THE OWL AT THE BRIDGE
Books - Appraisals - Gorham Silver
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SAMUEL J. HOUGH - PENELOPE R. O. HOUGH

The Gorham Centerpiece NLH

The NLH Centerpiece, a special order for the J. C. Grogan Company of Pittsburgh, was one of a series of centerpieces made for that firm, for all of which Grogan provided the glass.

The NLH (see costing slip, box 66) was completed 26 September 1908. The silver for it weighed twenty-seven troy ounces nine pennyweight, valued at $19.22. The silver was drawn (thirty-five minutes; twenty-three cents), spun (four hours, $1.60), and some cast (four hours, $2.00). The cast silver was chased for eighteen and a quarter hours ($9.12) by chaser #10.

This was Otto Colmetz, who worked for Gorham from 17 May 1891 until 1919. Colmetz was born in 1863 in Australia, where his parents had transported themselves from Prussia (his daughter-in-law, interviewed when in her  nineties by this writer, remembered an ostrich egg on a table in the Colmetz home). Otto Colmetz came to Gorham from New York and encouraged his friend, Charles Thomae, to join the Company in 1897. (Thomae later left to work for Watson in Attleboro, Massachusetts, and ultimately set up his own, still existing, silver firm.) Colmetz remained in Providence until his son, Richard, was graduated from Brown University in 1910 (and married Thomae's daughter), and then went on to Attleboro himself, although he returned to Providence by 1916. He died in Providence in March 1950 at age 87.

The silver was pierced for six hours ($1.80).

I assume that after all this work the glass and silver were sent to a silversmith in room M3, who required fifteen hours to fashion the centerpiece.

It was then bobbed (an hour and a quarter; thirty-one cents), green-rouge polished (a half hour; fifteen cents), and then finished for a half hour (fifteen cents).

Direct silver and labor costs came to $41.33. To this were added 20% overhead, $8.27; 40% profit, $16.53; and $3.30 for administrative costs for a total of $69.43. The factory price set for Grogan was $72.00.