Stove, Wood Heating

Description

Wood burning stove (a) with super-heater of cast iron. The stove door latch bar has a between-centers turned ebonized wood handle and a draft slot. The stove bottom extends out from the fire box to for a circular hearth apron. It is supported by arched legs - two in front and one in rear. Length of stove pipe (b). Mitered elbow (c).

Notes

On their stoves the Shakers frequently added an upper chamber, called a "superheater." Wood was burned in the lower chamber. Hot air leaving the bottom chamber was pulled through the upper chamber by the stove pipe that was placed at the opposite end of the chamber. Separated by approximately 3" from the lower chamber, the additional chamber greatly increased the hot surface area of the stove. Much like a radiator, the two-chambered stove could heat air circulating around it and between the chambers more quickly than a similarly sized parlor stove. While they produced more heat, superheater stoves did not require any more wood than stoves with only one chamber.

The sides and top of both chambers were cast in continuous pieces, shaped like an open box. The box-shaped pieces were turned upside down and attached to the chamber bottoms. The sides of the upper chamber extend below the bottom, and the lower chamber sides fit inside raised rims of the bottom pan. The door used for loading wood has a smaller door which was used to control the draft.

The Shakers at Pleasant Hill, Kentucky, where this stove was used, sent carved wooden patterns of their stoves to commercial foundries to be cast. One characteristic that differentiates Shaker stoves from other heating stoves is their lack of surface decoration. 19th-century American parlor stoves were often elaborately decorated in a variety of motifs (gothic, Egyptian, Greek, Renaissance-revival, Italianate, etc.), and the sheer variety of stoves available was enormous. This was a derivation of the ability of iron to be cast into any form, and therefore provide an easy and relatively inexpensive means to decorate an interior with the latest architectural designs. With their unadorned surfaces and sharply-defined geometric forms, Shaker stoves stand in sharp contrast to their worldly counterparts. This Shaker stove is not, however, without ornamentation.The decorative curves of the wrought front legs and the round hearth apron soften the straight lines and un-embellished surfaces of the stoves body.