Pitcher

Charles Cartlidge and Company

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The mid-nineteenth century porcelain manufactory of Charles Cartlidge and Company in Greenpoint, Brooklyn produced a variety of slip-cast wares for the middle class market. The firm offered a wide array of forms which included tablewares and pitchers, along with mundane, everyday objects (inkstands, paper weights, spittoons, etc.) to highly specialized items. Among the company’s favorite designs are the relief-molded pitchers of either corn and cornstalks or oak leaves and acorns. The most significant Cartlidge pitchers are those with shields and inscribed with names, often made for tradesmen or saloon keepers. Inscribed "CAPT. C. A. WOOLSEY" in the shield, this presentation pitcher was made for Captain Charles Augustus Woolsey (1809–1877), Superintendent of the ferries of the Pennsylvania Railway Company, and perhaps given to him to mark a milestone in his career or to celebrate some other achievement. This example appears to be unique with its applied handle in the form of an anchor, fully in relief and highly sculptural. This pitcher may have been a special commission for Woolsey and the anchor a symbolic nod to his business in the shipping industry.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art