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Hartford, Connecticut

Sales Blossom at Connecticut Spring Antiques Show

by Ed Pfeiffer

During the weekend of March 11 and 12, the Connecticut Spring Antiques Show came to Hartford, and so did spring itself. Except for a brief rain shower on Sunday, the skies were bright and clear and temperatures hovered at 60º. It appeared that a long, cold, windy winter of frequent snowstorms, including one that dumped 22" on the Hartford area, might finally be coming to an end. That seemed to create an upbeat mood for the show, and exhibitors reported that the crowd was ready to buy. The event was sponsored by the Haddam Historical Society. Rusty Clowes, who cochaired the show committee, said attendance was slightly higher than last year.

Karen DiSaia was managing the show for the first time. She and her husband, Ralph, are well known as dealers specializing in Oriental rugs. They have a shop in Old Lyme, Connecticut. Karen also has long experience in staging antiques shows and currently manages The American Antiques Show (TAAS) for the American Folk Art Museum, the Minneapolis Institute of Art show, and the Litchfield County (Connecticut) show. For many years she has also been a show coordinator for the Antiques Council.

Asked what changes she made for this Connecticut spring show, she cited one in particular, the floor layout. The show is held at the Connecticut Expo Center just north of Hartford. Built in 1998, it is the state's largest exhibition center with 88,000 square feet of exhibit floor space, high ceilings, and very large loading doors that dealers said are very helpful for the setup and teardown of the exhibits.

In the past, exhibitors' spaces lined three sides of the show floor, and aisles were arranged at right angles with the fourth side of the building, its front wall. DiSaia explained that visitors looking toward the front wall saw attractive exhibitor booths along both sides of the aisle. But at the end was the rather unattractive bare front wall of the center, lined with soft drink machines, an ATM, and restroom entrances. She added a new row of spaces in front of that wall so exhibits ringed all four sides of the floor, adding to its overall attractiveness.

Exhibitors generally seemed quite satisfied with their sales results. George and Debbie Spiecker of North Hampton, New Hampshire, reported selling a Queen Anne drop-leaf table for $3500; a Windsor chair, $3500; a cherry Queen Anne candlestand; a Queen Anne tea table; a card table, $6500; and a number of smaller items.

Daniel and Karen Olson of Newburgh, New York, had buyers for a circa 1760 cherry bed, $15,500; a yellow cupboard, $2100; and a ladder-back chair at around $1800. Carol Wojtkun of Preston, Connecticut, sold a Continental sea captain's liquor chest, $3200; a circa 1760 tavern table, $4000; a Delft punch bowl, $2000; and a brass charger, $800.

Ron Chambers of Higganum, Connecticut, called the show "excellent." That seemed a bit of an understatement. He specializes in pewter and sold 25 pieces of it to a single buyer. He also sold a circa 1760 blanket chest for $2750, a gate-leg table, a candlestand, and a mirror.

Four interesting and informative presentations by experts in various antiques and collectibles categories were featured at the show. The first, on Saturday, was a keynote lecture about Connecticut Valley furniture by Thomas and Alice Kugelman. They authored, with Robert Lionetti, Connecticut Valley Furniture: Eliphalet Chapin and His Contemporaries, 1750-1800, published in 2005 and sponsored by the Connecticut Historical Society. Their interest in 18th-century Hartford County area furniture led them in 1990 to create the scholarly Hartford Case Furniture Survey, a detailed, systematic investigation of more than 500 examples of case furniture, to study the characteristics of specific regional craftsmanship. They first concentrated on the work of noted cabinetmaker Eliphalet Chapin, then expanded the survey to include all of Connecticut and southern Massachusetts.

In their show presentation, the Kugelmans covered two basic areas. Alice Kugelman reviewed the history of the region's case furniture, the influence of Chapin and his apprentices and associates, and how as they settled in various towns they made certain communities focal points for fine cabinetmaking. In the second part of the talk, Thomas Kugelman reviewed and explained in detail the design characteristics and construction features of Connecticut Valley furniture.

On Sunday three specialized presentations were given as "Booth Chats" in the exhibit spaces of the presenters. Ron Chambers of Higganum, Connecticut, covered Connecticut pewter. He discussed the differences in flatware and intricate hollowware and compared American and English pewter. He also shared items from his collection, including pieces by Thomas Danforth II and the Boardmans of Hartford.

In a talk titled "Amos Doolittle: Connecticut Print and Map Maker of the American Revolution," Donald Cresswell of the Philadelphia Print Shop discussed this patriot and printer who engraved four early prints of the battles of Lexington and Concord, having actually been at both engagements. Cresswell, who appears as an expert appraiser on the Antiques Roadshow, also showed examples of Doolittle's work.

"The Elusive Connecticut Coverlet" was the subject of the presentation by exhibitor Melinda Zongor of Bedford, Pennsylvania, and collector Judith "Jude" Fera of Lebanon, Connecticut. Zongor is the author of three books on coverlets, and she and her husband, Laszlo, are active in the Colonial Coverlet Guild of America. At the show they announced plans for the opening of a national coverlet museum in Bedford, Pennsylvania, with some 500 coverlets on display. Fera is a well-known collector in the category, and examples from her very large collection were used in the show presentation.

The Haddam Historical Society, located on the Connecticut River about 40 miles south of Hartford, operates the Thankful Arnold House museum. The house was built in three distinct stages between 1794 and 1810. For information about the society's programs or future Connecticut Spring Antiques Shows, call (860) 345-2400 or visit (www.haddamhistory.org).