Thank you for your most interesting and useful responses about the location of toy marbles in your archaeological-historical research. I will incorporate and cite via "personal communication" in my thesis due next week to IDAHO STATE UNIVERSITY, Pocatello, Idaho. I may have forwarded it too often to make it clear it is my request for info. I hope it will help contribute to the available info. on the topic! Sincerely, Diane B. Rice -----Original Message----- From: Crist, Tom <[log in to unmask]> To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]> Date: Wednesday, April 08, 1998 10:14 AM Subject: Toy Marbles Information Request >Regarding Robin MIlls' recent request for information on toy marbles, we >have recently recovered the following examples during excavations at the >Collins-Jones House in Burlington City, New Jersey. These exceed the >1/2-in. diameter marbles in which Robin Mills was specifically >interested, but are included in this message to add to her database and >present information on this important historic preservation success >story. > > >Provenience: crawl space deposits below kitchen floor (kitchen was >mid-19th century addition) >Material: clay >Quantity: 2 >Description: #1-plain and completely smooth grayish-brown sphere, 1/2 >in. diameter > #2-"crockery" marble, blue with blurred white swirls, 3 >pock marks, 13/16 in. diameter >"crockery marbles" appear to have been most popular between 1842 and >1858, when the firm of Norton and Fenton in Bennington, VT was producing >stoneware of similar style and glazing. The pock marks are >characteristic of crockery marbles and are acquired where the surfaces >of the wet clay spheres rested against each other during the firing >process. They continued to be manufactured through the end of the 19th >century, when they were replaced by machine-made glass marbles. > >References: >Baumann, Paul > 1970 Collecting Antique Marbles. Mid-America Book Co., Leon, Iowa. > >Randall, Mark E. > 1971 Early Marbles. Historical Archaeology 5:102-105. > >Material: glass >Quantity: 2 >Description: #1-multiple color swirls, machine made, 11/16 in. diameter > #2-multiple color swirls, machine made, 1 in. diameter > > >Provenience: disturbed soils 5-9 in. below grade in unit located 2 ft. >west of main doorway from kitchen to west yard. >Material: glass >Quantity: 1 >Description: blue swirls, machine-made, 9/16 in. diameter > >The Collins-Jones House was built in ca. 1750 in the center of >Burlington City, the colonial capitol of West Jersey. Additions were >made in ca. 1785 and in 1810, the latter by Isaac Collins, who lived at >the house between 1808 and 1817. Collins was the Royal Printer of New >Jersey for King George III and later the printer of New Jersey's weekly >newspaper, The New Jersey Gazette. The kitchen was added to the rear of >the house after Collins' death in 1817, sometime in the 1830s-1840s. >Collins' descendants occupied the house until 1871, when it was >purchased by a locally prominent physician. The house was used as the >first Home for Aged Women in Burlington between 1896 and 1915, and then >subsequently as a residence. The property was donated by the Jones >Family to the Burlington County Historical Society in 1991 and was >listed in both the National and State Registers in 1992. > >The New Jersey Historic Trusts has awarded several Historic Preservation >Bond Program Grants to rehabilitate the building for use as a Living >History Learning Center run by the Historical Society. When completed, >the Center will serve as an anchor for the revitalization of Burlington, >the east side of which comprises a fairly intact historic district that >includes the Collins-Jones House, numerous eighteenth- and >nineteenth-century residences, small commercial buildings, and some >larger nineteenth-century industrial structures. For further >information about historic Burlington and its revitalization contact Ms. >Rhett Pernot, Executive Director of the Burlington County Historical >Society, at 609-386-4773. > >I hope this information is useful. > > >Thomas A.J. Crist, Ph.D. >Director of Archaeological/Anthropological Services >Kise Straw & Kolodner Inc. >123 South Broad Street, Suite 1270 >Philadelphia, PA 19109 >215-790-1050 >215-890-0215 (fax)