Side chair

Originally owned in Prince George County, Maryland, this chair and its mates were produced about 450 miles away in Salem, Massachusetts. Whether the chairs were bespoke (specifically ordered) or part of a venture cargo sent on speculation to southern ports is not known, but customers obtained fashionable northern furniture using both methods. The unidentified Salem cabinetmaker who produced this chair must have been familiar with plate 9 in George Hepplewhite’s A Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer’s Guide, which illustrates the same design. He may have owed his own copy or had access to one of the copies owned by the Sanderson family or another cabinetmaker in Salem.
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