Greencastle, PA

The teapot collection is Kathleen Forney's
and the
tea cup and strainer collection is that of Bonnie Shockey.

The silver tea service on display is on loan from Ruth Coldsmith, Greencastle. The teapot collection is Kathleen Forney's of Greencastle. Antique teacups and tea strainers are from the collection of Bonnie Shockey. Four additional cups and saucers are on loan from Evelyn Pensinger, Hazel Sellers, and Coldsmith. A video on tea, produced by McCormick, will run continuously during open house hours.

Tea was not introduced into Europe until the Portuguese traders brought it back in the mid-1500's. In the beginning, tea was sold in apothecaries along side the rare spices and flavorings such as ginger and sugar. The large demand and easier access lowered its cost allowing tea to be sold in common food shops by 1675 and to be served as a public beverage at London coffeehouses. In England, the passion for anything Oriental raised the importation level from 40,000 pounds annually in 1699 to 240,000 by 1708.

In China and Japan, tea was regarded from an introspective and religious point of view. But, in Europe tea inspired elaborate serving traditions that emphasized tea's exotic origins and the server's wealth. By the 19th century, silversmiths and manufacturers, competing against each other, devised many new tea wares. Tea caddies that were often locked, special vessels from which to serve it, measuring spoons, and other instruments such as mote strainer spoons, teacup strainers, tea spout strainers, tea balls, and stick infusers were invented to display and show refinement.

Mote strainer spoons were the first European devises invented to remove the motes (tea debris) found floating in the beverage. Motes could include not only, tealeaves but also stems, grit, and other debris. The bowl of the mote spoon was perforated with pointed ends used to clear tea spouts.

Teacup strainers were fashioned after wine strainers and larger two-handled punch strainers that were used to remove lemon and orange pieces used in other beverages. Cup strainers were made from a variety of materials - silver, bronze, copper, woven brass, tin and screen, granite ware, enamel ware, fine bone china, porcelain, and other materials. Some were made with two handles that straddled the cup and others had clasps that clipped the strainer to the edge of the cup. The designs ranged from the practical to unusual decorative forms.

By the early 20^th century tea strainers and infusers reached their height of popularity, manufacture, and use. Stick infusers were quite whimsical by times being manufactured to resemble pipes, golf clubs, an egg on a stick, or heart shaped.

It was only by accident in 1908 that the tea strainer era came to an end. Thomas Sullivan, an American tea dealer, in an effort to save on shipping charges, started packaging small-sized tea samples in silk bags for his customers. His customers, thinking that they were to dip the silk bags directly into hot water, began ordering the tea bags from him, thus ending the mass production of ingenious, attractive tea strainers.

The Europeans' Oriental passion caused a preference for Chinese porcelain for tea ware - teapots, teacups, sugar and creamers. Basically, what the Europeans saw Chinese porcelain as was cobalt blue decorations on white ware. As it was very costly to buy and import, Europeans attempted to make their own version that turned out to be nothing more than artificial porcelain because they did not know the formula.

True porcelain (hard paste) is Kaolin (white clay) plus feldspar. Artificial porcelain (soft paste) is clay, glass, sand, and other stuff. Fluxed Porcelain (bone china) is Kaolin, feldspar, and bone ash was added to use as the flux.

An easy way that curators and collectors use to tell the difference between pottery and porcelain table, tea, and toilet wares is whether or not one can see light through the body material, as long as it is not too thick. If light shines through, it is porcelain.

Dating porcelain pieces can be done with the help of back mark books that have illustrations of many of the manufacturers from different countries.

Between 1842 and 1883 the British Registration Office authorized a diamond shaped mark to reflect the registration of designs. After 1883 a consecutive set of numbers was used.

The U.S. Congress passed the McKinley Tariff Act in 1891 that required any imported items to have the name of the country of origin on it in English.