Description:
Shaving mugs were widely manufactured. In form they resembled a common cylindrical mug with, however, a small soap pocket either within the mug or protruding from one side. Shaving cup, thrown redware cylindrical mug with attached handle, a smaller cup is attached inside and on the side of the mug to hold soap; mug is covered with lead glaze with speckles of brown in a light brown colored glaze; incised on the side of the mug in cursive, “James L. Osborn 1877/ Gonic.” The Osborns of Danvers settled in Bristol County, MA, Exeter and Gonic, NH, and southern Maine. Redware production was established in all of these areas and their products reflect the influence of their Danvers training. Danvers had 33 potters in the period of 1775-1825. They employed dozens of people, 30 with the name of Osborn. This was the single most influential family of earthenware makers in this country. They migrated to all areas of New England and continued their craft in the same manner in which they had been trained in Essex County. James L. Osborn was born March 22, 1833, son of Elijah Osborn, Jr. and Mary Lane Osborn. James L. Osborn carried on the potting business with his father in Gonic, New Hampshire. With the death of Elijah in 1861, brothers James L. Osborn and John H. Osborn continued the potting business together until about 1875, when they separated. James with the help of his son William A. Osborne continued the ancestral pottery until 1885, when competition from machine-made ware became too severe.
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https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+2014.4.119 |
