Side Chair
Period1760 - 1790
MediumWalnut, with hard pine slip seat frame
Dimensions37.75 × 16.75 × 17 in. (95.9 × 42.5 × 43.2 cm)
MarkingsStamped "I" on the inside upper edge of the front seat rail. Also stamped "IIII" on the underside of the front piece of the slip seat frame.
ClassificationsSeating Furniture
Credit LineGiven in memory of Caroline Gallup Reed by her Four Grandchildren, 1931
Object number24
DescriptionOne of a pair. The slightly concave crest rail terminates in spiral-carved ears. Its underside is shaped with cyma curves that lead into the top of the splat, which is pierced with four vertical openings and which flares outward at the top. The splat is set into a concave molded shoe. The front and side seat rails have a thumbnail molding on their upper edge. The side rails are through tenoned into the rear stiles. The cabriole legs end in trifid feet. The back legs, which are chamfered, rake backward. Remnants of woven black horsehair survive around early tacks in the slip seat frame. The second chair of the pair was assigned accession number 25.Curatorial RemarksThe chamfered rear legs, use of through tenons, and the shape of the feet suggest an origin in the Philadelphia region. Each of the two chairs retain some of the original corner blocks - atypically made of walnut, not a cheaper secondary wood. Early tacks in the seat frame, since covered by three layers of upholstery, retain bits of woven black horsehair, probably the original cover material.NotesGiven to the Association on 12 October 1931, eight days before its new museum and library building in Freehold opened to the public. The donors were Sylvia Caroline Parsons Weld, Latham Ralston Reed, William Barclay Parsons, and Eunice Elizabeth Reed, grandchildren of Association founder Caroline Gallup Reed (1821 - 1914). The two chairs were intended for use by library patrons. Three similar chairs appeared in Sotheby’s Important American Furniture: The Contents of Langdon, Sale 5295, February 2, 1985, lots 1130 and 1131. They varied only in the legs and feet. Two of them ended in claw and ball feet, and the third had straight Marlborough legs with stretchers. Sotheby's attributed the three chairs to Reading, Pennsylvania.
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