Pictured here we have an exceptionally rare and original, 1820′s large size, Hand Sewn 24 Star American Flag.

The Flag came to us without information on its origin,  but we know that the 24 Star Flag was in use from July 4th, 1822 (after Missouri joined the Union) until July 4th, 1836 (when Arkansas became the 25th state). Although this was a rather long period, 24 Star Flags are among the very rarest and most sought after by collectors.

The outstanding research website “Rare Flags” by Anthony Iasso has this to say about the 24 Star Flag:

“Period flags in this star count are extremely rare. Although the period for 24 stars lasted for a relatively long time, flags in this star count are extremely rare, since militarily the nation was at peace and flag making for home use was uncommon. Some flags were made during this period to welcome Lafayette on his visit to the United States in 1824, but of the few flags that are believed to be from this period, possibly to celebrate that event, most feature 13 stars”.

He also states:

“Flags that pre-date the American Civil War are very rare. Those in certain star counts, such as this flag of 24 stars, are almost non-existent… Both 24 and 25 star flags are exceedingly rare, with just a small handful known to survive. Although among collectors smaller flags are generally more sought after, I’m personally very attached to these majestic large ship’s flags from the early-to-mid 19th century. Flags of this period were almost never made for personal use. The few survivors of the period were typically made for maritime or Navy use. They show the age and character of that time in American history where our sailing ships traveled the world, building up our nation’s trade and influence. These large flags were grand signals of our national presence, and they were often the first recognizably American symbol that people in foreign ports, unfamiliar with America itself, came to recognize as the symbol of our nation.”

Click Here to view one of the few surviving 24 Star Flags which is amazingly similar to the example offered here!!

This particular 24 star Hand Made American Flag measures approx. 140″ by 85″ and is made of strips of red and white wool bunting type material with a blue canton with inserted white cotton stars. Every bit of the extensive stitching on this beautiful and historically important Flag is hand sewn including all of the repairs and patches.

This Flag was not a factory production piece but a very large Flag made for a particular purpose likely as a Ship’s Flag. Although this Flag was official from 1822 to 1836, it was a period of peace and, since American Flags were not made for “home” use at the time, very few flags with this star count were made. We are told that 24 Star Flags are “almost non-existent” and only a small handful are known to have survived.

There no grommets on the hoist of the Flag but rather there is an original, braided rope cord sewn into the hoist with loops in the end of the cord for mounting the Flag on a pole or mast. There are 2 holes in the hoist – one near the top and one near the bottom. The borders of these holes have been hand sewn to create a reinforced “cloth grommet” There is a period, manuscript inscription in iron gall ink on the hoist that reads “4 yds” – indicating that the Flag is 4 yards long. The canton measures approx. 74″ by 47″. The 24 stars are arranged in four rows with 6 stars in each row.

This is an exceptionally rare and historically important, 1820′s large size, Hand Sewn 24 Star American Flag and worthy of a place at the very center of even the most advanced Museum quality Collection! We are thrilled to have been able to have it if only for a brief time!!

ORIGINAL 1820′s HAND SEWN 24 STAR AMERICAN FLAG – EXCEPTIONALLY RARE SHIP’S FLAG

For more information, please see our eBay listings.

We are pleased to be able to offer here our first ever Guest blogger!! We hope that you enjoy her blog post!!

Blog Post by Virginia Caputo
 -Our Big Fat Life in Antiques

Many of us who are antiques dealers love the history that is connected to the objects that we find as much as we love the excitement of the treasure hunt. Many interesting antiques are not acquired with their histories attached unless it was bought from the original family. Even then the history is often lost or misremembered. Thus it becomes our task to find the history and reconnect it with the object.

In 2013 we acquired an elegant sterling silver baseball trophy which had no information as to its history other than what was engraved on its sides. The trophy is engraved on one side with the following: “Baseball Trophy Presented by the Executive Committee of the Boston Wool Trade Association”. On the other side is engraved, “August 28, 1912 Boston 1 Philadelphia 2 Sept, 19. 1913 Philadelphia 19 Boston 2 Sept. 15 1916 Boston 17 Philadelphia 3″. Under the base it is marked Sterling with the eagle hallmark of the Meriden Brittania Company of Meriden, Connecticut. It is also marked “862″ “5 1/2 Pts” “11 1/2 IN”.

We had a lot of questions about the trophy that we set out to answer. These days with the ability to research expanded greatly by the wealth of information that is on the internet, we were able to learn the full story of the trophy: who made it, for whom it was made, and something about what it was like in America at the time it was made. After some time spent researching it on the internet, I discovered quite a lot about it. Often there was only one document that provided a piece of information but after finding several articles from early twentieth century publications, I put together, piece by piece, quite a bit of history of the trophy.

History

The trophy was presented to the winning team of games that were played between the Boston Wool Trade Association team and the Philadelphia Wool and Textile Association team in 1912, 1913, and 1916.

The Boston Wool Trade Association was formed in November 1911. At their first annual outing in Boston in August 1912 members of the Philadelphia Wool and Textile Association were guests of the Boston association. Golf, tennis and a baseball game were on the schedule of activities.

The baseball game was played between the Boston Wool Trade baseball team and the Philadelphia Wool and Textile Association baseball team. This silver trophy was presented to the winning team by the Boston Wool Trade Association. It was donated by Charles J. Webb of Philadelphia. Mr. Webb was one of the organizers of the Philadelphia Wool and Textile Association and held the office of treasurer for that group. The Philadelphia team won the game. The score was 2 to 1.

The second outing was held in Philadelphia on September 19, 1913 where the Philadelphia Wool and Textile Association played host to one hundred and seventy five members of the Boston Wool Trade Association. The two associations alternated where the outing was held between Boston and Philadelphia. A program of activities that included golf, tennis and baseball as well as field sports such as relay races were on the program for each outing as well as a dinner and speeches.

The baseball game was held at the Stenson Avenue Athletic Club where 500 people came to watch the game. Philadelphia won again with a score of 19 to 2 according to the information on the trophy (which varies from the 19 to 1 score as reported in the September 27, 1913 publication “Fibre and Fabric”). The following excerpt is from that article about the event:

“Charles J. Webb was called upon to say a few words in acceptance of the baseball cup for the Philadelphia Association since it was Mr. Webb who donated it. He stated that under the terms of the gift Philadelphia was entitled to hold the cup, having won it twice in succession, but that instead it would be donated to a permanent contest between the two associations. In connection with the afternoon’s game, Mr. Webb stated that hereafter no applicant for a position in a Boston wool house would be asked if he could sell wool, but rather, could he play baseball.”

That amusing observation was apparently due to the rather large margin by which Philadelphia had won the game.

The textile groups’ 1916 outing was in Boston on Friday, September 15, 1916. Six hundred were in attendance which was considerably more than the 470 who were expected to attend. One hundred and twenty five to one hundred and fifty were members of the Philadelphia association who were guests of the Boston association. The outing was held at the Tedesco Country Club, Phillips Beach, Massachusetts with dinner at the Copley Plaza Hotel. There were 550 reservations made for dinner.

The baseball game was at 2 PM. From an article about the outing in the Sept. 23, 1916 issue of Textile World Journal:

“Few of those who witnessed the ball game were aware that the natty appearance of the Boston team was due to the new suits provided by Chairman Frank W. Hallowell of the Base Ball Committee at his personal expense. Mr. Hallowell is an old Harvard ball player and maintains an active interest in the national sport.”

The Boston team won with a score of 17 to 3.

We noticed the absence of the years 1914 and 1915 from the trophy which seemed unusual as it was an annual outing. We did further research and learned that the Executive Committee of the Boston Wool Trade Association canceled the 1914 outing “owing to the terrible conditions now prevailing in Europe and which are liable to grow more serious in the near future.” They stated: “… our local trade as well as our Philadelphia guests could not feel fully justified in attending a day’s festivities with the world’s greatest conflict being enacted almost before their eyes.” The outing must have been canceled again in 1915, probably for the same reason. In the lengthy description of the 1916 outing found in the September 23, 1916 issue of the publication “Textile World” the 1913 outing was mentioned several times but there was no mention at all of a 1915 outing. Nor was there mention of the war in Europe.

In looking for further references to the groups’ outings after 1916, the next one that I could find was in 1920 when the format of the baseball games played was changed to a series of five games, two of which were played in Arlington, Massachusetts at Spy Pond on September 11 and three in Philadelphia at Fleisher’s Field on September 17, 18 and 19. As no dates beyond 1916 were engraved on the trophy, we have concluded that the entry of the U.S. into the war in the spring of 1917 resulted in the groups canceling their annual meetings again and that the meetings were resumed after the war was over.
In 1922 the tenth annual banquet of the Boston Wool Trade Association was held on March 2 at the Copley Plaza in Boston and was attended by 900 members and guests. They had a banquet. speeches, men in ballet outfits jumping out of fake bales of wool, piano playing, making witty repartee, and lampooning prominent members of the wool trade in a mock trial. No sports were on the program. At the banquet they provided a memento in the form of a booklet stamped in gold “1912-1922” which contained the banquet menu, list of association officers, guests, and members and a facsimile of a 1894 letter about the idea for the association.

From the scheduling of the 1922 meeting it is clear that they had decided to hold their meetings in the spring rather than in late summer. And that they no longer included golf, tennis and baseball in the program, sports which would have been impractical to play in March in Boston when snow could still be covering the ground. Thus there would have been no more need to use a baseball trophy as an award.

Due to the trophy having been part of an event where business and events of the time were discussed and then later reported on, our research on the history of the trophy and the textile associations brought up articles that described the political climate of the time, the working conditions of textile workers, the role of unions, the change in hours of the work week, the impact of war, and the concerns of those in the textile industry regarding the environment, politics, business, and law. Some of what concerned them then, particularly issues about the environment, were the same things that concern us now. Other matters, like the reduction in the maximum hours to be worked in a week to forty-eight, were a reminder that there was a time when working conditions in this country were far tougher than they are now and that people took it for granted so much that there was controversy when changes in the law were proposed.

To see more posts  by Virginia Caputo at Our Big Fat Life in Antiques visit: http://ginnymaxwell.tumblr.com/

 1864 Civil War Soldier’s Letter written on an Illustrated Broadside Song Sheet

I have been working with the Walnutts team now for… Well lets face it, my whole life. As the daughter of the Walnutts Antiques founders, I grew up sitting around the Antique shop, traipsing around flea markets and snoozing through auctions while my parents hunted for good finds. As I grew older I eventually became more involved in the business, and began slowly but surely learning more about the antiques that I had been surrounded by for as long as I can remember.

For years I have heard (and in turn repeated) that one of Walnutts specialty’s was “Ephemera“. I threw the word around feigning confidence, but if ever asked what exactly it meant, my reaction tended to be something like “Ummm… Like paper stuff…”. Well about a week ago I was reading a book, and came across the exact question that I had been too embarrassed to ask. “What is ephemera, exactly?” The answer was so perfect, that I decided that I had to share it, and finally confess my ignorance, and embrace my new knowledge.

 ”What is ephemera, exactly?” 

“Ephemera refers to the kind of materials intended to be short-lived or discarded, such as brochures, catalogs, menus, billheads, mining certificates, theater programs, bylaws, political flyers, travel guides, wine labels… and sometimes letters. Precisely because they weren’t created to last, they sometimes contain information that is not otherwise documented.”

(As written in book by Juliette Blackwell)

Wow… it seems so clear now! I can’t believe that after all this time I have finally come across such a concise and easy to understand definition for something that I have always been a bit ashamed to admit that I didn’t already know! But you learn new things all the time, and I am thrilled to have this piece of knowledge now in my toolbox! I hope that I may have cleared some questions up for some as you as well!!

Some other examples of Ephemera:

1876 “Buffalo Bill”  and “Texas Jack”  related Printed Silk Souvenir Broadside Playbill

1864 Civil War Soldier’s Letter

original 1860’s Civil War Patriotic Envelopes

1904 Illustrated and Priced Catalog of Kodak Cameras and Photography Supplies

1905 Real Photo Postcard written and addressed to William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody

1904 large format Card Mount Photograph of Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Cowboy Performers including William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody himself taken while the Show was performing in Scotland.

The photos pictured here were a part of a collection which was the personal property of Buffalo Bill Cody and his family, and which descended directly in the Cody family to his great-granddaughter Patricia Ann “Patsy” Garlow – granddaughter of Cody’s daughter Irma.

ca1894 Cabinet Card Photograph of the daughter of William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody – Irma Cody taken in the studio Brooklyn photographer Stacy.

Provenance: These fantastic Photographs descended directly in the family of Irma Louise Cody Garlow, Buffalo Bill Cody’s last surviving child. Buffalo Bill and his wife Louisa Frederici Cody (1843-1921) had four children but only their two daughters – Arta (1866-1904) and the baby Irma (1883-1918) lived to adulthood. Irma married Frederick Harrison Garlow Sr. (1880-1918) and had 3 children – Frederick Harrison Garlow Jr. (1911-1985); William Joseph Garlow (changed name to Cody) (1913-1992) and Jane Cody Garlow (1909-1987). When Irma and Fred Garlow Sr. died within three days of each other during the influenza pandemic of 1918, the three young children were cared for by their Grandmother Louisa, wife of Buffalo Bill Cody. Fred Garlow Jr. married Margaret Southerland and they had two children Patricia Ann (b.1948) and Mark Frederick (b. 1952). The Photographs that we acquired were the property of Patricia Ann “Patsy” Garlow, Buffalo Bill’s direct great-granddaughter. It was among the property of the Cody-Garlow family and was originally the property of William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody and his wife.

1894 large format Card Mount Photograph of William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody and his wife Louisa Federici Cody taken by Brooklyn photographer Stacy.

Many of these Photographs spent most of the last half of the 20th century on loan to the Buffalo Bill Historical Center of the West and bear BBHC index numbers on the versos. We were also told that any of the items with tack holes were displayed on the walls of one of Cody’s homes including the TE Ranch, the Bobcat Ranch (usually Irma’s home), the Pahaska Tepee and his residence in North Platte – Scout’s Rest Ranch.

ca1910 Real Photo Postcard / Photograph of the Yellowstone Hunting Lodge of William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody known as the “Pahaska Tepee” in winter.

The photographs included in this collection varied greatly, from some likely one of a kind Photographs taken with a snapshot camera and printed out as Real Photo Postcards, photos which were likely given as a mementos to Cody by the photographers,  a number of personal photographs taken by Stacy in the photographer’s studio and at Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show grounds during the 1894 Season (during which the Show performed at Ambrose Park in Brooklyn, New York for the entire summer), etc.

ca1910 Real Photo Postcard / Photograph of William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody with his close friend Native American Lakota Chief Iron Tail and a man believed to be Captain Jack Crawford on the show grounds of Buffalo Bill’s Wild West.

One postcard pictures the “fairgrounds” at Bourg, France with a herd of livestock grazing on the small plot. The Postcard is addressed to “Col. Cody Buffalo Bill” at Reims. The message and the Postmark are dated July 10, 1905 and the message appears to have been written by an Advance Man for Buffalo Bill’s Wild West named Dean.  Apparently “Dean” was scouting possible locations where Buffalo Bill’s Wild West might be able to appear during the European tour that was taking place in 1905. It seems that the fairgrounds at Bourg was too small to accommodate the show and “Dean” was reporting this directly to Buffalo Bill.

1905 Postcard written and addressed to William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody from an advance man of Buffalo Bill’s Wild West in Europe regarding a possible location for the Show to perform in Bourg, France. This Postcard was sent to Cody while the Show was performing at Reims.

We feel truly lucky to have been able to hold some of this history in our hands, and hope that you have enjoyed reading about it – and perhaps buying one of the items for yourself! We will be offering selected items from this collection over the next few week as part of our weekly eBay auctions.

For more information, please see our eBay listings.

If you were holding this, you’d be holding the world in your hands. Or, the Western Hemisphere, at least, as interpreted in the mid-1600′s. It is an original, 1646 / 1662, “Miniature Speed” Map of the Western Hemisphere depicting North and South America. California, as you can see, is depicted as an island. The piece was engraved by Pieter van den Keere (also Petrus Kaerius). It is fully titled with a cartouche reading, “America / Petrus Kaerius / Anno Do 1646.” A pencil notation on the reverse identifies the map as being from the 1662 edition of Speed’s Pocket Atlas and engraved by Pieter van den Keere.

The reverse features text title “The Description of America.” The map shows the continents in full as known at the time and is taken directly from Speed’s important and influential 1627 map of the same name which, for its depiction of California as an island, has solidified its place in history. The original, 1627 rendering of this map is particularly famous, for it was the first atlas map upon which this misconception appeared and Speed’s depiction of the island of California was thus a major contributing factor in the longevity of this notorious myth. The inclusion of this map in Speed’s Pocket Edition did even more to disseminate the long held misconception.

John Speed (1552-1629) was one of the most famous British mapmakers of the seventeenth century, and indeed perhaps the most popular of all with map collectors around the world. Historically, he is noted for placing England into the mainstream of map publishing, which had been dominated by the Dutch since the late sixteenth century. Speed began by issuing maps of Great Britain as early as 1611 in his famous Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine. That publication contained maps of the entire British Isles, their kingdoms, and the counties of those kingdoms. Beginning in 1627, this was then accompanied by A Prospect of the Most Famous Parts of the World with maps of the world, its regions and its countries. Although Speed used many Dutch geographers and engravers, such as Jodocus Hondius and Abraham Goos, in his works and he copied many Dutch maps, his work is important in establishing a thriving British cartographic industry.

Pieter van den Keere, or Petrus Kaerius, was the engraver responsible for the maps which are now referred to as the “Miniature Speed’s” (including the Map of the Western Hemisphere offered here). Having fled the Low Countries as a refugee because of religious persecution, he arrived in London in 1584, and began his career as an engraver and cartographer. This was made all the easier as a result of his sister Colletta’s marriage to another refugee from the Low Countries who had recently arrived in London. His name was Jodocus Hondius – an already well-established engraver of maps. In the course of a long working life, Keere engraved a large number of individual maps for prominent cartographers of the day, but he also produced an Atlas of the Netherlands (1617-22) and county maps of the British Isles, as well as other countries of the World which have become known as “Miniature Speeds.”

Highly collectable for a long time now, these tiny maps got their name when John Speed’s publisher, George Humble, issued a pocket edition of Speed’s Atlas in 1627, using plates Keere had engraved almost 20 years previously. He had used various sources for his plates, Saxton and Ortelius for the English and Scottish plates, and the famous map by Baptista Boazio for the Irish offerings. For his small pocket atlas, George Humble used the descriptive text of the large Speed maps (part of which is found on the reverse of the map offered here), and reduced in size a couple of these larger Speeds. However, the 40 or so of the van den Keere plates were the mainstay of the publication. The publication was a success and proved very popular, going through numerous re-issues right up until 1676. The name “Miniature Speed” for these maps was one that caught the imagination, and they are now almost universally referred to by that name.

If you’d like to learn more about this piece, further details can be found at our eBay listing.