Harry Piers: Museum Maker

Notes from Piers Accession Book:

Scientific Name: / Common Name:  Brass, handmade "Warming-pan", about a hundred years old. (A warming-pan was a metal vessel with a hinged cover, for containing live coals, for warming the sheets of a bed in winter.  This household utensil, formerly well known, went out of general use probably about 1830 or 1840).  The rather long wooden handle is missing.

Locality and When Collected:  From southwestern part of Nova Scotia; collected a few years ago

Collector (c) Donor (d):  Bought from Dockrill Bros., Halifax, dealers in antique furniture for $3.00

Received:  1923 Nov 6

Quantity:  1

Remarks: This warming-pan is precisely of the same scope and design as the one illustrated in Esther Singleton's Furniture of Our Forefathers, opp. Page 254  See also acc no. 6700

Diameter of pan ……………………... 11 inches.
Length of socket for handle ……….. 4 1/4 ins.
Probable length of wooden handle 2 ft.  To 2 ft. 6 ins. ?24 ins. to 30 ins.

The hinged cover is perforated with 3 groups of 4 holes each, and ornamented with incised design representing conventional floral forms.  The outside of the bottom has many incised concentric circles.

Date Accessioned: 6 November 1923

Reference: Harry Piers number 5366  Nova Scotia Museum History Collection