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Posted 3 years ago
Pinupthrif…
(1 item)
I recently found this hiding at a thrift store for so cheap you wouldn't believe it. They are unsigned from what I can tell they are prototype holt Howard's but I can only find one other set online and they sold a long time ago with no price . Can anybody help verify these are real
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Hi Pinupthrift79, welcome to our site. These certainly look authentic & if so, are very rare. There are books about Holt Howard pottery written by Walter Dworkin, who had a set of these cubs & claimed he had only ever seen two others so perhaps they were a prototype as they were unsigned. The real ones were cream crock 3"H, and sugar 4.5"H. A set was sold on Worthpoint under title Rare Holt Howard Kitchen Cubs Creamer Crock & Sugar Crock, try googling that for more info. Adorable set & fabulous find!
I don't know anything about Holt Howard pottery, but the word 'saccharine' on the sugar bowl would have to date these somewhat, wouldn't it, to 1970's or so before they declared it unhealthy??
Oh, they are indeed authentic and they're part of the "Kitchen Cubs" line. They're featured on pages 182-184 in Walter Dworkin's 2nd edition collectors guide from 2007. They were made in 1958 as prototypes but never went into full production and thus never had the Holt Howard back-stamp applied to them. From the guide:
"After Holt-Howard created a successful line of animal collectibles,
the company ran a test of Polar bear cubs. This series of what we
believe to be ten items (or 14 pieces with pairs) was the last series
of animal collectibles that Holt-Howard created for the kitchen.
At the time, Holt-Howard was unsure just how many more animal
collectibles would be successful for kitchen themes.
Once an item was in a test run, very few were made for the first
production. If the itemsold well, then a full production schedule was
planned. Some of these polar bear cubs may only be mold samples
or prototypes that never even went into production because all
were unmarked. They did appear in the 1958 Holt-Howard catalog,
however. Some of the mold samples and prototypes found their
way to the buying public or may have just been given away.
Mr. Howard said that if a new item was added to a Holt-Howard
catalog, it at least went through the sample stage. Five or six mold
samples or prototypes would have been created to ensure quality,
but sometimes only two of the original mold samples returned to
the U.S. from Japan. At that time, decisions were made to cancel
or continue with the items. If the decision was made to go f0rward
with a piece then a master mold was created. According to Mr.
Howard, there was a concern with some of the textured surfaces
of the cubs at the sample stages, and indeed some of the scheduled
production may never have taken place. But today we know that
some of these cubs are around. If you locate one, consider yourself
lucky because these Holt-Howard cubs of yesteryear are rare!
Holt-Howard described these kitchen cubs in its catalog as "Form
.... with function. Kitchen Cubs ... Chipper, cute, created to serve."
Because many of them never went into full-scale production, they
are not back stamped or marked, but most carried the blue and
white rectangular paper "Japan" label. This label was not common,
but was used for small test runs or samples until Holt Howard
decided to put its name on the pieces. All the cubs in the polar bear
series are perched on icebergs."
You can download a PDF of the three pages from the guide plus a rare pic of the 1958 merchant's catalog mentioned in the description above from the following link:
http://bit.ly/3YzLFLP