whale oil lamp

The combination of colorless and colored glass makes this lamp unusual. The blue-spattered ball that forms most of the stem is quite rare, and the lamp is one of a pair, separated at auction 15 or more years ago, that are probably without parallels. The foot is hand-pressed, so it was probably made before the pressing machine was widely employed in the 1830s. The attribution to one of Thomas Cains’s glasshouses in Boston is based on the horizontal air trap that encircles the font. A number of well-documented pieces made by Cains have this decoration. Whale oil was the premier fuel for lighting in the early 19th century, and lamps of this type were common. The font is small but typical because whale oil was expensive and most homes did not burn it for long periods of time. The other lamp in this pair is published in Joan E. Kaiser, The Glass Industry in South Boston, Hanover, New Hampshire: University Press of New England, 2009, p. 46, no. 17.