Tique Talk by Marianne Dow

Who's Hermione? Hermione Pottery / California Pottery / Abstract Artist / Hermione Palmer Chase

Finding Lady Godiva's Sculptor: My Wild Research Ride

Here's a sweet little pottery figurine of Lady Godiva. The signature ''HELEN'', above, didn't tell me much, but luckily I did find a very similar figurine of a blonde nudie-cutie-patootie on a grey horse, below, which is incised with 'Lady Godiva Hermione'.

I feel pretty confident that both figures are by the same artist, even though they have different signature/marks.

[Sold on ebay 1/29/2013 - see here in Worthpoint's archive SOLD $60.99

Hermione Pottery? Who the heck is Hermione?

Thanks to google, I found out several sources with a variety of info-tidbits about Hermione Ruth Palmer Chase.

It's going to be a Wild Ride!

In searching all different combinations of names and subjects, I tend to go off on tangents, following one concept to another, winding up miles from where I started, and nowhere near where I'd hoped to go, but sometimes winding up in a far more interesting place than I'd imagined. It's fun!

Some of this information seems valid, some seems questionable. I'll try to suss it out here, and share my thoughts, and some source links.

Fact or fiction? Salted, Please.

There are several ''facts'' that have become Hermione internet-lore that I don't think are true. They have just been copy-pasted repeatedly by sellers of Hermione pieces, and by repetition have become accepted as fact. That is understandable. Not very many people are crazy enough to spend as many hours as I did researching a little figurine, when they just want to sell it quickly and be done with it.

I'm sure a lot of it is true, and I don't necessarily have all the facts either. So perhaps you should sprinkle the proverbial grains of salt as you read my post...

Hermione Ruth Palmer:

She was born in San Francisco in 1905 and grew up in Berkeley, California.
Died Dec. 16, 1987 in Glendale, Calif. (No obituary online).
She went to college at UC Berkeley
She did illustrations for magazines from 1929 until about 1942 -- College Humor, Life Magazine, Ballyhoo, and American Weekly
She is a Lifetime Member of the Society of Illustrators.

It was during college that she supposedly created the ''nationally syndicated'' college-paper cartoon called Co-Ed Cora Says.
But the only reference I found for the Cora cartoon was in The Rice Institute's 1929 school paper, The Thresher. That signature sure looks like Luella Davis to me. Pass the salt.

Hermione was also into pottery sculpting, working out of Berkeley's famous California Faience studio.
At some point Hermione moved to Glendale, Calif.
In 1942, opened her pottery business in the upscale Los Feliz neighborhood.

Hermione Pottery examples:

Hermione's Patent

Check out the wonderful ceramic head vases above. These are what most pottery collectors know Hermione for. They are unmistakeable, with their real wire curly hair-dos.

The process of embedding those wire curls was Hermione Palmer's invention, which she patented in 1939.
I found her middle name, Ruth, in a copyright filing.

So... 2 facts. No salt needed.

Now for something saltier...

She married a Mr. Chase in 1955 -- but
I could find no mention online of her wedding, or any mention of her husband's first name.
It is also noted online that Mr. Chase passed away only 2 months after their wedding. No other marriages are mentioned.
It's written that her husband, the afore-mentioned Mr. Chase, was connected with Chase Bank. But Chase Bank was NOT founded by a family named Chase.
Per wikipedia:

Chase National Bank was formed in 1877 by John Thompson It was named after former United States Treasury Secretary and Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase although Chase did not have a connection with the bank.

Her husband could have been a descendant of Salmon P. Chase...

HERMIONE paintings:

Signature is HERMIONE

Later in her artistic career, in the 1960s, she studied painting at L.A.'s Otis College of Art and design, along with Sister Mary Corita.
She painted and exhibited in the 1960's and 1970's, and became a listed artist, known for her colorful abstract paintings.
Note: The signature on paintings, HAPalmer is often mistaken for HRPalmer (Discussion of signatures)
But you can see in the photos of her paintings, above, that Hermione's signature is her name written out, Hermione.
Obviously, she is neither artist, H.A. Palmer, or Herman Palmer.

HAPalmer signature is not HRPalmer, and thus NOT Hermione Palmer's.

__________________________

And now for some stuff I came up with that is very unlikely to have anything at all to do with Hermione but will now be added to her lore. Sorry, I just can't help it.

Hermione was known to name her pieces, and mine is marked HELEN. Why not Godiva?

My guess is that the famous Burlesque Queen SALLY RAND was known for doing a Godiva-esque nude horse back ride in her act. Sally Rand was very popular, and living/working in California, during the time that Hermione was making her pottery... and Sally's birth name was... wait for it... HELEN -- tada! -- Info about Sally Rand

Or could it possibly have anything to do with Dr. Seuss? Seuss, aka Theodore Geisel, was married to a Helen Palmer - a relative of Hermione's perhaps??? In 1939 Geisel wrote Dr. Seuss's Seven Lady Godivas: The True Facts Concerning History's Barest Family. [Source]

I said this was a wild ride!

But seriously... obviously, I'm reaching here, grasping at shiny-blonde-straws.

Dented Glass Jar: Bishop's Spoon Ledge Jar / Cooper & Co Grocers, Glasgow / History & Photos

I came across this odd looking glass jar, and thought I'd share my findings. It's an English jar, not rare, they come up on ebay for less than $20.00. And the history of the jar is not a mystery, but it's still an interesting piece.

The jar has lots of embossing on 2 sides.

On one panel you see a raised hand pointing to the dented corner.

Embossing reads: SPOON LEDGE / BISHOP'S PATENT No 5040.

The adjacent panel has: COOPER & Co / GLASGOW / LIVERPOOL / LONDON / ETC.

The base is embossed: GLASS MADE IN FRANCE

The jar has a dent, similar to a dent-milk bottle, in which the dent performs as a cream separator.

Apparently the jar was designed for honey and jam, to rest the spoon on inside the jar, so it wouldn't sink into the yummy goo and get the handle all sticky.

The jar's inventor, AH Bishop, worked for his family's large and successful Scottish grocery store company, COOPER'S.

Thomas Bishop was born in Hamilton, Lanarkshire, and founded a grocery business that also ran tea rooms in Glasgow.
The business rivalled the similar and contemporary enterprise of Thomas J. Lipton (1850-1931), both being founded on importing and marketing tea in Glasgow.
Bishop's firm was named Cooper's after his aunt who lent him money to start the business.
On his death it became a public company and his son Andrew Henderson Bishop was then Chairman; he also had a passion as an amateur archaeologist (q.v.).
Having been early pioneers of the supermarket system the company became part of a larger chain, Coopers Fine-Fare, in 1955.

Interior of Coopers. [Source]

The interior of Cooper & Co's grocery shop in Great Western Road, c 1890s.

Cooper & Co was founded by Thomas Bishop in 1871 and became one of Scotland's leading grocery shop chains.

The building at 499 Great Western Road, famous for its French Renaissance facade and clock tower, was erected in 1886 and contained beautiful fixtures and fittings. The pillars are decorated with garlands of fruit and female faces at the bottom, with intricate plasterwork leaves and swirls at the ceiling.

The floor has the typical multi-coloured tiling of the period. There are a wide variety of goods on display including fresh fruit and vegetables, tinned and bottled foodstuffs, mops and brushes.

The shop closed in the early 1980s and the premises were converted for use as a pub.

More photos and the story of the what happened to the original tea room and Cooper Grocery store building here.

Portraits of Thomas Bishop and Arthur Bishop:

Portrait of AH BISHOP
Arthur Henderson Bishop (1874 – 1957)

Combined participation in the family business with a keen interest in amateur archaeology and collecting.
In his time, he had one of the largest pre-historic collections in Scotland.
In 1951, the year the University of Glasgow celebrated its quincentenary, Bishop gifted his collection of prehistoric artefacts from Great Britain and the Continent to the Hunterian Museum.
Following the death of his wife, he moved to Switzerland in 1941 and remained there until his death in 1957

Arthur Bishop also had a famous home, Thornton Hall, and a fondness for curling.

He moved to Thorntonhall (the town) in 1904 when he bought Thornton Hall, the estate home. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorntonhall
He laid out extensive gardens and a floodlit curling rink, which was powered by his own plant.
A.H.Bishop first appears in the minutes of Haremyres Curling Club in 1904 when he paid ten shillings as an occasional member of the Haremyres Curling Club.
In 1930 he was elected Honorary President of the club which office he held untill 1954.
The Henderson Bishop has to be the most prestigious ladies curling competition held in Scotland
Source: Curling Contest -- http://www.bordericerink.co.uk/id108.html

The Henderson Bishop Ladies Curling Trophy

Curling history here - http://curlinghistory.blogspot.com/

Arthur Bishop was the son of the founder of Cooper & Co. wholesale grocer.
He married Mary McAlpine in 1897 and set up home at Burncroft.
In 1904 he bought Thornton Hall where he maintained an interest in pig breeding. The sties were surprisingly close to the house.
He laid out extensive gardens and a floodlit curling rink, powered by his own plant.
He extended the railroad station platform and built his own entrance gate. In the sidings he kept a private rail car which could be hurriedly coupled to the Glasgow train.
In 1939 Bishop sold Thorntonhall and the advent of World War II in 1939 changed Thorntonhall for all time.

The Apollo Chocolates ~ F.H. Roberts Candy Co. Boston Wilmington MA

I picked up this great little display jar at a bottle show, embossed simply with THE APOLLO. I was pretty sure it was a candy jar, but researching it was a little bit of a project, as ''The Apollo'' brings up a lot of hits for ''Show Time At the Apollo'', and of course there's the Apollo Space Program. And I didn't know it was actually ''The Apollo Chocolates'' made by the FH Roberts Candy Co.

But eventually I fell down the right rabbit hole, and found some info about FH Roberts, the company and the man, as well as lots of The Apollo Chocolates collectibles - boxes, jars, tins, signs, and advertising. My ''collection'' consists of the above jar, a screw-top jar, and a bonbon spoon (details below). Let's just say the rest of the items below are from my ''virtual collection''.

FH Roberts was involved in many candy companies. He started selling his Apollo Chocolates in 1903, and sold the business after WWI, but it continued on in the same name. Fred H. Roberts passed away in 1920.

My small (approx. 6" tall) clear glass jar.

This small (approx. 6" tall) SCA ground lip jar was the 2nd addition to my Apollo collection.

This amethyst colored jar is a variation of the clear one I have. This one is also base embossed FH Roberts Boston. Sadly, I didn't win the bid on it.