An American Federal mahogany gaming table of the highest ranking and condition from Coastal Massachusetts, most likely Salem, circa 1795-1815. This superior card table ranks among the best of regional variants found on such pieces of the Federal Era (1785-1820) in New England. It is interesting to note here that card playing, or gambling was extremely popular among upper-classes in both England and America in the 18th and early 19th Centuries; games such as loo, faro, quadrille and others provided entertainment for leisure hours of the well-to-do. Card tables were most often made in pairs; however, very few have been known to survive in this fashion.

The business of cabinetmaking in Federal America was two-sided; it was certainly a means by which cabinetmakers could make a living by practicing their artistry (one unfortunately all but lost today), but it was also a heavily regulated business. Price books, which were printed lists of prices for the making of furniture, were issued both in England and America, and protected both cabinetmakers and their consumers from irregular charges for work performed. They were as essential to a cabinetmaker's shop as his materials and tools. "The prices in these books provided the basis of employer-employee contracts much like union contracts with steel and motor car industries today." (Montgomery, p. 19). These books listed both the prices for basic forms of furniture, as well as for extraordinary pieces meant to fill the needs of a newly created upper-class who were eager to embrace the latest fashions in the New Republic. Some examples of these “extras” might include elaborate fitted "drawers" or "making (a) serpentine front" or even "tapering (the) legs". Subsequently, furniture made in the era was made to accommodate the taste, and affluence, of the client who placed the order. Therefore, the more flamboyant and fashionable the piece, the more expensive it was to produce and purchase. The table presented here contains several of those "extras", and is undoubtedly the product of a sophisticated cabinetshop located in a highly urban environment, the most likely candidate being Salem, Massachussetts.

Condition and construction: This graceful Massachusetts example is comprised of dense tropical “plum pudding” mahogany. The top features an elliptical front and ovolo sides, a feature that repeats itself on the veneered skirt. The sides of the the table’s top is accentuated with a series of vertically carved reeding. The skirt is faced with mahogany veneers a features; a central raised relief carved with an acorn motif*. The two front legs feature three-quarter colenettes. All legs are turned and reeded with great delicacy**. The upper part of the proper right leg contains a repaired stress crack. The table’s proper left top contains a small patch. All four legs ends in the original brass ferule feet, a French 18th century innovation. Surprisingly, the tables appear to retain a large amount of an old, possibly original, surface, which has been conserved with several applications of microcrystaline paste wax.

Attribution: The present table shown here falls into a large grouping of furniture produced in a number of urban areas along the coast of Massachussetts. Among these are predominantly Boston and Salem, and to a lesser extent, smaller towns such as Newburyport. Much of this furniture shares similar design details including bulbous reeded legs, turreted corners, various and elaborate inlays, and carved relief work. The table shown here is the product of a highly sophisticated cabinet-shop, employing skilled journeymen familiar with the most successful designs available in the American Federal period (1785-1820). The table’s basic architectural design is derived from English designer Thomas Sheraton’s “Appendix to the Cabinet-maker and Upholsterer’s Drawing-Book” 1793, suggesting this table’s maker had a copy of that publication, or at the very least, a familiarity with that style. One of the most celebrated, accomplished, and well-documented workshops of the era was that of Samuel F. McIntire. A master cabinetmaker and carver, McIntire was patronized by many of the most elite families in the area, including the Derby family of Salem. Many of McIntire’s workshop products feature elaborate “tour de force” details of the Federal vocabulary, including star punched backgrounds, eagles, basket of flower motifs, as well as other natural carved details, and turreted corners, particularly on card, work tables, and chests. While such details were popular amongst Coastal Massachusetts workshops, particularly in Boston***, perhaps the most distinctive innovation of the McIntire workshop was the use of carved relief work, usually centrally placed on an object, such as seen on the present card table, with star punched backdrops. Therefore, an association, directly and indirectly, can be made between the maker of the table shown here, and the McIntire cabinetshop. It is possible that it could have been made by McIntire, however, it is more likely the product of a workshop in the nearby environs that was familiar with the McIntire school, and competitively, worked in a style paralleling his. Lastly, it is possibly the product of a nearby workshop that contracted out Samuel McIntire’s skills to perform relief work on their product, a practice that has been documented in a number of instances****.

Marks/inscriptions: The table is branded on the underside of the top “ I*M*S”. While it is tempting to assume that this might be the brand of the table’s maker, an exhaustive study of cabinetmaker’s brands in New England proved fruitless for a match. Therefore, either the mark is that of a heretofore-unknown cabinet-shop, or, more likely, the initials are that of the original owner. Branding furniture with the owner’s initials was common in the Federal era for proof of ownership as house fires were a common occurrence and furniture was often rushed out into the street of houses that might be in the fire’s eventual path. There are also numerals of the underside in chalk (illegible), and the “stay rail” retains the remnants of an old jelly label.

Materials: Mahogany, mahogany veneers, white pine, chestnut, and brass.

Dimensions: Height overall 29”, Depth overall 18”, Width overall, 38”

CA.10.00.124

Reference: Barquist 1992, American Tables and Looking Glasses, Yale University Press.

Christies, “The Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Eddy Nicholson”, 27th

January 1995, New York City, Sale #8082.

Hewitt”s Database of American Cabinetmakers, 2000.

Montgomery 1966, American Furniture: The Federal Period, New York, Viking press.

Swann, “Samuel McIntire and the Sandersons”, The Essex Institute Historical Collections, Salem, 1934, p. 16.

*Acorns, as well as oaks leaves, have long been associated, particularly in the 18th and 19th centuries, with strength and honor.

**The reeded design of the legs of this table have their origin in the Classical designs of the Greco-Roman period, when it was popular to incorporate a bundle of arrows tied together (as a motif), into architecture as well as furnishing. The reeded legs parallel the bundle of arrows.

***The Seymour family of cabinetmakers in Boston is the best example of the transmission of these styles on the Massachusetts Coast.

****Documentation exists between the Elijah and Jacob Sanderson workshop of Salem (active approximately 1780-1810) and the McIntire workshop. The Sanderson’s were billed twice, once in 1802, and once in 1803, for “carving [a] Sofa and working [the] top rail”.