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Ukaplacidnewi.com
AUGUST 31.V2 0 07
LAKE PLACID NEWS
Features
Tools of the blacksmith trade
Adirondack
Attic
Andy Flynn
A
mong George M. Bardo's
tools of the trade were the
hammer, tongs, anvil, forge
and fiddle. He was, after all,
the "fiddlin' blacksmith" of
Lewis County.
Bardo (1872-1952) lived in
the hamlet of New Bremen and
worked in his own blacksmith
shop, several miles to the north
in the hamlet of Beaver Falls,
from about 1900 until his
dying day. Visitors can" still
walk through the shop, with all
its tools, at the Adirondack
Museum. J.P Lewis and Latex
Fiber Industries, which bought
the Bardo property from
George's^son, Wilbur, donated
the building and its contents to
the museum in 1967. The gift
was accession No. 1967.221
for the museum's collection.
The blacksmith shop dates to
1875. Fred Walter, of Beaver
Falls, was its first owner, and
he sold it to George Bardo's
father, Peter, in 1885. Peter
Bardo, of New Bremen, was an
established blacksmith at the
time and was listed as such in
the
"1872-3
Business
Directory of Lewis Co., N.Y."
Fred Walter and Peter Bardo
were two of 26 blacksmiths
serving 6,979 horses in Lewis
County in 1875. And shoeing
horses was only part of a blacksmith's job. Needless to say,
they had plenty of work to keep
them occupied.
Peter's son, George, learned
the blacksmith trade as an
apprentice in Beech's Bridge,
N.Y. and worked in his father's
shop after moving back to the
area and marrying a Beaver
Falls woman. When Peter died
around 1900, George took
PHOTO COURTESY OF THE ADIRONDACK MUSEUM
This is the inside of George M. Bardo's blacksmith shop, Which was moved from the Lewis County hamlet of
Beaver Falls to the Adirondack Museum in 1969.
over the business and operated
it until 1952.
George Bardo was more than
a blacksmith; he was a wheelwright, a wagon maker and a
salesman. He built cutters, logging sleighs, and wagons and
sold items such as Deer River
Plows. That was his day job. In
his spare time, he was a musician, playing the fiddle and
teaching others how to play the
violin and brass instruments.
He organized the Castorland
Band and Beaver Falls Band.
His son, Wilbur, became a professional musician based on
those early violin lessons.
George Bardo was also a
founding member of the
Beaver Falls Evangelical
Church.
Before Wilbur Bardo sold
the blacksmith shop and property to J.P. Lewis, he "took a
few of the tools my father told
me that my grandfather Peter
Bardo made," as well as some
other objects, he told the
Adirondack Museum's George
Bowditch in a March 30,
1970 letter. Wilbur donated
those items to the Adirondack
Museum in May 1970 as part
of accession No. 1970.24.
They included his father's
cane, sledge hammers, a farrier's fitting hammer, ball-pien
hammers, horseshoe tongs,
nail-pulling tongs, flat tongs, a
draw knife, monkey wrenches,
S-wrenches, straight wrenches, a drill with a bit, a carpenter's square, pruning shears, a
hot chisel, a wood chisel, a
grab hook, horse rasps, a box
of tire bolts, a spirit level, a
whippletree, and large boltcutting tongs. These artifacts
are on display in the blacksmith shop along with other
tools.
Wilbur only took a small
portion of the items in his
father's shop. When J.P. Lewis
and Latex Fiber Industries
donated the shop to the museum, there were hundreds of
objects that accompanied the
building. The artifacts were
shipped to Blue Mountain Lake
in 1968. The shop was taken
apart, "board by board and
beam by beam," in the spring
of 1969 and transported to the
Adirondack Museum, where
the new "Age of Horses" building was being constructed.
Chet Johnson, of W.C. Johnson
& Sons in Tupper Lake, was in
charge of re-constructing the
blacksmith shop inside the new
building, according to an article Bowditch wrote for the
Lewis County
Historical
Society.
"Incidentally, we wound up
with one thousand six hundred
and ninety-four cataloged
items," Bowditch wrote.
At the Beaver Falls site, a
wheel shop had been added to
the back of the blacksmith shop
but was not salvageable.
Photos were taken of both
shops before the move, and
special care was taken when rebuilding the blacksmith shop in
its new home, according to
Bowditch:
"Once re-erected, and working very carefully from the
photographs taken almost two
years before, everything that
had been in the shop when we
first started work on it was
replaced: vices, anvil, benches,'
boxes, stove, drill, tools, buckets, cord wood, tire upsetter,
posters, horseshoes, and on and
on. Even the original dirt had
been carefully preserved on the
windows."
Now that's attention to
detail.
Learn
more
about
Adirondack history and the
"Adirondack Attic" column
and books by logging on to the
following
Web
sites:
www.adkmuseum.com
and
www.hungrybearpubhshing.com.
• • •
Andy Flynn lives in Saranac Lake.
He can be reached via e-mail at
adkattic © yahoo.com.
KOVELS: ANTIQUES AND COLLECTING
BY RALPH AND TERRY KOVEL
The crossed-swords mark on die bottom of a
vase. -Small figurines of 18tivcentury people.
Elaborate bowls. Onion-pattern dishes. These are all
antiques that make collectors hope that they have a
piece of very old Meissen porcelain. Sometimes it's
wishful thinking, because all of these things were
made by other factories as well, and the original
famous Meissen factory made many other types of
porcelains. Meissen is a town in Germany. A factory
was built there in 1710. It made stoneware,
porcelain and other ceramics. That factory,
remodeled and rebuilt from time to time, is now
called Staatliche Porzellan-Manufaktur and is still
making porcelains in old and new styles. Dresden,
Meissen and Saxe are all names for ceramics made
in the area or even for pieces made in the style of
the old German factory. But collectors often are
uninformed about 20th-century Meissen. Since
1900, the original factory has made art nouveau
dinnerware, realistic animal figures, art deco
figurines, vases in modern designs and glazes and,
recently, abstract shapes and patterns. And it still
makes many of the early traditional pieces. Look for
the.crossed-swords mark or other indications that a
piece was made by the original Meissen factory
even if the design is modern. Twentieth-century
The "nodding pagoda" was originally
modeled by J.J. Kandler for Meissen in
the 18th century. This one, 7 1/4 inches
high, was made about 1900. The head,
hands and tongue move. It sold for $9,565
at a Sotheby's London auction in June.
wares are bringing higher and higher prices.
***
Q: Our hutch has a label on the back that reads
"Waring & Gillow." What can you tell us about the
company?
A: Waring & Gillow was a British firm making
quality furniture. It was formed at me turn of the
20th century from the merger of Gillow, a furniture
business established in Lancaster in 1730, and
cabinetmaker S.J. Waring of Liverpool. The
company outfitted luxury yachts and ocean liners,
including the Queen Mary (1934) and Queen
Elizabeth (1946). It made aircraft parts during both
world wars. Business declined, and the Lancaster
workshops closed in 1962. In the 1980s, the
company merged with the cabinetmaking firm
Maple & Co. to become Maple, Waring and Gillow.
The Waring and Gillow brand of furniture is now
owned by the Allders of Croydon department store
near London.
***
Q: Please help me identify the maker of a
porcelain vase that my husband's grandmother
brought to mis country when she emigrated from
Europe. It's marked in blue with a semicircle
enclosing an eagle. The words in the mark are
"Victoria, Carlsbad, Austria." The hand-painted
troubadour scene on the front is signed by an artist
named Stahl.
A: The mark was used between 1891 and 1918
by the Victoria Porcelain Factory, operated by
Schmidt & Co. in Altrohlau, Bohemia (now Stara
Role, Czech Republic). Stahl was one of many
artists who worked there while the factory was in
business, from 1883 to 1945. The pottery made
practical as well as decorative porcelain and
earthenware. The word "Karlsbad" (sometimes
spelled "Carlsbad") is in some of the factory's
marks because u e town of Karlsbad was the center
of Bohemia's porcelain industry. The name of the
famous town in any mark improved sales.
***
Q: Please tell me what my old wooden toy is
worth. The toy is called "Torpedoes Away! Kentline
Sea Battle." It includes a battleship and a
submarine. There's also a torpedo, which you can
put in the submarine. When you shoot the torpedo
into the battleship, the upper part of the ship
explodes into several separate pieces. I have the
original box.
A: Your Kentline wooden toy dates from the
1940s. If you have all the parts and if the toy and its
box are in excellent condition, you could get about
$75 for it.
***
Q: My 17-inch umbrella vase is stamped
"Burley Winter, Crooksville, Ohio" on the bottom.
How old and valuable is it?
A: The Burley and Winter Pottery operated in
Crooksville from 1.872 until me mid-1930s. It first
made everyday stoneware, then later made artware
with colored glazes. The old Burley and Winter
plant was purchased in 1986, and New Burley
Winter Inc. then began making pottery using Burley
and Winter's original molds. The new pieces are
clearly marked "New Burley Winter." Your vase is
vintage and worth about $400 to $700. Large, floorstanding pieces of pottery are very popular.
***
Q: I have two cast-iron garden chairs (once
white, but now very rusty) with "Atlanta Stove
Works" embossed on the underside.
A: The Atlanta Stove Works primarily made
wood-burning stoves, but it also made patio
furniture. The company was founded in 1889 and
became part of Birmingham Stove and Range Co. in
the 1930s. Our Web site, www.Kovels.com, lists a
Renaissance Revival cast-iron garden set marked
"Atlanta Stove Works" at $2,530.
***
Tip: Use two hooks a few inches in from the
edges of a picture to hang it straight on the wall.
***
The Kovels answer as many questions as
possible through the column. By sending a letter
with a question, you give full permission for use in
the column or any other Kovel forum. Names and
addresses will not be published. We cannot
guarantee the return of any photograph, but if a
stamped envelope is included, we will try. The
volume of mail makes personal answers or
appraisals impossible. Write to Kovels, (name of
your newspaper), King Features Syndicate, 300 W.
57th St., 15th Floor, New York, NY 10019.
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CURRENT PRICES
Current prices are recorded from antiques'
shows, flea markets, sales and auctions throughout
the United States. Prices vary in different locations
because of local economic conditions.
Pisgah Forest mug, cameo, guitar player, blue
ground, raised mark, 1950s, 3 1/2 inches, $150.
Donald Duck ring with Kellogg's Pep magnet,
white plastic, Donald with box of Pep Cereal in
beak, Living Toy, 1949, 2 inches, $165.
Japanese kimono, bamboo-and-floral stitched
design, orange ground shading to ivory, 1950s, 64
inches, $300.
R.S. Prussia tea set, teapot, creamer, covered
sugar, cup and saucer, ,roses^ on cream-colored
ground, c. 1900,fivepieces, $310.
Eveready Flashlight poster, boy outside circus
with flashlight, 1930s, 20 x 30 inches, $400.
Woody Woodpecker. alarm clock, "It's Fun
Time! Fun in Nursery-Bedroom-Playroom-School,"
spring wind, Walter Lantz Productions, 1959, 3 1/2
x 5 x 5 1/2 inches, $505.
Dirk Van Erp copper cigar box, handhammered, hinged lid, applied monogram, wood
insert, 2 3/4x10x6 inches, $690.
English Georgian chest-on-chest, mahogany,
three dovetail drawers, oak linings, canted comers,
bracket feet, 53 x 44 x 20 inches, $715.
Heisey candelabrum, Old Williamsburg
pattern, three-light, Sahara, 15 1/2 inches, pair,
$1,285.
Madame
Alexander
doll,
W.A.A.C,
composition, World War II uniform, c. 1943, 15
inches, $1,410.
***
Flea market time. You can carry lots of stuff
with this modern version of the newspaper bag. It's
an oversize bag with a padded strap, a flap to keep
contents dry in the rain and an extra outside pocket.
It has the Kovel logo, showing that you are a
knowing collector. The Kovels bag is perfect for the
serious flea-market shopper. Send $14.95 plus $3.95
shipping to Kovels, P.O. Box 22900, Beachwood,
OH 44122, or call 800-571-1555.
***
Visit www.Kovels.com to sign up and see more
than 750,000 free antiques and collectibles prices
and to receive free weekly e-mail updates with the
latest information on the world of collecting.
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