.

In all, the First Parish Church silver garnered $1,721,313. Eight lots were passed. Sotheby's dispersed silver from the Church of the Presidents in Quincy, Mass., and the First Church in Milford, Conn., in 2001 and 2005.

"We were absolutely thrilled about the results of this series of sales. We feel that the market is energized and that we are seeing new buyers out there. Other buyers are stepping up," said Leslie Keno.

All prices reported include the buyer's premium.

For additional information, www.sothebys.com or 212-606-7000.

As Sotheby's American Furniture specialist Leslie Keno took bids, his family cheered him on. In the front row, from left, were his father, Ron Keno; Leslie's wife Emily; his son Schuyler; and his brother Leigh. The youngest bidder in the room, Schuyler Keno purchased two hat boxes, $3,125, and two English transfer-printed creamware jugs commemorating George Washington, $3,125. Both lots were from the collection of Betty Ring. Leigh Keno underbid the signed John Townsend high chest that fetched $3,554,500.