File:American homes and gardens (1908) (17969988130).jpg

Title: American homes and gardens
Identifier: americanhomesgar51908newy (find matches)
Year: 1905 (1900s)
Authors:
Subjects: Architecture, Domestic; Landscape gardening
Publisher: New York : Munn and Co
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Biodiversity Heritage Library

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Head of Daphne Phoenix_,type Tiger design Eagle knocker a certain fine individuality about this article, and we find few duplicates of even the most admirable specimens. Hav- ing found a suitable copy, however, it is not at all difficult to have it reproduced. Present day manufacturers make a variety of brass knockers, whose only defect is that brass requires so much polishing. These artisans will repro- duce or adapt patterns in brass at prices ranging from three dollars to fifteen, according to size and style. Of course, these modern articles are wholly lacking in that historic element so dear to the hearts of collectors and antiquarians, unless the new ornament has been copied from some model which possesses special interest for the pros- pective owner. For my own part, I should investigate the nearest antique shop before having a knocker made; for I know to a certainty that fine examples of genuine colonial door-knockers can often be obtained in such places at a figure astonishing low. In fact, they are less expensive than the modern reproductions; for antique brass specimens can be bought for two dollars or more, and an excellent iron one for a dollar and a half. Very large and elaborate old-time knockers can be purchased for five dollars. This is not because their true value is not known, but because there is, as yet, comparatively little demand for them. Where a person could use twenty candlesticks, she could use, at the most, not more than two knockers, perhaps not more than one. The horseshoe knocker has been already mentioned as a typical example of the hammer class. Like all truly colo- nial specimens, it is made of wrought iron, painfully ham- mered out by hand upon the forge, as even nails had to be hammered out, in the colonies, in the absence of ma- chinery for working iron. This is one of the most quaint and original knockers that I have ever seen, and is on the style of the earliest made. They soon became more elabor- ate, and colonial craftsmen bestowed upon them their high- est skill. Among the more elaborate were purely Greek or
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Lion design A Georgian type Horseshoe knocker

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