Anchor Pottery Mark Query

by Amy
(Indiana)

Anchor Pottery Mark Query:- Hi! I started working at a thrift store a few months ago for fun and as a result have become increasingly interested in taking up amateur antiquing as a hobby.

I have tried to do a little research online to help me find out how to translate symbols etc. but there is SO MUCH TO LEARN!!!!!!!

This is by FAAAAR the most helpful site I've found!

I've been taking notes. So many times customers come in and complain that the managers at the thrift store price worthless things too highly and very valuable pieces obnoxiously low.

Call me a brat... but I'm going to try to take advantage of that!! No one can be an expert on EVERYTHING! I think I am going to concentrate on ceramic pieces and possibly glass wares.

I just bought my first piece to "play with" and here are the pics. It cost a dollar but after my employee discount I only paid approximately 80 cents after tax. lol. Can't beat that!!!

It kills me to watch some of the things go through there for pennies that look so potentially valuable to me. But I am ignorant on the subject yet trying to become less and less so as time goes by.

This piece just spoke to me b/c it appears to ME to be in such good condition...no hairline cracks anywhere...nearly perfect to my untrained eye if not perfect...appears handpainted...the symbol at the bottom appears handpainted and there are no made in or country name stamps on it.

It appears to be a decorative piece to me.... anyway... what do you make of it?

Can you identify the marking?

Amy

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Reply from Peter (admin) below - just scroll down

HOW I MADE MONEY FROM BITS & BOBS OF OLD CHINA .....more

Reply by Peter (admin)

To:- Anchor Pottery Mark Query

Hi Amy

Welcome to the site. Sounds to me like you have the will to succeed, plus the other vital ingredient - ENTHUSIASM!

Also sounds like you got 'the bug' bad and there's no stopping you now...

There was a famous US pottery firm called the Anchor Pottery based in Trenton, New Jersey. Maybe this piece was one of theirs, as I know they used just an anchor by itself sometimes (they closed in 1916 though).

The lattice work reminds me of American firm Knowles Taylor Knowles who had raised self-colored lattice work on their Lotus ware. Maybe Anchor Pottery were doing an 'homage' to KTK (who were quality leaders).

In the UK and Europe there were a lot of firms using anchor marks, but normally they had more than just a simple anchor, unless they were really really old wares - like Bow, or Chelsea or Derby or Worcester or Duc de Penthievre, or Ludwig Wessel or Geminiano Cozzi or... (we are talking 1700's, we are talking museum pieces, fantastically valuable).

I think to expand your knowledge, you need to get hold of two or three top reference books like Godden's encyclopedias and Miller's guide to Pottery & Porcelain Marks. Put them on your birthday & Christmas lists and you will soon be 'cookin' and before you know it, gaining in knowledge every day.

Make it your obsession and one day, you might be an antiquarian appraiser or museum curator or antique dealer. We all start somewhere.

Peter (admin)

p.s. The following page is a 'must see' if you are researching fine china - for value and identification:-

Researching the identity and value of antique and vintage fine china.

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