2-740-680 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Side Chair, c. 1775. Before becoming one of the best known Connecticut furniture makers of the late 1700s, Eliphalet Chapin worked in New York City and Philadelphia. His furniture shows evidence of that experience. For example, the back of this chair has a splat design found on New York pieces, while the untapered rear legs and the shell carving on the crest rail are typical of Philadelphia workmanship. The use of cherry, however, is characteristic of Connecticut furniture. This chair comes from a set recorded in Chapin's account book as having been supplied to Ebenezer Grant to form part of the dowry of his daughter Anne, who married the Reverend John Marsh of Wethersfield, Connecticut, on December 6, 1775. The set was owned by their descendents until 1986.