Slifer Wall Drawing

Posted by PA Heritage Staff on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Slifer Wall Drawing The old adage, “Kids will be kids,” once again rings true with the recent discovery of a fragile work of art most likely executed by a child of Eli Slifer (1818-1888) and Catharine Motter Frick Slifer (1814-1886), at their stately residence in Lewisburg, Union Coun­ty, about 1870. Hidden in a third-floor closet of the Slifer House Museum for more than one hundred and twenty-five...
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Torchere by L. Straus and Sons

Posted by PA Heritage Staff on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Torchere by L. Straus and Sons Eight years after it dazzled visitors to the 1893 World’s Columbia Exposition in Chicago, a magnificent torchere created by L. Straus and Sons, New York, was purchased by Pennsylvania candymaker Milton S. Hershey (1857-1945). The electric torch – with nearly fourteen hundred separate pieces – was the largest composite article in cut glass produced to that time. Crafted by some...
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Portrait of Valentine Blanchard

Posted by PA Heritage Staff on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Portrait of Valentine Blanchard Upon graduating from Lancaster’s Franklin and Marshall College in 1900, Worth B. Stottlemyer settled in Arling­ton, Virginia, where he prospered in the insurance and real estate businesses. An insatiable collector, he amassed a cache of antiques and works of art, intending to open an antiques shop in Frederick, Maryland, upon retiring. While building his enormous collection, Stottle­myer...
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William Wagner Portrait by Thomas Sully

Posted by PA Heritage Staff on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on William Wagner Portrait by Thomas Sully In 1836, eminent Ameri­can artist Thomas Sully (1783-1872) painted a por­trait of William Wagner (1796-1885), Philadelphia businessman and philanthropist, which had, until last year, remained in private hands. More than a century after its creation, the likeness has virtually returned “home” to the Wagner Free Institute of Science, founded by Wagn­er and his wife Louisa Bin­ney...
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Anchor by Stuart Davis

Posted by PA Heritage Staff on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Anchor by Stuart Davis “I am an American, born in Philadelphia of American stock. I studied art in America. I paint what I see in America, in other words, I paint the American scene,” so Stuart Davis (1894-1964) described himself and his work. He was raised in an environment that nurtured artistic leanings. His mother, Helen Stu­art Foulke, a sculptor, and his father, Edward Wyatt Davis, art editor for the...
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Abraham Lincoln Mask (1860) by Leonard W. Volk

Posted by PA Heritage Staff on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Abraham Lincoln Mask (1860) by Leonard W. Volk One of the most famous likenesses of President Abraham Lincoln is an unusu­al life-mask made in March 1860 by sculptor Leonard W. Volk (1828-1895) in his Chicago studio. Volk measured Lin­coln’s head and upper torso and made a plaster impression of his face, on which he based his exquisite bust of the beard­less future president. Lincoln’s life-mask lay neglected for twenty years,...
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Birdhouse by J. Warren Jacobs

Posted by PA Heritage Staff on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Birdhouse by J. Warren Jacobs J. Warren Jacobs (1868-1947), of Waynesburg, Greene County, was an artist, essayist, poet, bird watcher, and woodworker. A versatile individual, he fashioned cabinets, display cases, and furniture for his library and the “J. Warren Jacobs Museum of Applied Oology,” housed in two rooms on the second floor of the family’s residence on South Washington Street in Waynesburg. He...
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Berry Brothers Spring Wagon

Posted by PA Heritage Staff on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Berry Brothers Spring Wagon Now largely bred for recreation and sporting-jumping, foxhunting, dressage, training, trail riding, and racing (which alone contributes ten billion dollars to the Commonwealth’s economy each year!) – horses were critical to the settling and development of the United States, essential to commerce, transportation, communication, and trade. For more than two centuries, they carried...
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First Troop Philadelphia City Cavalry Flag

Posted by PA Heritage Staff on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on First Troop Philadelphia City Cavalry Flag First Troop Philadelphia City Cavalry known widely as the First City Troop, was originally organized as the Light Horse of the City of Philadelphia at a meeting conducted at Carpen­ters’ Hall on November 17, 1774. A purely volunteer cavalry troop, it is the oldest mounted military unit in the country’s history. The founders – mostly individuals of conspicuous prominence engaged...
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Iris Painting by Georg Dionys Ehret (1745)

Posted by James White on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Iris Painting by Georg Dionys Ehret (1745) One of the treasures of the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation in Pittsburgh is a 1745 gouache painting on vellum by the eminent German­-English artist Georg Dionys Ehret (1710-1770) depicting two species of Iris, Iris susiana L. (Mourning Iris) and Iris latifolia Mill. (English Iris). The Hunt Institute is fortunate to own more than two hundred and twenty-five paintings by Ehret; most...
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