Dish, Serving

Description

Small white oval porcelain dish. The long sides of the dish follow the oval form, though slightly irregular. Along these sides are two thin black lines and a light-green stripe 4/16" wide in between them. The light-green line follows the form of the dish, but its outline is not perfectly straight. Underneath this border, along one side, there is light-green transfer-printed text, in all caps, which reads "SHAKERS MT. LEBANON N.Y.". The font of the text has a white outline to give the letters a three-dimensional quality. The short ends of the dish are cut away slightly and molded. On each side hand-painted black lines emphasizes the shape of the sides, outlining its form and extending into the bottom of the dish with three black floral branches. On the bottom of the interior of the dish are two floral decorations which consist of flowers, a brown branch and a dual-green stem with leaves. Underneath "SHAKERS" there is one floral decoration with three orange flowers. One flower has five heart-shaped petals around a yellow floral disc with a brown center, another has one heart-shaped petal with an oval petal on either side, and the smallest has one heart-shaped petal and one oval petal. The other floral design has four blue flowers, three of which are made up of two petals each, and a fourth larger seven-petal flower with a yellow floral disc.

Notes

On October 12, 1886 Benjamin Gates, Cornelia French, and Mary Hazard of the Church family traveled to New York City to order plates from Union Porcelain Works. On February 20, 1887 a note in Anna Dodgsons journal refers to new plates with "Shaker & c". These are the only dishes marked with a community name.