1. "Victorian Interior"
Posted by Kat on Jan-23rd-03 at 2:49 PM

In the Victorian Vistas book vol.II, there are 2 pages of photo's of Col. Richard Borden's house interior, and look at all the STUFF stuffed in there! Why didn't the Borden home resemble this type of cluttered rooms? This depiction is from 1870.

I always wondered about that too, the Victorians were
so sensual in their decorating, everything was so warm &
cluttered & sometimes exotic --- 92 Second St. looks like
a hotel almost. They had the clashing patterns on the walls
and floors but not many other signs of life. In Andrew's
autopsy pic you can see a very cluttered & decorated table
in the background, that is about the only time you see
anything that looks like someone lived there, the guest room
looked stark --- and I always thought the hall looked like
a prison cell.  

Cool, thanks.  We know that in the guest room there was a camp chair at Abby's head and another chair by her feet with her work basket that didn't appear in the photos.  I have to wonder how much other gewgaws and bric-a-brac that was removed from the vicinity of the bodies when the photos were taken.  Wasn't there supposed to be a few little tables in the sitting room that were just filled with stuff?

That was the Victorian look, layer upon layer, textures and lots and lots of stuff.  The Borden house what we can see of it does look subdued, I would love to see photos of all the other rooms of that house during the 1892 time period.

On the right side of some of the sitting room pics you
can see a skirted round table that looks like the one
in the autopsy picture --- but I always thought they
did those in the dining room --- so if it was in the
dining room it was a bit cluttered, they had the dining
table & the sofa & a round side table too. That hat in
the picture of Andrew, I wonder if that could have been
Lizzie's barn visiting hat? I think I've seen those men's
style hats on Victorian women before.........

(Message last edited Jan-23rd-03  8:38 PM.)

Supposedly Abby was autopsied in the dining room and Andrew in the sitting room.
I believe they were on what's called *Undertakers Boards*.

There was a small table near the two doors on the entryway side of the room.
That straw boater on the bigger table may have been a reporters hat,
You'd think it was a Doctors as it's in a room with an autopsy going on, but I have read that at that time, *good time guys* wore that type of hat.  Maybe it was the photographers.  But not a doctor or policeman in uniform, or anyone just passing through.

(Message last edited Jan-24th-03  2:10 AM.)

Yes, I remember that table in the autopsy pic, theres that Gone-with-the-wind type of lamp and books and the hat and who knows what else.  I wonder what the rest of the sitting room looked like, looking towards the windows?  How much stuff may have also been crammed in that room. 

From what we DO see, I'd say not much.
One sofa against one wall with one print hanging over it, and 1 picture on the tiny wall by the entry way door?



This is sort of how it looked. It does show another chair and the little table and a  low table near the sofa.
Maybe by 1890, all those knick-knacks were not so much in vogue? I wonder what people did with their old bric-a-brac once that went out of style?

I've always thought that table shown to the right in this picture was actually pretty far away from the sofa and not so low at all.  Remember, I always argue that Victorians did not have sofa (coffee/cocktail) tables.  I have yet to see a single one.  I see coffee tables made by cutting down Victorian dining tables and other taller tables, but not genuine Victorian sofa tables.  Incidentally, anybody who wonders what the Victorians did with all their old stuff should go to a few antique auctions.  Ta-da!  There it is!

The cluttered table must have been sitting in front of
a fireplace:
http://www.lizzieandrewborden.com/autopsyassets/AJB4.jpg

In this one there is a chair & you can see the fireplace
mantle:
http://www.lizzieandrewborden.com/92SecondSt1892Assets/without%20sofa.jpg

You can see both the table & chair here:
http://www.lizzieandrewborden.com/crimesceneassets/andydead.jpg

Going by the house chart of the first floor the sitting room
was full of tables & chairs, maybe they just didn't have
many paintings & stuff on the walls.

I'd never noticed before that they had a table in front
of the sofa, that must have made whacking Andrew a little harder
if it really was anywhere near the sofa.
http://www.lizzieandrewborden.com/Housechartassets/firstfloor.gif

(Message last edited Jan-24th-03  5:38 PM.)

Yes, Edisto I see now that table depicted in the drawing is higher than the couch seating area, and being closer to us in view it would be higher still!

Back then, tho, their bric-a-brac wasn't antique?  Or was it?
Would it be donated to Salvation Army or Goodwill?  (Dumb question, I know!--but that's where my *modern* bric-a-brac goes!)--or a garage sale.

[Composed before Kimberly--not yet read]


(Message last edited Jan-24th-03  5:38 PM.)

That is funny when everyone posts at the same time!
I think I have seen "coffee" tables in Victorian decorating
books, maybe low tables were more casual than the high tea
tables? Maybe it could have been an ottoman? Something
for the "family room" not the formal parlor?

Can you get us a source?  I personally have never seen one (unless it was cut down from a taller table, which would have been done much later than Victorian times).  If you can find an original one, I'd be interested in seeing it!  I can actually remember when "coffee tables" became popular.  It would have been in the 1940s.  Admittedly, I never lived in an area that was in the vanguard of fashion, and we might have gotten them later than some communities.  But not 50 years later!
I'm sure some of that Victorian bric-a-brac was antique, but a lot of it was contemporary too.  Remember the industrial revolution.  There were factories turning out all sorts of stuff.  Some companies made the basic item in a factory and then carted it to people's homes to have hand decorations applied.  People of moderate means were able to afford all kinds of attractive items to decorate their homes.  There's an incredible amount of this "stuff" surviving today.  

(Message last edited Jan-24th-03  8:28 PM.)

Here is a low table --- 21" tall --- it is shorter than
"parlor" tables & tea tables.

http://pages.laurelridgeantiques.com/5083/PictPage/1921029405.html

0072902 - Walnut marble top coffee table, Laurel Ridge.
Price: $ 3500.00     

American Victorian furniture, 19th Century antiques. Walnut marble top coffee table attributed to Thomas Brooks. Original white carrara marble. Measures 21" tall, 40" wide, and 31" deep. Circa 1850. LAUREL RIDGE ANTIQUES.

I found my new favorite site:

http://www.heritagephotographs.com/funimages.html

http://store1.yimg.com/I/zhemgang_1714_25736461


And for laughs:

http://store1.yimg.com/I/zhemgang_1714_16127656

http://store1.yimg.com/I/zhemgang_1714_16074909

I tried to link to this site, containing the opinion of a furniture expert who agrees with my assessment.  (Actually it isn't my own assessment; I've heard and read it in a number of reliable sources.)  Couldn't get the link to work, so I'm quoting here from the Knoxville (TN) "News-Sentinel" of Nov 1, 2002:

"There are no 'antique' coffee tables although some are old
By Joe Rosson, Special to the News-Sentinel
November 1, 2002

Dear Mr. Rosson:

My uncle gave this table to me. It has a removable, clear glass top and no markings. It has a carved eagle clutching olive branches inside the top. I would appreciate any information you can give me. I love old furniture, and this is one of my favorite pieces.

Thank you, C.C.

Dear C.C.:

The word "old" can be very misleading and can mean different things to different people. To a 4-year- old, for example, his or her 30-year-old parent is truly "old," and to many under-60 collectors, anything made before they were born or when they were young is often thought of as being "old."

C.C.'s coffee table is certainly "old," but it is not "antique." It was probably made in the 1930s or '40s, which is a respectable age, but it is not the 100 years required for a piece to gain the generally accepted status of "antique."

In fact, there are no "antique" coffee tables in existence. To be sure, there are Victorian "antique" center and occasional tables that were shortened in the 1920s and later to become coffee tables, but this action maimed and desecrated these tables and seriously compromised their value and interest to purists such as myself.

As a form, the coffee table as we know it originated in the 1920s or just a touch earlier. Middle Eastern tables used for serving coffee were around earlier, but most of us would not recognize these as being "coffee tables" per se.

In any event, C.C.'s coffee table is a form that is very popular with many collectors, but it is also one that is seen fairly commonly. Such tables are usually made from mahogany and have a four-lobed or "quatrefoil" top covered with a removable glass top, which provides a flat surface so that objects will not slide down into the deep center well.

These tables can have a variety of images represented in the central depression that range from nude reclining women and cavorting cupids to the eagle, which is probably the most often-encountered design. The design in the center is generally not actually carved but was impressed into the wood using mechanical means.

However there is growing interest in pre-World War II vintage coffee tables, and C.C. should value hers for insurance replacement purposes in the $275 to $350 range.

Joe L. Rosson's column appears each Friday and Sunday in the News-Sentinel. Questions should be directed to Joe L. Rosson, The Knoxville News-Sentinel, P.O. Box 59038, Knoxville, TN 37950."

You're free to accept or not accept Mr. Rosson's opinion as you see fit.

I researched Thomas Brooks furniture on the Internet.  A fairly standard height for Brooks occasional tables appears to be 29", so this is likely a cut-down.  Unfortunately, this table is exactly the kind that's easy to shorten, since it has a center post. (Yes, people do that sort of thing when selling old furniture!)  However, in fairness to the seller, it was probably cut down 'way before he/she ever saw it.  Nevertheless, the dealer should have researched better.) If it is a Brooks table, which it may not be, it's a shame it was "maimed" in this way.  Brooks was a very distinguished American furniture maker.

If you took a higher tea table & stuck it in front of your
sofa your company would still call it your coffee table. The
one in front of the sofa in the Borden's sitting room would
be called a coffee table by people now. There was one there
in front of their sofa right where coffee tables go. When
I was growing up we used my grandmothers cedar chest in front
of our couch for our "coffee table".

Thanks for the interesting link, Kimberly.  Cool stuff!  No forgotten pictures of Lizzie though. 

Kimberly, what's your source for the info that there was a table - of whatever height - directly in front of the Bordens' sitting-room sofa?I think some of us may have been misled by that diagram that shows furniture placement in the Borden house, with certain items that were "definitely" there and others that were "probably" there.  The problem is that nobody seems to know where the information in the diagram came from.  This was discussed at length on the old LBMB, and there's simply no reliable source as to a "coffee table" in front of the Borden sofa.  (There are other errors in the diagram too.)  There is a reference to a "little table that was nigh the sofa," but it could have been an end table or even the little tripod stand shown in some of the pictures.  I don't believe there was any long rectangular or oval table in front of the sofa, nor any other piece of furniture standing in for a table.  I don't believe it because people of that era didn't usually put long rectangular or oval tables (or chests) in front of their sofas, and the Borden house was furnished in a typical Victorian style.  Such a table would probably have been bloodied in the attack on Andrew and might even have gotten in the attacker's way, assuming he/she actually entered the room.  In that case, it would probably have been mentioned in some of the testimony.  Anyone else who posts here can certainly entertain his/her own opinions on the matter, despite what the evidence suggests.  (Incidentally, my earlier post mentions that residents of the mideastern countries, who utilize the floor for seating, have long used low "coffee tables."  That's also true of the Far East.  Somehow I have trouble envisioning Andrew Borden sitting cross-legged on the floor!  I admit that my estimate of the 1940s as the heyday of coffee tables might be a little late.  Apparently they were in vogue as early as the 1920s, which means Lizbeth could have used them at Maplecroft.)

(Message last edited Jan-26th-03  1:50 PM.)

I LOVE looking at photographs of people's houses then. I
like old photos in general, but there is something so fun in
seeing the way people really lived & not like the museum
rooms they create now. I don't know if I'm just nosey or what.

The house plan on lizzieandewborden.com has a table in front
of the sofa. It does not give a height. I had never noticed
it being there & it occured to me that if there was a table
there Andrew would have been a little harder to attack. The
drawing from the newspaper also shows a table there --- it
looks higher than the sofa --- tea table height. Maybe they
had one of those "center" tables in the middle of the room & was
just in the artist's view & wasn't really next to the sofa at all.