George Christian Gebelein portfolio of designs

Collection

Identifier: Col-0021

Scope and Contents

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The collection consists of drawings, mostly watercolor, for a wide variety of silver work and jewelry, including designs of reproduction English and colonial pieces, as well as original designs showing the influence of the Arts and Crafts Movement. Over half of the drawings show tea and coffee services, including creamers, sugar bowls, and waste bowls. There are, in addition, depictions of pitchers, candlesticks, plaques, frames, urns, and ceremonial cups. Some of the leaves are annotated in pencil, revealing the names of those who commissioned Gebelein's work, prices, and directions for improving the way an object was to look. A few have Gebelein's small paper labels affixed to the reverse. The drawings from the 1930s and 1940s may have been done by Walter Edward Werner, who did a great deal of that sort of work during those years.

The jewelry designs are for bar pins, stick pins, brooches, earrings, pendants, necklaces, bracelets, a watch, watch fobs or seals, rings, cuff links, etc. Some are marked with the initials G.E.G., one is dated 1914, some betray an influence of Art Deco work, and some indicate for whom the piece was designed. A number of the jewelry designs include notes about which stones were to be used and a few indicate that the customer would supply the stones. Finally, prices are recorded on some of the drawings. It is not known who executed the jewelry designs. The jewelry designs have been scanned.

In addition, there are a few printed items: an article about Gebelein’s work, and an advertisement and a price list for his silver lined copper bowls. As well, the collection includes a copy of the finding aid for the Gebelein papers held by the Henry Ford Museum and photocopies of some of the papers held by the Henry Ford, chiefly dealing with jewelry design.

Much of this collection is also available on microfilm, reel number 3017.

Dates

Creation: 1903-1930s

Conditions Governing Access

Collection is open to the public.

Conditions Governing Use

Permission to use materials held by the Henry Ford Museum must be obtained from that institution.

Biographical / Historical

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George Christian Gebelein, perhaps America's foremost silversmith of the 20th century, has been referred to as "the modern Paul Revere." He was born in Germany in 1878, the son of Margeretha Solger and Johann Nicolaus Gebelein. The family moved to the United States shortly after his birth, settling in Cambridge, Massachusetts. George Gebelein graduated from the Harvard Grammar School in June 1893.

After graduation, Gebelein worked briefly at a woolen mill and then began an apprenticeship in silversmithing at Goodnow and Jenks of Boston. There he developed a passion for handcrafted silver. After working for several other silversmiths, including Tiffany’s, Gebelein opened his own silversmithing and jewelry business at 79 Chestnut Street, Boston, in 1909. Here, he sold not only his own work, but also those of his assistants, items produced by other companies, and antique silver goods, as well as pewter, brass, and copper ware. In addition, he crafted domestic and ecclesiastical silver, flatware, and such presentation pieces as trophies and cups, including the Harvard Cup. Gebelein employed a jewelry designer, but in all likelihood the jewelry settings themselves were probably done elsewhere. During his early years in business, Gebelein taught silversmithing to a select group of pupils.

During his fifty-year career, Gebelein exhibited his work at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Museum, and the Currier Gallery of Art. The Boston Society of Arts and Crafts awarded him its Master Craftsman's Medal, and he garnered other honors from the Art Institute of Chicago, and at the Panama Pacific Exposition of 1915. In addition to producing items for private individuals, Gebelein had commissions from the United States Military Academy at West Point, the College of William and Mary, and the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C.

In 1901, Gebelein married Eva May Pelren, the daughter of Rosa and Moses Pelren, of Concord, New Hampshire. They raised four sons and three daughters at their home in Wellesley Hills, outside Boston. One son worked in his father’s shop, although not as a silversmith. After George Gebelein died in 1945, his family kept the business going, but in 1984 it was sold.

For more information about George Gebelein’s life and work, see George Christian Gebelein, Boston Silversmith, 1878-1945, by Magaretha Gebelein Leighton (Boston: The Author, 1976), and George Christian Gebelein: The Craft and Business of a “Modern Paul Revere,” by Alexandra Deutsch, a 1995 thesis done in the Winterthur Program in Early American Culture.

As many retailers do, George Gebelein used a price code for his products. His code used the phrase TRADEQUICK, with each letter corresponding to the numbers 1-0; thus a T would stand in for the number 1, Q stood for the number 6, etc. An item priced QAK cost $630.

Partial Extent

21 boxes

Language of Materials

English

Metadata Rights Declarations

License: This record is made available under an Universal 1.0 Public Domain Dedication Creative Commons license.

Additional Description

Arrangement

Silver drawings are arranged by type of object depicted and then roughly in accession number order, in Boxes 1-17. Oversized silver drawings, listed at the beginning of this inventory, are in map case drawers. Drawings of jewelry are in Boxes 18-20 and are arranged by size and then by type of jewelry shown. Scans of these designs are found in Box 21 and should be used before the original designs. Materials from the Henry Ford Museum are also in Box 21.