Notes
Joseph K. Ott: Rhode Island Furniture Scholar
By Patricia E. Kane
No scholar has had a more influential role in expanding our knowledge of the lives of furniture makers in Rhode Island than Joseph K. Ott whose contributions to scholarship began in 1965 and continued for two decades. Ott, who was born in Providence in 1929, graduated from Harvard with a degree in Economics in 1951, and received a master's degree from the Harvard Business School in 1953, joined his father's company, Joseph M. P. Ott Textile Manufacturing in Pawtucket, in 1953. After the firm was sold in 1964, Ott turned his attention to researching American antiques. His first important scholarly project was serving as chairman of the committee to organize the exhibition "The John Brown House Loan Exhibition of Rhode Island Furniture," so titled because the exhibition celebrated the new lease on life that the John Brown House assumed when the Rhode Island Historical Society, Providence, relocated its library holdings from the John Brown House to a building it acquired in 1964. As Ott states in his foreword to the exhibition catalogue "for the first time in many years the rooms were empty of their heavy burdens." In those rooms Ott and his committee assembled an exhibition borrowed from more than forty institutions and individuals of ninety-one pieces of furniture, two sculptures, two pieces of needlework, three examples of export porcelain, and seven portraits. It was on view for just one month from May 16 to June 20, 1965. The fully illustrated catalogued, printed by the Meriden Gravure Company, then the preeminent American producer of fine art books, provided a lasting record useful to succeeding generations of scholars for the clarity of its illustrations as well as appendices that contain a brief analysis of Providence makers' account books and a transcription of the 1756 Providence cabinetmaker's agreement (see Joseph K. Ott: A Rhode Island Bibliography, 1965). Built upon the seminal exhibition, "The Arts and Crafts of Newport Rhode Island," organized a little more than a decade before by Ralph E. Carpenter, Jr., "The John Brown House Loan Exhibition of Rhode Island Furniture" broke new ground by including work documented or attributed to Providence makers and by publishing objects previously unknown. The research on Providence furniture by Eleanore Bradford Monahon, assistant curator at the Historical Society, published at just this time no doubt informed the exhibition and publication.1 This exhibition was held the year before I commenced my studies in the Winterthur Program in Early American Culture, but my recollection from that time is that it was acknowledged as a major contribution. My copy of the book was acquired while a student at Winterthur and I have consulted it on numerous occasions over the years.
Ott's role as chairman of the exhibition committee no doubt arose from his passion for collecting early American furniture which began in 1957 with the acquisition of a mahogany side chair with shell-carved knees and crest, baluster splat, and claw-and-ball feet that was then attributed to Newport, but which is now thought to have been made in Massachusetts (lot 154).2 He and Mrs. Ott loaned many objects to "The John Brown House Loan Exhibition" including a ladies's chair with knuckled handholds (no. 22), an easy chair (no. 24, lot 146), a side table by John Goddard (no. 40, lot 139), a maple chest on frame (no. 58), and a Seril Dodge tall case clock (no. 78, lot 142). His articles that focused on objects in his collection included "John Townsend, A Chair and Two Tables," in which Ott offered insights into later Newport cabinetmaking, including the publication of one of a set of four labeled and dated Federal chairs by John Townsend, that illustrates the post Revolutionary career of this cabinetmaker, known then mostly for his pre-Revolutionary work (lot 156). He also identified for the first time the graphite mark "M" on a card table as an identifying sign of Townsend work, as well as suggesting in his discussion of a side table that stop-fluted Marlborough legs on Rhode Island furniture should be dated to the period 1785 to 1795, a revision to previous scholarship that gave them an earlier date (lots 145, 153; Bibliography, 1968).
The publication of pieces from his collection continued with "Some Rhode Island Furniture" (Bibliography, 1975). Although some pieces from his collection reappeared in this article, others had not previously appeared in print including a low armchair, one of a pair, with a history of having been owned by Christopher Champlin (1731-1805), a Newport merchant who was born in Charlestown, Rhode Island, where his father was a Narragansett planter, but who moved to Newport in the 1750s and carried on mercantile trade both before and after the American Revolution (lots 169, 170). The article also discussed a maple side chair with original rush seat acquired from the collection of Cornelius C. Moore that had been owned by William Ellery (1727-1820), a Harvard-trained merchant who then became a customs collector in Newport, clerk of the Rhode Island General Assembly, and signer of the Declaration of Independence. A chest-on-chest attributed to John Townsend owned by Moses Brown (1738-1836) and a commode chair owned by John Brown (1736-1803), brothers who were important Providence merchants, are additional objects described in the article (for the commode chair, see following essay, fig. 3). Also associated with John Townsend were two upholstered armchairs that descended in the Townsend family (lots 148, 149). Another article discussed an upholstered armchair that had been owned by the Newport merchant and Antiguan plantation owner, Abraham Redwood (1709-1788) (lot 138). The article evaluates a chair at the Winterthur Museum and its counterpart in Ott's collection using primary documents in Newport (Bibliography, 1981). As was evident in the organization of "The John Brown House Loan Exhibition," in his personal collection Ott valued objects with strong provenance. Objects with provenance like these provide important evidence for identifying regional schools of furniture making.
It may well be that Ott's greatest contributions to the study of furniture making in Rhode Island were those presented in a series of four articles he published in Rhode Island History based on the research he did among the manuscripts, account books, deed books, and other primary documents in the Rhode Island Historical Society, where he served as President from 1971 to 1974 (Bibliography, 1969, 1972). The first three articles focused on publishing data on cabinet and other furniture makers and the last article addressed house joiners, shipwrights, and related woodworkers. Ott found gems of documentary evidence in family papers, an activity akin to looking for needles in haystacks. One of the richest resources uncovered in that sleuthing were the personal and household expenses of the Newport physician Isaac Senter between 1782 and 1800 that are part of the Albert C. and Richard W. Greene Papers. From the Senter papers Ott identified Walter Nichols as a major Newport maker of mahogany furniture and Joseph Vickary as a productive chairmaker, also from Newport. The kinship between New York and Newport furniture was also noted by Ott, such as the fact that when furniture was purchased outside Newport, it tended to come from New York. His finds include a bill between the Newport upholsterer Robert Stevens and the cabinetmaker John Goddard, which offers evidence that Stevens was still working as an upholsterer in the 1760s long after he began identifying himself as a merchant.
As Ott summarized in the Fall 1969 article, the last in the series that focused on cabinetmakers, the 314 Rhode Island makers known from the research published by Wendell Garrett in the June 1958 and October 1966 issues of The Magazine Antiques, which drew upon earlier scholars, notably Mabel Munson Swan and Ethel Hall Bjerkoe, had grown almost twenty percent. With the publication of these three articles sixty-one new names were added for a total of 375 makers. In the last of these articles "Rhode Island Housewrights, Shipwrights, and Related Craftsmen" Ott added more names of woodworkers who may occasionally have made furniture again drawing on primary documents such as the John Bannister Account Book, the Moses Brown Ledger, U.S. Customs House Papers, the Providence Association of Mechanics and Manufacturers Papers, and the Providence Town Tax Records, all in the Rhode Island Historical Society, as well as Rhode Island Land Records in the State Archives and the George H. Richardson Occupations [in Newport] Scrapbook, Newport Historical Society, a copy of which is in the Rhode Island Historical Society Library. Going through this mass of primary material adds up to many hours of dedicated reading.
Delving into primary documents, this time the customs records, his publications continued with "Exports of Furniture, Chaises, and Other Wooden Forms from Providence and Newport, 1783-1795" (Bibliography, 1975). The discussion details the types and amounts of furniture shipped from the two towns and concludes with four tables that show the types of wares and the destination of those wares for both towns, with Providence outstripping Newport in the number of ports to which furniture and other goods were shipped. Ott's training in economics comes to the fore in presenting the data in tabular form and developing his argument for the rise of Providence in the post Revolutionary war era. The information in this article was presented in a fuller version in Rhode Island History (Bibliography, 1977).
Another valuable contribution of Ott's was "Lesser-known Rhode Island Cabinetmakers: The Carliles, Holmes Weaver, Judson Blake, the Rawsons, and Thomas Davenport" (Bibliography, 1982). This article underscores the value Ott placed on documented objects. He brought to light eight pieces of furniture that had either labels or inscriptions that identified their makers. Among the ground breaking information that appear in this article was the publication of a classic Rhode Island kylix back chair labeled by John Carlile and Sons, the first time this form was linked to a particular maker (lot 157). Information like this is the bedrock of scholarship and is invaluable to furniture scholars.
Although like most collectors of early American furniture, Ott favored objects that were elaborate and mahogany, his primary research unearthed much information on simple turned, flag-bottom chairs and other forms of vernacular furniture. He understood that it was as important to publish information about vernacular furniture as it was to publish the high style work to understand the furniture trade as a whole. Once again I attribute this to his training as an economist. Among his later articles was one on simple banister-back chairs that survive in great numbers in the area of Little Compton (Bibliography, 1984).
Building on the work of those who came before him, Ott expanded the foundation of Rhode Island furniture scholarship. It has served his successors well. Writings on Rhode Island furniture have flourished and include such noteworthy examples as Michael Moses, Master Craftsmen of Newport: The Townsends and Goddards (1984), American Furniture 1999 whose many articles were devoted to the topic of Rhode Island furniture, Morrison Heckscher, John Townsend: Newport Cabinetmaker (2005), and The Rhode Island Furniture Archive at the Yale University Art Gallery (website launched 2010). The nuggets of primary evidence that Ott unearthed in Rhode Island record repositories are essential elements that enable us to reconstruct the lives of craftsmen whose day-to-day existence has eluded the scrutiny of history.
ENDNOTES:
1 Eleanore Bradford Monahon, "Providence Cabinetmakers, "Rhode Island History 23, no. 1 (January 1964), pp. 1-22; "Providence Cabinetmakers of the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries," The Magazine Antiques (May 1965), pp. 573-579.
2 Leigh Keno, Joan Barzilay Freund, and Alan Miller, "The Very Pink of the Mode: Boston Georgian Chairs, Their Export, Their Influence," American Furniture 1996, Luke Beckerdite, ed. (Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 1996), p. 285, fig. 34.
Joseph K. Ott: A Rhode Island Bibliography
1965 The John Brown House Loan Exhibition of Rhode Island Furniture (Providence: Rhode Island Historical Society, 1965).
1965 "The John Brown House Loan Exhibition of Rhode Island Furniture," The Magazine Antiques (May 1965), pp. 564-571.
1965 [with N. David Scotti] "Notes on Rhode Island Cabinetmakers," The Magazine Antiques (May 1965), p. 572.
1968 "John Townsend: A Chair and Two Tables," The Magazine Antiques (September 1968), pp. 388-390.
1969 "Recent Discoveries Among Rhode Island Cabinetmakers and Their Work," Rhode Island History, vol. 28, no. 1 (Winter 1969), pp. 3-25.
1969 "More Notes on Rhode Island Cabinetmakers and Their Work," Rhode Island History, vol. 28, no. 2 (Spring 1969), pp. 49-52.
1969 "Still More Notes on Rhode Island Cabinetmakers and Allied Craftsmen," Rhode Island History, vol. 28, no. 4 (Fall 1969), pp. 111-121.
1972 "Rhode Island Housewrights, Shipwrights, and Related Craftsmen ," Rhode Island History, vol. 31, no. 2 (Spring and Summer 1972), pp. 65-80.
1973 "The Loved One: Being and Account of the Funeral of George Mason of Newport," Rhode Island History, vol. 32, no. 3 (Summer 1973), pp. 87-89.
1973 "John Innes Clark and His Family--Beautiful People in Providence," Rhode Island History, vol. 32, no. 4 (Fall 1973), pp. 123-133.
1974 "Rhode Islanders in Charleston: Social Notes," The South Carolina Historical Magazine, vol. 75, no. 3 (July 1974), pp. 180-183.
1975 "Exports of Furniture, Chaises and Other Wooden Forms from Providence and Newport, 1783- 1795," The Magazine Antiques (January 1975), pp. 135-141.
1975 "Some Rhode Island Furniture," The Magazine Antiques (May 1975), pp. 940-951.
1976- "Antiques" [column], Providence Sunday Journal.
1978
1977 "Rhode Island Furniture Exports, 1783-1800, Including Information on Chaises, Buildings, Other Woodenware and Trade Practices," Rhode Island History, vol. 36, no. 1 (Winter/February 1977), pp. 3-13.
1981 "Abraham Redwood's Chairs?," The Magazine Antiques (March 1981), pp. 669-673.
1982 "Lesser-known Rhode Island Cabinetmakers: The Carliles, Holmes Weaver, Judson Blake, the Rawsons, and Thomas Davenport," The Magazine Antiques (May 1982), pp. 1156-1163.
1984 "A Group of Rhode Island Banister-back Chairs," The Magazine Antiques (May 1984), p. 1171.
1987 [with Daniel Snydacker and Deborah Walker] "Masterpieces of Simplicity: Newport Desks and Chairs, 1740-1780," Newport History: Bulletin of the Newport Historical Society, vol. 60, part 4, no. 208 (Fall 1987), pp. 173-184.
Joseph K. Ott: A Rhode Island Story
By Martha H. Willoughby
Kevin, Darby, Joseph--Joseph Kevin O'Neill Ott (1929-1994) may have had many names, but he had one overriding passion: Rhode Island's history. He was born in Providence in 1929, the son of Joseph Molter Piva Ott (1904-1983) and Mary (Polly) Pendergast (b. 1904/5) and the grandson of Joseph Ott (b. 1861), who immigrated to America in 1884 from Germany and established the family's business in the textiles industry. After attending public schools in Pawtuxet, Joseph K. Ott was a student at the Moses Brown School in Providence, graduated cum laude from Harvard University in 1951 and received an M.A. in Economics from Harvard Business School two years later. From 1953 to 1964, he worked in his father's company, the Joseph M. P. Ott Textile Manufactory, where as a member of the fiber glass division, he developed the first fabrics for Nike missile cases. In 1959, he married Anne Northrop and the couple purchased and restored a 1774 house on Providence's Benefit Street. His father's company was sold in 1964, and he spent his remaining thirty years managing investments, protecting Providence's architectural heritage and raising a family. At the same time, Joseph K. Ott became the preeminent scholar and collector of Rhode Island artworks from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
It was during his college days that Joseph K. Ott first became afflicted with the collecting bug. His maternal grandmother gave him a pewter tankard and with this gift, started a life-long obsession with Rhode Island pewterers and their products. He was also exposed to the antiques marketplace through his parents. A keen golfer who played at the varsity level at Harvard, Joseph K. Ott gave up his sport on Saturday mornings in order to drive his mother to local auctions. Early on, he was known as a pewter collector as evidenced in a letter written by dealer Irving Lyon to his mother in which he referred to pewter available that might interest her son. While he probably started buying earlier, invoices for his collecting survive from as early as October 1955 and the following year, he joined the Pewter Collectors' Club of America, later becoming the Secretary for the Club's New England regional group. His focus on his native state was well established by 1957, when in a letter to Charles F. Montgomery, then Director of Winterthur Museum, he noted that he was mainly interested in "unusual or rare R.I. pieces and marks." While he purchased from dealers Carl Jacobs, George Abraham and Maxwell Turner, his research of pewter forms and their makers were the subject of extensive and detailed correspondence with America's foremost pewter historian, Ledlie Laughlin (1890-1977). After his death, much of his pewter collection was given to the Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art by Mrs. Ott.
Upon acquiring a piece of pewter, Joseph K. Ott immediately subjected his purchase to an intense investigation of its maker and history, an approach he also applied to his furniture collection. As penned by Ott, the "serious beginnings" of his furniture acquisitions were the chest in lot 178 and a few months later, the chair in lot 154. Ironically, both of these were Massachusetts-made. The chest was purchased as such but the Boston chair was considered a Newport form by Joseph K. Ott and until recently by most other furniture historians. Ott also noted that these pieces were purchased at New England auctions and both underbid by the firm of Israel Sack, Inc. Perhaps the enthusiasm of the established New York City firm gave confidence to the twenty-eight year old embarking on a new collecting field. Ten years later, Joseph K. Ott was a recognized authority in his own right and had amassed the bulk of his significant collection of Rhode Island furniture. With the publication of The John Brown House Loan Exhibition of Rhode Island Furniture (1965), Ott embarked upon his renowned scholarly career and increasingly became the person the field's historians, curators and dealers turned to when a question regarding Rhode Island's decorative arts arose. A manuscript compiled by Ott entitled "Fine Arts Items" reveals a snapshot of the collection as it stood in 1967. As recorded in this document, the greatest single source for his furniture collection was the legendary dealer, Harry Arons of Ansonia, Connecticut. From Arons, Joseph K. Ott acquired two of his Newport masterpieces, the John Goddard marble slab table in 1963 and the John Townsend card table in 1966 (lots 138 and 145). Besides Arons, Ott patronized other leading dealers, including Israel Sack, Ginsburg & Levy and John Walton, in addition to purchasing items on his own at local auctions or directly from owners. With a focus on his beloved state, his collecting goals were described by him in the 1967 document: "I have tried to collect things that are rare, good looking, and in good proportion." Joseph K. Ott noted that his collection had largely been formed by 1970, but he continued to acquire items until at least the early 1980s. This later phase of collecting, as seen in lots 157, 158 and 173, reveals a concentration on labeled furniture from Providence and parallels Joseph K. Ott's scholarly interest in Rhode Island craftsmen from the entire state, not just Newport. Ott's fondness for documentation did not prevent him from acquiring extraordinary unlabeled pieces during this time, such as the open armchair in lot 138 in 1980. With characteristic zeal, thoroughness and alacrity, Ott researched its history, design and attribution, which resulted in the publication of a pioneering article, "Abraham Redwood's Chairs?" just one year later.
Described as "the ultimate Rhode Island historian," Joseph K. Ott did not limit his pursuits to pewter and furniture. As revealed by items previously in his collection, his research papers and publications, including the "Antiques" column for the Providence Sunday Journal, which he wrote from 1976 to 1978, his interests encompassed a wide range of materials from Rhode Island and beyond. Quadrants, needlework, ceramics, glass, paintings, rugs, silver, bronze sculpture and architecture are just some of the other media that Ott acquired, investigated and protected for future generations. Illustrating his keen eye and preservation ethos, the portrait of Joseph Whipple (fig. 2) was discovered by Ott at an auction and despite its dilapidated state, Ott suspected it to be the work of Robert Feke. After its conservation, Ott's initial attribution was confirmed and the portrait was donated by Mr. and Mrs. Ott to the Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art, where it was displayed at Pendleton House. Ott also turned his attention to the late nineteenth century. Organizing an exhibition at Providence's Olney Street Baptist Church, Joseph K. Ott is credited with "singlehandedly" raising awareness of the work of Providence artist Edward Mitchell Bannister (1828-1901), an African-American painter whose masterful landscapes had previously been overlooked. Ever concerned with making the arts of Rhode Island and early America accessible to the public, Joseph K. Ott was actively involved in a number of institutions. Besides the Whipple portrait, Mr. and Mrs. Ott donated and loaned extensively to local museums, especially the John Brown House at the Rhode Island Historical Society, whose gifts from the Ott Collection include a commode chair owned by Providence merchant John Brown (1736-1803) (fig. 3). Joseph K. Ott served as President of the Rhode Island Historical Society from 1971 to 1974, was on the Boards of Directors of the Children's Museum of Rhode Island and the Providence Athenaeum, and on the Fine Arts Committees of the Diplomatic Reception Rooms at the U.S. Department of State and the Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art. He was later affiliated with the Newport Restoration Foundation and after his death, a fund in his name was established at the Rhode Island Foundation for the preservation of historic documents. Along with Antoinette Downing, Joseph K. Ott was Providence's leading historic preservationist and his efforts to save and restore Providence's architectural heritage are among his most lasting contributions to the field. In 1959, Mr. and Mrs. Ott, newly married, purchased the 1774 John Jenckes house on Benefit Street and painstakingly restored it to its former glory (figs. 4, 5), one of the first projects of its kind in Providence. Soon after, Ott became instrumental in preserving other historic structures through his work as organizer and President of the Benefit Street Association, Vice-President of the Providence Preservation Society, executive at the Hill Realty Company and Trustee of the Preservation Society of Newport County. In addition to skiing and golf, Joseph K. Ott's greatest hobby was collecting and driving vintage automobiles and he was a frequent contributor to Veteran Motor Car Club of America publications. Protected by foul weather gear, he and Mrs. Ott drove their 1901 Hurtu in the 1990 London-to-Brighton Run and were frequent participants in the Gilden Tours and Veteran Motor Car Club events (fig. 8).
Most of the furniture and decorative arts in the following pages stood in the Ott residence on Benefit Street and formed an integral part of family life with wife Anne and sons Joshua and Andrew. Accompanying her husband to Pewter Club meetings, on buying trips and on antique car runs, Anne shared Joseph K. Ott's passions--but to a degree. Ott once wrote that "to the despair of my wife, I like chairs," perhaps additional impetus for their loan of about ten seating forms to the John Brown House. A lover of cartoons, Joseph K. Ott quipped many a verse, often drawing upon his surroundings and family. Referring to a 1955 pewter purchase, one draft for a rhyme for a holiday card began, "A lamp by Roswell Gleason Is always Joshua's reason For stopping on the stair With hand waving in air..." Furnished with the card table in lot 145 and easy chairs in lots 141 and 146, the parlor was reserved for special occasions such as Christmas Day, yet as the photograph in fig. 6 well illustrates, the collection was also a part of the everyday life of a growing family. Most of all, the collection is tangible evidence of a remarkable life, one spent indefatigably researching and preserving Rhode Island's material past.
SOURCES:
"Joseph K. Ott Papers," "North Benefit Association Records" and "Hill Realty Company Records," at the The Rhode Island Historical Society.
Wendell Garrett, "Joseph K. O'Neill Ott, 65, Rhode Island Antiquarian," The Antiques and Arts Weekly, 17 June 1994, p. 55.
"In Memoriam: Joseph K. O'Neill Ott," Museum of Art Rhode Island School of Design (September/October 1994), n.p.
"Benefit Square, Providence," The Magazine Antiques (April 1968), pp. 512-513.
The Joseph K. Ott Papers, the Ott Family.
Mrs. Anne N. Ott, Mr. Andrew Ott and Mr. Joshua Ott.
This lot is offered without reserve.
Charles Blaskowitz (c.1743-1823), cartographer and William Faden (1749-1836), engraver and publisher, 1777
