Our cozy front porch |
Tiny spoon |
In addition to being uncertain about how the tiny spoon made it into the wall, we are equally baffled about its purpose and origins. There is no maker's mark, unfortunately, but it does have a delicately beaded edge around the handle. Was this a very fancy child's toy, or was this a salt spoon regularly used by the Foreman's at meals? We may never know, but we will keep digging. Suggestions are welcome!
Bone handle fork |
Another utensil we found while cleaning out the dairy building (more on that later), was a bone-handled two-tined fork. These types of forks have been found in various archaeological contexts, dating to the late 18th or early 19th century. Very similar forks were found at Thomas Jefferson's Poplar Forest, the site of Davidsonville in Arkansas, and at Plymouth, among many other sites in Colonial North America. The date of this type of fork suggests that it was among the first generation of Greenwreath Foremans' personal possessions. Whatever its story may have been, and however it ended up in a cardboard box in the dairy building, we were so excited to have found it. Once again, these little things tell us more about the life the Foreman family lived in their early days here in North Carolina.
This fork (or a similar one) was actually mentioned in an article in Greenville's Daily Reflector about the previous restoration of the house. It was among many artifacts discovered in Greenwreath's walls in the 1980s. While it's a shame to now have no knowledge of where the rest of these artifacts have ended up, we were thrilled to have rediscovered the fork. Greenwreath just keeps offering more and more little tidbits of its history with every new job we undertake!