Rhode Island Furniture Archive - Yale University Art Gallery

Photo: Courtesy Winterthur Museum and Country Estate, Del., 1952.241.1-.6 Click the image to enlarge	Side chairs, set of six
	Object number RIF2702
	Maker Maker Unknown
	Dimensions 38 � 22 1/8 � 20 in. (96.52 � 56.2 � 50.8 cm)
	Date 1755–80
	Current location Winterthur Museum, Garden, and Library
	Geography Made in Newport, Rhode Island (view a map of Rhode Island)
	Medium American black walnut (primary); soft maple (seat frame)
	Inscriptions "I," incised on front seat rail and underside of slip seat (1952.241.2)
	Provenance Harry Arons (1891–1967), Ansonia, Connecticut; sold to Henry Francis du Pont (1880–1969), Winterthur, Delaware, 1952; given to Winterthur Museum, Garden, and Library, Delaware, 1952
	Associated names Henry Francis du Pont Harry Arons
	Construction The crest is supported on rectangular tenons at the post tops (pinned) and splat. The face is blocked slightly at the posts; the rear surface is chamfered across the top and at the arches and tips. The splat is slightly canted at the edges, front to back, and tenoned into the plinth. The backs of the piercings are finished with chamfers, except at the rounded tops, which are channeled. The plinth is hollow on the front and side faces, finished with a top bead, and nailed to the back rail. The rear post corners are chamfered from crest to seat. The seat rails are joined to the posts and front leg extensions with rectangular tenons (pinned). The rear legs are chamfered on all corners between the seat and rear stretcher, and the chamfer tips are marked, top and bottom, by prominent scribe lines on the forward and inside post faces. The rear feet are canted on the forward faces. The knee brackets of the front legs are secured with nails. The side stretchers are joined to the legs in vertical rectangular tenons (pinned); the medial and rear stretchers are round tenoned into the adjacent members. Source: Nancy E. Richards and Nancy Goyne Evans, New England Furniture at Winterthur, (Winterthur, Del.: Winterthur Publications, 1997), 63-64.
	Bibliography Joseph Downs, American Furniture: Queen Anne and Chippendale Periods in the Henry Francis DuPont Winterthur Museum (New York: MacMillan Company, 1952), no. 104, ill. John T. Kirk, American Chairs: Queen Anne and Chippendale (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1972), 138, fig. 178. Nancy E. Richards and Nancy Goyne Evans, New England Furniture at Winterthur: Queen Anne and Chippendale Periods (Winterthur, Del.: Winterthur Publications, 1997), 62–64, no. 35 (left), ill. Patricia E. Kane et al., Art and Industry in Early America: Rhode Island Furniture, 1650–1830, exh. cat. (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Art Gallery, 2016), 268n4. Oscar P. Fitzgerald, American Furniture: 1650 to the Present (Lanham, Md.: The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc., 2018), 66, 68, fig. 4.14.