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Pitcher with engine turned decoration

(c) Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association, Deerfield MA. All rights reserved.
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Pitchers ranged in size from very large to quite small. Their materials and design also varied, ranging from simple redware to those with elaborate decoration such as this engine-turned example. The incised decoration was done on unfired pottery leather-hard with the aid of the engine-turning lathe. This lathe has an eccentric motion which enables it to cut a variety of patterns. The "1 Qt. Pitcher" Elijah Williams bought from Orlando Ware's Deerfield, Massachusetts, store for seventeen cents in 1803 might have looked something like this.

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