Written by: Jessica Pearl We recently had an unexpected visit to the museum. A couple, let’s call them John and Jane Doe, stopped by the museum saying they had something that belonged to the museum. What they pulled from their bag was an 18th-century mahogany tea caddy! At first glance,

Guest Post by Elizabeth Fox, Marcia Brady Tucker Fellow in American Decorative Arts at the Yale University Art Gallery Textile enthusiasts, knitters, and sewing bees: this post is for you!  In December 2023, I presented a “Townsend Talk” on the history and craftsmanship of furniture made in Long Island between

Written by: Jessica Pearl While recently moving archival materials to our new collections storage space, I found part of a well-known sketchbook in our collection inside a box. The section had detached from the binding due to age and ended up stored in a folder in a box, separated from

Our guest expert, Joanna Badami, has more than 25 years of experience appraising and evaluating household furnishings, including paintings, prints, sculptures, furniture, silver, porcelain, glass, rugs, and textiles. She also adores dolls!  

The book featured in this video was printed in 1884 and donated to the museum by a local resident in the 1990s. The illustrator Doré was a French artist, printmaker, illustrator, comics artist, caricaturist, and sculptor who worked primarily with wood engraving. He illustrated this oversized edition of “The Raven,”

The items featured in this video were owned by Captain Hubbard Skidmore of New York (1767-1842). As a teenager, Skidmore served as a shipmate under his father, Zophar, in the Revolutionary War. By 1805, he was the owner and commander of the ship, Mississippi. His first wife was a cousin