Posted 8 years ago
Mrplotner
(1 item)
Hello,
I bought two chairs from an estate sale. They are stamped with brass US Post Office plates on the bottom. They also have the manufacturer, The A.H. Andrews Co, and date of 1904. I have not been able to find any information on them.
This:
https://chicagology.com/goldenage/goldenage090/
And this:
http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/2549.html
"Andrews (A. H.) & Co.
This furniture company was founded in 1865 by Alfred H. Andrews, a Connecticut native who moved to Chicago in 1857. By the end of the 1860s, Andrews employed about 70 men, who made about $150,000 worth of furniture each year. By the beginning of the 1880s, A. H. Andrews & Co. had become the largest firm in the city's robust furniture industry, employing about 500 people and manufacturing about $600,000 worth of school and office furniture each year. During the 1880s, the company opened branches in New York, Philadelphia, and Boston. Andrews & Co. started to produce metal furniture in the early 1890s, but it entered bankruptcy and went into decline soon thereafter."
Yes Sir, thank you. I had no issue finding a wiki on the company however I have not been able to find the chair or its link to the post office. The company sold largely to schools and was well known for school furniture. I'm curious to find either a catalog of the company that shows it or to learn about the history with the post office. Of course I'm also curious to its potential value.
You have a lot of info there already as most furniture is not marked and little info comes up on the internet on most. The value is rather minimal as furniture has dived in prices.
LOL I'm a "Ma'am"....there is likely no information about this chair online. You would need to know the name of the post office where the chair was used as a starting point, and that's not available. The furniture company was already bankrupt and out of production by 1904.