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Texas Food Safe

Currency:USD Category:Antiques Start Price:500.00 USD Estimated At:1,000.00 - 3,000.00 USD
Texas Food Safe
All items sold as is where is. See photos for condition, email info@burleyauction.com or call 830-629-9280 (Prior to sale day) if you have specific condition questions.
Pine Ash and Cypress. Raised construction. Food safe measures 71" tall, 39 1/2" wide, 14" deep. This early Texas raised two-door over two-drawer pie safe was handcrafted in perhaps the last quarter of the 19th century. The pie safe measures 71” tall, 45-1/2” wide, and 12-1/2” deep. It has mortise and tenon and groove joinery. Cut nails reinforce many of the joints and it has two removable shelves. The pie safe was originally painted white is made of pine or ash. The species is somewhat difficult to determine as the piece was a walnut stained finish. The two most outstanding features of this pie safe are its cornice and legs. The molding, probably machined, measures 4-1/4” wide and forms a pronounced crown to the piece consisting of cyma recta over a cavetto molding. The four styles (legs) anchor the case to which two hand-planned dados accept the tenon rails.
The mortise and tenon doors measure 17” wide and 36” long. They have two horizontal oriented rectangular screened panels (originally cloth) over a single rectangular flat panel. The wooden panels with interior chamfer are oriented vertically. The outside styles have a single bead mold and are attached by two one-inch iron butt hinges. An astragal (probably 2” wide) is missing from the right door as evidenced by the many existing nail holes. The drawer fronts are flush mounted and measure 3-3/4” tall, 14-3/4” wide and 13-1/2” deep. The box is joined with wire and cut nails. The chamfered bottom floats in their frame. A single round pegged knob is located in the center of each face.
The side panels are somewhat similar in style to the doors as they have the two screens over a much larger flat wooden panel (also interior chamfering), while the backboards as well as other framework have a tongue and groove joinery, secured with cut nails.
Provenance: This raised pie safe used for many years in the Bergman family home, who resided in Comfort, Kendall. He pie safe cannot be attributed to a single craftsman. Several cabinetmakers maintained shops in Comfort during the second half of the 19th Century. Perhaps the most active was Otto Brinkmann, a German immigrant from Westphalia. He operated a shop during the 1870’s and it is reported be built pie safes, among other pieces