International studio (80.1925)

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WEATHER VANE FROM GERM ANTOWN, PHILADELPHIA

By courtesy of Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston, Mass.

except for a headdress of upright feathers, of the second of the only very old ones in Boston,
which two are broken off, secured by a band is the grasshopper vane likewise made of gilded
ending with three long streamers; a bead necklace copper with glass eyes by Deacon Drowne, which
and a beaded feather girdle about the waist. whirrs to the breezes above Faneuil Hall, "The

As a companion to this vane and comprising Cradle of Liberty," and probably placed in posi-
tion in 1742, when the market

GILDED COPPER WEATHERVANE WITH GLASS EYE FORMERLY ON PROVINCE WaS Opened tO the public. For

HOUSE, BOSTON. MADE BY DEACON SHEM DROWNE, (ijlfi?) many years ft ^ supposed

this design had been copied
from Peter Faneuil's crest, as
another vane of this design stood
for many years over a summer-
house in his garden, but this
has been disproved by the dis-
covery of some of the Faneuil
family plate, which bore a crest
of quite a different character.
It is, however, said to be a
duplicate of the vane on the
Royal Exchange, London, Eng-
land, which was the crest of Sir
Thomas Gresham, through
whose generosity, likewise, the
Exchange was built.

Another vane of unusual de-
sign is on the Quincy Market
building, Boston, which dates
from about 1826, and represents
a golden ox.

Weathervanes were especially
numerous in the Dutch settle-
ments in the romantic Hudson
River valley, where they formed
an important addition to nearly
all buildings. On the old Van-
derheyden mansion in Albany,
a vane represented a running
horse, which was obtained by

four fifty-two

MARCH 1925