Extremely Rare Albany-Slip-Glazed Stoneware Temperance Jug, Incised "B / 1885" and "Bray / 1885," Simeon L. Bray, Evansville, IN, 1885, semi-ovoid jug with tall neck and semi-squared spout, the surface heavily-incised to resemble tree bark, the handle modeled and incised in the form of a monkey curiously ascending the spout to look inside. The body of the jug is further decorated with a hand-modeled and applied snake, lizard, and turtle. The vessel's surface features a light Albany slip wash, while the figures are heavily-coated in dark-brown Albany slip. There appears to be an additional light salt glaze over the entire piece. The incised initial and date, "B 1885," appear along one side of the jug and the underside is incised "Bray / 1885." The Bray brothers, Simeon, J. Wallace, and William, were all potters raised in Anna, Illinois, and appear as children living there in the 1860 census. The itinerance of the three potter-brothers is evidenced in census and city directories of the period. Simeon, the oldest of the three, is listed in the 1870 census as a "Turner in pottery" working in Anna, where he presumably adopted the temperance jug form in his production at Wallace and Cornwall Kirkpatricks' Anna Pottery. Ten years later, Simeon appears as a potter in Evansville, Indiana, along with his brother, William; William is also shown working in Mound City, Illinois, the same year. Wallace Bray is listed in the 1880 census as a "clay artist" working in Metropolis, Illinois, assumedly at Metropolis Pottery, and in the 1890 Paducah, Kentucky, city directory as a potter. In all, less than ten Bray family temperance jugs have been documented, making them significantly rarer than the Kirkpatrick examples on which they are based. This jug is highly important to this body of work as it is the only example that that we have seen inscribed with a full Bray name, serving as a "rosetta stone" for attribution of related examples. This jug survives in rarely-found excellent, essentially as-made condition. Temperance jugs, because of their delicate applied work, typically succumbed to losses in the firing or from use. H 7 5/8".
