The Fearless Female blog prompt for March 6 is:Describe an heirloom you may have inherited from a female ancestor (wedding ring or other jewelry, china, clothing, etc.) If you don’t have any, then write about a specific object you remember from your mother or grandmother, or aunt (a scarf, a hat, cooking utensil, furniture, etc.)
The photograph shows some rings that belonged to my maternal grandmother, Sara Wolfe Guokas Archibald, and a sugar bowl that belonged to my paternal grandmother, Elizabeth Massmann Pape.
The ring on the left (an unusual design with one large cubic zirconium surrounded by four smaller ones) is one my grandmother gave me the summer before she passed away in November 1997. The one on the right was given to me after her death by my mother. It's gold with real diamonds - supposedly my grandmother had it made from her rings from her two husbands. It's the only diamonds I have so it's pretty special to me. I used to wear her watch as well (also given to me by my mother after my grandmother's death), but recently it quit working and is not repairable.
The sugar bowl is part of a set my grandmother had when she was a newlywed. After my grandfather passed away in 1970, I believe she started giving pieces of the set to her granddaughters (and grandsons?) as they married, but I'm not entirely sure about this. Hoping some of my first cousins will read this post and let me know.
I'm glad to have done this post as I looked more closely at the sugar bowl. It has a Pickard trademark on the bottom (specifically, #11 from 1925-1930). At the time the company was based in Chicago and specialized in hand-painted designs decorated with 24-carat gold. You can see more examples of this beautiful china here.
© Amanda Pape - 2010
As nearly as I can remember, I think this set went to my sister Moe, since deceased. So perhaps one of her daughters has it.
ReplyDeleteBeautiful pieces worth posting - a lovely photograph of them. Thank you.
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