Hi Ho Silver!

Its been quite an adventure going through all the historic objects in the house - cataloging, cleaning, identifying (what we can), and taking photographs.

One of the more prolific collections we have is the spoons.  Many are sterling silver, some silver plated, some others a combination of metals.  There are spoons from most of the 50 states, a multitude of other countries, some engraved with first names, or decorated with symbols from famous works of art.

We recently had a guest who offered her insight into the polishing, storage, and identification of our silver.  

Some basics we learned are:
1. Sterling silver should be marked with the number 925 (or .925).
2. The United States has a reputation for not marking it's sterling silver, making it harder to identify.
3. Many countries such as England, Scotland, and Ireland have done a very good job marking and documenting silver in the past and there are some great book resources available to help with that.
4. Once silver is cleaned up and polished, it should be wrapped in silver cloth, kept away from the elements, and polished once or twice a year.

Jackson's Hallmarks

As we sift through these symbols of our past, it can get overwhelming. Luckily, over the course of the last hundred or so years, we have become more aware of the value of our cultural past and have taken time and care to document and preserve what is important.  Hence the value of a book with Maker's Marks (or Hallmarks) for Silver such as this one.

Now, on to the fun part!

 Here lies a spoon between the pages of the book mentioned above.

 When you look at the maker's mark under good light and magnification, what do you see?  Two distinct set of stamps.  Let's start by identifying the ones on the right.

 To put it in perspective, we'll zoom out and look at a few different charts with similar stamps, all three of which would put the origin of the spoon in Birmingham, England.  The stamp includes an anchor, a lion, and a cursive letter, but the shape of the shields is how we make a final identification.

It may be hard to see, but the "squares" around the shapes are flat with rounded edges on top and indented on the bottom.

 Looks like we have a match! Our spoon was manufactured in 1927-28.  Pretty neat, huh?

 Now, there is a second stamp to decipher as well.

Here's the front of the spoon nestled between two more pages of potential matches for a Maker's Mark.

We found it! 

Our spoon was manufactured by Elkington & Co. Ltd., in Birmingham, England sometime between 1927 and 1928.

I hope you found this little adventure as fun as I did when I was first learning about it.  Now I have an urge to go watch Indiana Jones or Lara Croft Tomb Raider... 

As always, thanks for stopping by!

A Cabinet of Curiosities

According to Wikipedia, "The term cabinet originally described a room rather than a piece of furniture." and "Cabinets of curiosities...were encyclopedic collections of objects whose categorical boundaries were...yet to be defined."  This led to the modern day use of "curio cabinet", which is generally a wooden cabinet with glass doors to protect and display special objects in the household.

The women in my family, from my Great-Grandmother to my mother, used them to store the sets of "good dishes", teacups with plates, and the occasional collectible figure.

The Covina Heritage house has amassed quite the collection of cabinets and curiosities over the years. These are a few of the ones we've cleaned and cataloged.

These are fun to clean because there are so many pretty designs to look at. There are even the occasional mysteries.  There are certain types of objects that have fallen out of use in the modern age but show up in cabinets like these.  Luckily, we have a conservation expert on hand to help us figure out what some of these things were used for!

I hope you enjoyed theses photos. I know, I always enjoy looking at the "stuff" inside the Covina Heritage House while volunteering.

Now that I've got curiosities and tea cups on the brain, I will leave you with the following quote from Alice in Wonderland:

"Mad Hatter: Would you like a little more tea?

Alice: Well, I haven't had any yet, so I can't very well take more.

March Hare: Ah, you mean you can't very well take less.

Mad Hatter: Yes. You can always take more than nothing."

- Thanks for stopping by!

The Kitchen, a Sneak Peak

Hello, and welcome to the first post!

This is long overdue, so here are some photos to warm you up.  I start with the kitchen because it is one of my favorite places in any home.

This week, the crew did some dusting and light cleaning throughout the house, with an emphasis on the kitchen.

As you can see, there are a lot of neat collectible items on display: jars, aprons,tea kettles, baskets, utensils, and four different Morton's salt containers.

A wall of gadgets! Can you guess what each of them was used for?

Such a lovely spice jar collection.  Of course these, along with most other food containers in the collection, are now empty.

Suddenly, I am hungry for a pumpkin pie...and salad.

And just look at these appliances!

There is a lot more to come! I just wanted to get started. Hope you enjoyed this sneak peak and please check back soon.

Cheers!