1908 Shreve & Co. Sterling Presentation Cup
Appraised Value:
$4,000 - $6,000
IMAGE: 1 of 1
Appraisal Video:
Appraisal Transcript:
GUEST: This was awarded to my great-grandfather in 1908 for a sales and marketing event that happened with Union Oil. And that's pretty much all I know about it.
APPRAISER: The Union Oil Company is listed here. And they were actually quite an early oil company in the United States. They were sort of at the cutting edge of the oil industry. It was presented in 1908, which, in San Francisco, there was the earthquake and the terrible fire of 1906.
GUEST: Right.
APPRAISER: So this is not very long after the devastation that happened in San Francisco. And this is a piece made by a San Francisco silversmith, Shreve and Co. of San Francisco,
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: which is a firm that was started by two brothers that had East Coast connections and then moved to California. They also had a brother named Benjamin who stayed on the East Coast, and he later became involved in the Shreve, Crump & Low company that's in Boston. That's also a famous company. But these two brothers went to San Francisco and worked as jewelers and then became silversmiths, and quite successful silversmiths-- sort of the toast of San Francisco in terms of silversmithing. And this piece just shrieks Shreve and Co., San Francisco. They made all kinds of silver. They made plainer neoclassical silver, but this was sort of their stock and trade, this type of medieval-style gothic revival. Beautiful hand-hammering. And this is classic gothic-revival strap work that you see here. And these really sort of sexy loop handles that make it sort of masculine and feminine at the same time. And I was reading in one of my books about Shreve and Co. that their factory was destroyed in the fire that resulted after the earthquake. Oh. But they were insured, so they were able to get back up and running. Two years later, able to produce something this great. It's just a gorgeous, eye-catching piece. In terms of auction value, I think that it would be about $4,000 to $6,000.
GUEST: My, my! Thank you. That's awesome.
APPRAISER: Thank you.
GUEST: I'm very excited.
