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Photo: Courtesy Rhode Island Historical Society, Providence, 1931.4.1
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Side chair

Object number

RIF3372

Maker

Maker Unknown

Dimensions

38 1/2 × 20 1/2 × 14 1/4 in. (97.79 × 52.07 × 36.195 cm)

Date

1780–1800

Current location

The Rhode Island Historical Society

Geography

Made in Providence, Rhode Island
(view a map of Rhode Island)

Medium

Mahogany (primary); cherry (slip-seat frame)

Marks

None

Inscriptions

1931.4.1: “IIII,” incised on rabbet of front seat rail; "[top of label missing] / [?]ay Fowler Weeden 1818 / Susan Weeden Reynolds 1858 / [?],” written in ink on label glued to inside of front seat rail

Style

Chippendale

Provenance

Benjamin Weeden, Wickford, Rhode Island; by descent to Mrs. Peleg Weeden (née Mary Fowler, 1776–1858), Wickford and later Exeter, Rhode Island; by descent to her daughter Mrs. Alfred J. Reynolds (née Susan Weeden, 1807–1882), North Kingstown, Rhode Island; by descent in her family; sold to Elliott Flynt (1863–1949), Providence, Rhode Island, 1910; gift 1931 to Rhode Island Historical Society, Providence

Associated names

Benjamin Weeden
Elliott Flynt
Mary Fowler Weeden
Elliott Flynt
Susan Weeden Reynolds

Construction

The double-serpentine flat-fronted, chamfered-back crest centers a slightly inset arched mid-section above a small, arched-triangular void and ends in plain, upward-turning ears. The single-piece openwork splat is tenoned into the underside of the crest and into the top of the single-piece molded shoe, which is fixed with nails to, and flush with, the rear seat rail. Also tenoned (and wood-pinned) to the crest are the flat-fronted, rounded-back legs/stiles, which are square in section and rearward-raking below the seat. The rectangular rear and side stretchers are tenoned and wood-pinned to their respective legs, as are the seat rails, which have rounded tops. The medial stretcher meets the side stretchers in a half-dovetail joint. In each corner of the rabbeted seat frame is a block fixed with screw pockets. The front legs, trapezoidal in plan, are chamfered on their inside corner. The rails of the slip seat are tenoned to each other, without wood pins. Examined by P. E. Kane, June 26, 2014; notes compiled by T. B. Lloyd.

Bibliography

Ralph E. Carpenter, Jr., "Catalog of The Rhode Island Historical Society Furniture Collection," Rhode Island History 14, no. 4 (October 1955): 128–29, no. 4.
Eleanore Bradford Monahon, "Providence Cabinetmakers of the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries," Antiques 87, no. 5 (May 1965): 576, fig. 8 (illustrates RIF3372, but records the history for RIF5542), ill.