The Silver and Furniture Collection Sotheby’s to Offer The Silver and Furniture Collection
of the First Parish Church in Cohasset, Massachusetts,
formerly the Second Church of Christ
News-Antique.com - Jan 23,2009 - New York, New York – On January 23 & 24, 2008, Sotheby’s New York will offer for sale The Silver and Furniture
Collection of the First Parish Church in Cohasset, Massachusetts, a Unitarian Universalist Congregation, as part of its twoday
sale of Important Americana. The collection will feature six lots of 18th and 19th Century American silver beakers
highlighted by two pairs of beakers – The Deacon John Jacobs Silver Beakers by Jacob Hurd, Boston, 1728 (each
Press Release New York For Immediate Release
New York | +1 212 606 7176 | Lauren Gioia | Lauren.Gioia@Sothebys.com | Blair Hance | Blair.Hance@Sothebys.com
The First Parish Church in Cohasset, Massachusetts
2
pair est. $70/100,000*). The sale will also include An Important William and Mary Carved and Figured Maple
Armchair, Ipswich or Boston, Massachusetts, circa 1720 (est. $50/100,000).
The First Parish Church began as a congregation in 1721, when Nehemiah Hobart was ordained as the first minister,
and today serves approximately two hundred members on the South Shore of Boston. The church acts as both the
spiritual and the physical centerpiece of town, on the Cohasset Common, and occupies a Meeting House constructed
in 1747 as well as a Parish House built by the
first minister. As the First Parish Church
approaches its 300th anniversary, it remains a
community grounded in the past, inspired by the
present, and planning for the future.
The earliest American colonial silver is highly
valued by both scholars and collectors, yet
exemplary pieces have rarely appeared at
auction. Those pieces that do survive are
typically preserved in the churches to which they were given.
Custodianship by a church insures that the silver has been treated
with respect and has stayed in far better condition than that in
domestic use. The six lots of beakers to be offered in January
have remained out of use, tucked away in a vault, for over fifty
years.
