James L. [Jim] Murphy (1941 to 2012) of Grove City, Ohio passed away on Oct. 8, 2012. Murphy published widely in the field of archeology and in 2008 was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Archeological Society of Ohio. He was known to Ohio collectors as one of the state’s foremost experts on the topic of Ohio pottery. He was also an avid collector who was always willing to share his extensive knowledge of the subject. He was employed for over 20 years at the Ohio State University library.

Biographical note courtesy of Professor Robert Treichler.

The potter known as Dave the Slave was born circa 1800 in an area devoted to pottery making. The Edgefield District of South Carolina had the clay, workforce and demand to make it the area’s pottery capital. Large pottery factories dotted the district, most operating with slave labor. Their products were essential to life on the early to mid-19th century plantation where pottery served as refrigerator, Mason jar and dinnerware.

Dave was the district’s most celebrated African American potter. He was literate when teaching slaves to read was illegal. He signed his work in cursive while others merely used an identifying mark. Skilled as a typesetter, he also worked at The Edgefield Hive, a local newspaper run by the Landrum family, his owners for a time. He threw 40-gallon pots from coiled clay, an astounding feat requiring great physical strength and agility. His artistry, knowledge of the Bible, defiance and sense of humor made him famous in his own time.

What set Dave apart and made his work highly collectible was his poetry. Not only did he include his name, production date and his master’s name on his pottery, but Dave also added two or four line rhyming couplets to the shoulder of a few jugs and jars. Twenty-seven poems have been identified, some appearing twice. There may be others. For 16 years, from 1841 to 1856, there is no evidence of Dave’s poetry. His silence occurred during his servitude to the Landrums and may have been related to a suppressed slave uprising in nearby Augusta, Georgia in 1841. During his lifetime Dave was bought, sold and traded between five different families.

In the past few years as prices for Dave’s pottery have skyrocketed, more of his jugs, jars and pitchers have surfaced. Charlton Hall Galleries in Columbia, South Carolina, has developed a reputation as the place to sell Dave’s work. When they sold an 1840 poem jar for $155,250 (with buyer’s premium) in December 2004, Charlton Hall set a record for a Dave pot (p4A item C225921).

Collectors and dealers classify Dave’s pottery as attributed to him, strongly attributed, marked LM, signed and poems with prices increasing from attributed to poetry. With a trained eye, collectors can separate Dave’s work from other Edgefield District makers. Unsigned jars typically have thick walls, rolled rims, high shoulders, a double incised shoulder ridge, an incised horseshoe or other signs. It seems safe to say that pots marked only with “LM” (for Lewis Miles, one of Dave’s owners) are Dave’s. Pots signed by Dave are usually also dated and marked LM.

The first Dave pot was produced circa 1827; the last was dated 1864. Dave was emancipated in 1860, took the name Dave Drake and died, one Edgefield historian speculates, in the 1870′s or possibly later.

Reference Note by p4A Contributing Editor Pete Prunkl.

Shimuel was a man of the times. He was a Justice of the Peace, fought in the Creek Indian War, and was a Confederate soldier. His only sibling, John, died as a POW at Camp Douglas, Illinois. His two sons continued to run the business after their father passed on. He is buried at the Wayfare Primitive Baptist Cemetery, Cow Creek, Echols County, Georgia. (Information provided to p4A by a granddaughter of Shimuel Timmerman.)

Ohio potter Prosper Rich produced stoneware products at New Castle (originally named West Liberty, later Caldersburg, and then New Castle, in Coshocton County), in the late 1850′s. He moved a pottery operation to Roscoe Village (also Coshocton County) in the 1860′s. He purchased this Roscoe Village property from George Bagnall about 1869. Rich purchased additional local property in 1870 and 1871. Caroline (Kate) Rich, Prosper and Melissa Rich’s daughter, married G. A. McDonald in 1858. She purchased land from him in 1877.

Sources: Coshocton Historical Collections, by W. C. Hunt, 1876, page 107; History of Coshocton County Ohio, by N. N. Hill, Jr., 1881, page 574; and Roscoe Generations – Regeneration, by Lorie Porter, 1991, pages 156-7, 242.

information courtesy of Mary (Mrs. Tom) Stream.