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The Potter Is in!
In this first part of a two-part episode, Historic Bethabara Park's current potter, Stuart Marshall, provides a brief history of the pottery trade and potters of Bethabara from the 1700s to the 1800s, their differing pottery styles, and the importance of their work.
Gottfried Aust: Born in Europe, Aust broke away from the family trade of waving to train to become a potter in Herrnhut, Germany, where he also joined the Moravian Church. By the 1750s, he was working in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Arriving in 1755, Aust was the first potter to set up shop in the newly established town of Bethabara. He stayed in Bethabara until 1771 when the Moravian Church begins moving operations to Salem. Aust had a few apprentices working under him.
Rudolph Christ: By 1766, a teenage Christ was working for Aust in the Bethabara pottery shop. Christ and Aust held a tense relationship often resulting in Christ requesting to be sent away to work in other settlements or to work in other shops.
Peter Oliver: Born enslaved, he became bound to the Salem Single Brothers for labor and learned the pottery trade. He would come to work under Christ at the Bethabara pottery shop. Oliver eventually purchased his own freedom at least partly through his work as a potter.
John Butner: Butner lived in Wachovia during the 19th Century and operated the 1782 brick pottery shop that is still standing at Historic Bethabara Park as well as holding different jobs in the town. He and his son, Joseph, carry the pottery tradition well into the 19th Century.
Bibliography & Further Reading:
Chipstone---Ceramics in America:
Luke Beckerdite and Johanna Brown: Eighteenth-Century Earthenware from North Carolina: The Moravian Tradition Reconsidered
Mary Farrell: Making North Carolina Earthenware
Alain C. Outlaw: The Mount Shepherd Pottery Site, Randolph County, North Carolina
Stephen C. Compton, “Research Note: The Eighteenth-Century Potters of Salisburyand Rowan County, North Carolina,” MESDA Journal Vol 39 (2018)
Stephen C. Compton, North Carolina's Moravian Potters: The Art and Mystery of Pottery-Making in Wachovia (Fonthill Media LLC: America Through Time, 2019)
John Bivins, The Moravian Potters in North Carolina (Chapel Hill: UNC Press for Old Salem, Inc., 1972)
Adelaide Fries, ed.,: Records of the Moravians in North Carolina Vol. 1
Adelaide Fries, ed.,: Records of the Moravians in NC, Vol. 3, p. 1231
Daniel B. Thorpe, The Moravian Community in Colonial North Carolina: Pluralism on the Southern Frontier (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1989)
Charles G. Zug III, Turners and Burners: The Folk Potters of North Carolina (Chapel Hill: UNC Press, 1986).
Other links:
David Drake
MESDA piece: https://mesda.org/exhibit/storage-jar/
Music (Freemusicarcive.o
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In this first part of a two-part episode, Historic Bethabara Park's current potter, Stuart Marshall, provides a brief history of the pottery trade and potters of Bethabara from the 1700s to the 1800s, their differing pottery styles, and the importance of their work.
Gottfried Aust: Born in Europe, Aust broke away from the family trade of waving to train to become a potter in Herrnhut, Germany, where he also joined the Moravian Church. By the 1750s, he was working in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Arriving in 1755, Aust was the first potter to set up shop in the newly established town of Bethabara. He stayed in Bethabara until 1771 when the Moravian Church begins moving operations to Salem. Aust had a few apprentices working under him.
Rudolph Christ: By 1766, a teenage Christ was working for Aust in the Bethabara pottery shop. Christ and Aust held a tense relationship often resulting in Christ requesting to be sent away to work in other settlements or to work in other shops.
Peter Oliver: Born enslaved, he became bound to the Salem Single Brothers for labor and learned the pottery trade. He would come to work under Christ at the Bethabara pottery shop. Oliver eventually purchased his own freedom at least partly through his work as a potter.
John Butner: Butner lived in Wachovia during the 19th Century and operated the 1782 brick pottery shop that is still standing at Historic Bethabara Park as well as holding different jobs in the town. He and his son, Joseph, carry the pottery tradition well into the 19th Century.
Bibliography & Further Reading:
Chipstone---Ceramics in America:
Luke Beckerdite and Johanna Brown: Eighteenth-Century Earthenware from North Carolina: The Moravian Tradition Reconsidered
Mary Farrell: Making North Carolina Earthenware
Alain C. Outlaw: The Mount Shepherd Pottery Site, Randolph County, North Carolina
Stephen C. Compton, “Research Note: The Eighteenth-Century Potters of Salisburyand Rowan County, North Carolina,” MESDA Journal Vol 39 (2018)
Stephen C. Compton, North Carolina's Moravian Potters: The Art and Mystery of Pottery-Making in Wachovia (Fonthill Media LLC: America Through Time, 2019)
John Bivins, The Moravian Potters in North Carolina (Chapel Hill: UNC Press for Old Salem, Inc., 1972)
Adelaide Fries, ed.,: Records of the Moravians in North Carolina Vol. 1
Adelaide Fries, ed.,: Records of the Moravians in NC, Vol. 3, p. 1231
Daniel B. Thorpe, The Moravian Community in Colonial North Carolina: Pluralism on the Southern Frontier (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1989)
Charles G. Zug III, Turners and Burners: The Folk Potters of North Carolina (Chapel Hill: UNC Press, 1986).
Other links:
David Drake
MESDA piece: https://mesda.org/exhibit/storage-jar/
Music (Freemusicarcive.o