Chair, Side

Description

Early side chair with typical bulbous pommels and heavy turnings. Posts and slats (three) of maple and stretchers and seat rails of chestnut. Leather seat. Chair equipped with tilters. Originally painted dark red.

Notes

The heavier turnings, restrained backward tilt of the posts, and the bulbous finials suggest that this dark red side chair is characteristic of Shaker chairs from the 1800-1820 period. Leather seats are rarely found on surviving examples of Shaker chairs. Typically, chairs were seated with rush (flag), splint, cane, or the peculiar cloth seats made with listing or narrow woven worsted tape. Like many other Shaker side chairs, sockets in the bottom of the back posts are fitted with wooden balls. These were called tilter buttons and were put on chairs to reduce the marring of the floor that occurred when sitters, as was the custom of the day, tilted back against the wall to increase their comfort. The balls are flat on the bottom and secured to the chair leg with a rawhide strip that passes through the ball and out a hole drilled up and through the side of the leg.