Outstanding and Important Twenty-Gallon Tapered Stoneware Pot with Profuse Freehand Cobalt Decoration, Stenciled "EXCELSIOR WORKS / Isaac Hewitt, Jr. / RICES LANDING, PA", circa 1875, exceptionally large-sized, tapered pot with semi-rounded rim and thick lug handles, decorated with an undulating vine bearing large tulips and graduated leaves above the stenciled maker's mark, "EXCELSIOR WORKS / Isaac Hewitt, Jr. / RICES, LANDING, PA", flanked by curving flourishes on each side. Base decorated with a freehand "20" flanked by graduated leaves. Freehand straight and wavy line decoration to shoulder, midsection, and base. Large, circular cobalt highlights to handle terminals. Featuring an extremely rare, squat-shaped form with tapered sides, this monumental pot gained notoriety for its use as the frontispiece of Carmen and Marie Guappone's 1992 book, America's Cobalt Decorated Stoneware- Special Edition: Book III A Pictorial Reference Price Guide, in which it received a $100,000 valuation. It is regarded as the finest example of Isaac Hewitt, Jr. stoneware known. While twenty-gallon jars were produced in Western Pennsylvania with some regularity, examples of this stylish form are virtually nonexistent. Literature: Illustrated on the first page and frontispiece of Guappone and Guappone, America's Cobalt Decorated Stoneware- Special Edition: Book III: A Pictorial Reference Guide. Very nice condition. Hairlines to one handle. A fairly innocuous 2 1/2" in-the-firing contact mark to one side. An 8" in-the-firing separation line on interior, not visible on exterior. Some surface lines in underside, not visible on interior and probably in-the-firing. H 18 1/2" ; Diameter 20 1/2".
