Platter

This green and white transfer-printed earthenware platter made by the Staffordshire firm of Francis Morley & Co. features a view of sailing vessels at port from a series of views titled "American Marine." The series was also printed in monochrome brown, blue and red and later copied, with slight changes, by the firm's successor, G. L. Ashworth Bros. Ltd. (1860–present). The American Wing's collection contains a brown and white plate, 14.102.309, from the Ashworth series. Although the central views differ, the borders of the Morley platter and Ashworth plate are quite similar. Both feature medallions of steamships and sailboats representing the various types of water transportation available to nineteenth-century travelers as waterways quickly became the site of nautical innovation and expanding commercial trade. Steamboats were a particularly common theme on transfer-printed wares and appear again, for example, on a plate, 14.102.244, by James & Ralph Clews (ca. 1815–1834) and on two pieces, 14.102.102 and 16.83.9, by Enoch Wood & Sons (1818–1846). Staffordshire potters also recorded the development of many other significant modes of early American travel, including ferryboats (see, e.g., 10.57.14), horse-drawn barges (see, e.g., 14.102.247), horse-drawn chaises or sedan chairs (see, e.g., 14.102.240), stagecoaches (see, e.g., 10.57.11), steam locomotives (see, e.g., 14.102.115) and travel via the Erie Canal (see, e.g., 14.102.82). Refer to the Dictionary for a definition of the term "transfer printing" and for information about Morley and the other above-mentioned firms.