1. For a range of discussions regarding regionalism, homogeneity, and isolation, see Milieu B. Vance, “The Regional Concept as a Tool for Social Research,” in Regionalism in America, edited by Merrill Jensen (Madison, Wis.: University Press of Wisconsin, 1951), pp. 119–40; Michael K. Brown, “Scalloped-Top Furniture of the Connecticut River Valley,” Antiques 117, no. 5 (May 1980): 1092–99. See also, Robert Blair St. George, “Artifacts of Regional Consciousness in the Connecticut River Valley, 1700–1780,” and Richard D. Brown, “Regional Culture in a Revolutionary Era: The Connecticut Valley, 1760–1820,” in The Great River: Art & Society of the Connecticut Valley, 1635–1820, edited by Gerald W. R. Ward and William N. Hosley Jr. (Hartford: Wadsworth Atheneum, 1985), pp. 29–39, 41–48. 2. Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 247–48. John Witherspoon, The Works of the Reverend John Witherspoon, 4 vols. (Philadelphia, 1802), 3:583. The author thanks Kenneth Hafertepe for bringing this reference to his attention. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, “neat” in the eighteenth century was defined as “elegance of form or arrangement, with freedom from all unnecessary additions or embellishment; of agreeable but simple appearance; nicely made or proportioned.” For examples of southern “neat and plain” furniture, see Wallace B. Gusler, Furniture of Williamsburg and Eastern Virginia, 1710–1790 (Richmond: Virginia Museum of fine Arts, 1979), figs. 56, 76, 78–81, 86–88, 92, 105, 109, 113. Ronald L. Hurst and Jonathan Prown’s forthcoming catalogue of southern furniture at Colonial Williamsburg will address the topic at length. 3. Philip D. Zimmerman, “Regionalism in American Furniture Studies,” in Perspectives on American Furniture, edited by Gerald W. R. Ward (New York: W.W. Norton, 1988), esp. pp. 19–38. 4. Philip Zea, “Craftsmen and Culture: An Introduction to Vermont Furniture Making,” in Charles A. Robinson, A Checklist of Vermont Furniture Makers (Shelburne, Vt.: Shelburne Museum, 1994), pp. 18–20. Kenneth Joel Zogry, The Best the Country Affords: Vermont Furniture, 1765–1850, edited by Philip Zea (Bennington, Vt.: Bennington Museum, 1995), passim. 5. John Gaines II and Thomas Gaines I, Account Book, 1707–1761, Winterthur Museum Library; Philip Zea, “Rural Craftsmen and Design,” in Brock Jobe and Myrna Kaye, New England Furniture: The Colonial Era (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1984) pp. 63–64; Robert E. T. Hendrick, “John Gaines II and Thomas Gaines I, ‘Turners’ of Ipswich, Massachusetts,” M.A. thesis, University of Delaware, 1964, pp. 67, 78, 95–96. 6. Donna Keith Baron, “Furniture Makers and Retailers in Worcester County, Massachusetts, Working to 1850,” Antiques 143, no. 5 (May 1993): 786, 789, 792, 794; William G. Lord, History of Athol, Massachusetts (Athol, Mass.: by the author, 1953), pp. 282, 284, 490–91. Donna-Belle Garvin, James L. Garvin, and John F. Page, Plain & Elegant, Rich & Common: Documented New Hampshire Furniture, 1750–1850 (Concord, N.H.: New Hampshire Historical Society, 1979), pp. 132–33, 142; Brock Jobe, ed., Portsmouth Furniture: Masterworks from the New Hampshire Seacoast (Boston: Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities, 1993), pp. 114–21. A similar Haverhill sideboard by Stephen Adams (1778–1859) is also known. See American Collector 6, no. 5 (June 1937): 7. 7. Donna-Belle Garvin, “A ‘Neat and Lively Aspect’: Newport, New Hampshire as a Cabinetmaking Center,” Historical New Hampshire 43, no. 3 (Fall 1988): 202–24; New-Hampshire Spectator (Newport), May 1828; Garvin, Garvin, and Page, Plain & Elegant, pp. 134–35, 144. 8. Cary Carson, “Doing History with Material Culture,” in Material Culture and the Study of American Life, edited by Ian M.G. Quimby (New York: W.W. Norton, 1978), pp. 41–64. 9. Philip Zea, “Erastus Grant: The Emergence of a Connecticut Valley Cabinetmaker,” 1987 Western Reserve Antiques Show Catalogue (Cleveland, Ohio: Western Reserve Historical Society, 1987), pp. 18–20; Houghton Bulkeley, “George Belden and Erastus Grant, Cabinetmakers,” in Contributions to Connecticut Cabinetmaking (Hartford: Connecticut Historical Society, 1967), pp. 72–81. The distinction of being the earliest documented piece of western Massachusetts furniture with neoclassical detail is shared with a tall clock case made in 1799 by Daniel Clay (1770–1848) of Greenfield, Massachusetts, now in the collection of Historic Deerfield, Inc. See Dean A. Fales Jr., The Furniture of Historic Deerfield (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1976), p. 267. 10. Beatrix T. Rumford, “Uncommon Art of the Common People: A Review of Trends in the Collecting and Exhibiting of American Folk Art,” in Perspectives on American Folk Art, edited by Ian M. G. Quimby and Scott T. Swank (New York: W.W. Norton, 1980): pp. 13–53; Kenneth L. Ames, Beyond Necessity: Art in the Folk Tradition (Winterthur, Del.: Winterthur Museum, 1977), esp. pp. 62–65; Sumpter T. Priddy III., American Fancy (forthcoming). 11. For example, see Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 219–20, 227. 12. William Salmon, Palladio Londinensis (London, 1734), pl. 26. 13. Philip Zea and Robert C. Cheney, Clock Making in New England, 1725–1825: An Interpretation of the Old Sturbridge Village Collection (Sturbridge, Mass.: Old Sturbridge Village, 1992), pp. 23–25, 28; Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 349–51. 14. For example, see William N. Hosley Jr., “Timothy Loomis and the Economy of Joinery in Windsor, Connecticut, 1740–1786,” in Ward, ed., Perspectives on American Furniture, p. 132. Gail Nessell Colglazier, Springfield Furniture, 1700–1850: A Large and Rich Assortment (Springfield, Mass.: Connecticut Valley Historical Museum, 1990), pp. 28–29, 36–37. 15. Nancy Goyne Evans, “The Tracy Chairmakers Identified,” Connecticut Antiquarian 33, no. 2 (December 1981): 14–21; William R. Child, History of Cornish, New Hampshire, 2 vols. (Concord, N.H.: Rumford Press, 1910), 2:372–74; Stephen Tracy Day Book, Lisbon, Conn. and Cornish, N.H., 1805–1849, p. 10, private collection. 16. Jean M. Burks, “The Evolution of Design in Shaker Furniture,” Antiques 145, no. 5 (May 1994): 732–41; Mary Lyn Ray, True Gospel Simplicity: Shaker Furniture in New Hampshire (Concord: New Hampshire Historical Society, 1974), fig. 32; Mary Lyn Ray, “A Reappraisal of Shaker Furniture,” in Winterthur Portfolio 8, edited by Ian M.G. Quimby (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1973), pp. 107–32. 17. Brock Jobe, “The Boston Furniture Industry, 1720–1740,” in Boston Furniture of the Eighteenth Century, edited by Walter Muir Whitehill (Boston: Colonial Society of Massachusetts, 1974), esp. pp. 39–47. William Hogarth, The Analysis of Beauty (London: J. Reeves, 1753), pl. 1; Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 210–11; J. L. Cummings, “Painted Chests from the Connecticut Valley,” Antiques 34, no. 4 (October 1938): 192–93. 18. Jobe, ed., Portsmouth Furniture, pp. 193–200. See also Philip Zea, “Piscataqua Clocks: Marking Change Through Time,” paper presented at “‘That Little World’ Portsmouth: The Art and Culture of the Piscataqua Region: A Symposium,” Currier Gallery of Art, Manchester, N.H., September 26, 1992, pp. 12–16; Zea and Cheney, Clock Making in New England, pp. 15–17. 19. Jobe, ed., Portsmouth Furniture, pp. 289–91. 20. Philip Zea and Donald Dunlap, The Dunlap Cabinetmakers: A Tradition in Craftsmanship (Mechanicsburg, Pa.: Stackpole Books, 1994), pp. 6–45; Benno M. Forman, “German Influences in Pennsylvania Furniture,” in Scott T. Swank, Arts of the Pennsylvania Germans, edited by Catherine E. Hutchins (Winterthur, Del.: Winterthur Museum, 1983), pp. 102–70. David Hewett, “G. Stedman—The Elusive Vermont Cabinetmaker,” Maine Antique Digest 14, no. 3 (March 1986): 1D–4D. 21. Henry R. Stiles, The History and Genealogies of Ancient Windsor, Connecticut, 2 vols. (Hartford: Case, Lockwood & Brainard Company, 1891–92), 2:76–77, 126, 393, 700–702; Sylvester Judd, History of Hadley, Including the Early History of Hatfield, South Hadley, Amherst, and Granby, Massachusetts (Springfield, Mass.: H. R. Huntting and Company, 1905), Part 2, pp. 111–12; Patricia E. Kane, “The Joiners of Seventeenth Century Hartford County,” Connecticut Historical Society Bulletin 35, no. 3 (July 1970): 78–80; Jonathan L. Fairbanks and Robert F. Trent, eds., New England Begins: The Seventeenth Century, 3 vols. (Boston: Museum of Fine Arts, 1982), 2:121, 3:506–7; Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 185–86, 190–93, 201–2. William Buell (d. 1681) was born in County Huntingdon. Thomas Holcombe (d. 1657) was born in Devonshire. Thomas Bissell (d. 1689) may have come from Somersetshire. Richard Lyman Jr. (d. 1662 in Northampton, Mass.) and Samuel Porter Sr. (d. 1689) left different villages in Essex, and Henry (1598–after 1685) and Francis Stiles (b. 1602) were born in Bedfordshire and emigrated from London. Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 193–94. 22. Clair Franklin Luther, The Hadley Chest (Hartford: Case, Lockwood & Brainard Company, 1935). Philip Zea, “The Fruits of Oligarchy: Patronage and the Hadley Chest Tradition in Western Massachusetts,” in Early New England Furniture: Essays in Memory of Benno M. Forman, edited by Brock Jobe (Boston: Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities, 1987), pp. 1–65; Philip Zea and Suzanne L. Flynt, Hadley Chests (Deerfield, Mass.: Memorial Hall Museum, 1992). 23. Zea, “The Fruits of Oligarchy,” pp. 14, 18–19. Kevin M. Sweeney, “Mansion People: Kinship, Class, and Architecture in Western Massachusetts in the Mid Eighteenth Century,” Winterthur Portfolio 19, no. 4 (Winter 1984): 231–55; Kevin M. Sweeney, “River Gods in the Making: The Williamses of Western Massachusetts,” in The Bay and the River, 1600–1900, edited by Peter Benes (Boston: Boston University, 1982), pp. 101–16. 24. Jonathan Chase Papers, Ledger 1, pp. 1–50, New Hampshire Historical Society, Concord; Zea, “Rural Craftsmen and Design,” p. 47; Child, History of Cornish, New Hampshire, 2:62–63. Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 243–44. 25. Kevin M. Sweeney, “Furniture and Furniture Making in Mid-Eighteenth-Century Wethersfield, Connecticut,” Antiques 125, no. 5 (May 1984): 1156; Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 212–13; Henry R. Stiles, ed., The History of Ancient Wethersfield, Connecticut, 2 vols. (New York: Grafton Press, 1904), 2:495; Robert F. Trent, “The Colchester School of Cabinetmaking, 1750–1800,” in The American Craftsman and the European Tradition, 1620–1820, edited by Francis J. Puig and Michael Conforti (Minneapolis, Minn.: Minneapolis Institute of Arts, 1989), pp. 112–35; Joseph Lionetti and Robert F. Trent, “New Information about Chapin Chairs,” Antiques 129, no. 5 (May 1986): 1082–95; Thomas P. Kugelman, and Alice K. Kugelman, “The Hartford Case Furniture Survey,” Maine Antique Digest 21, no. 3 (March 1993): 36A–38A; Alice Kugelman, Thomas Kugelman, and Robert Lionetti, “The Chapin School of East Windsor, Connecticut: The Hartford Case Furniture Survey, Part II,” Maine Antique Digest 22, no. 1 (January 1994): 12D–14D. Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 226–27. Two generations of craftsmen, working before and after the Revolution, made case furniture ornamented with carved vines in western Massachusetts. Eliakim Smith is a viable candidate for the earlier craftsman. A partial 1850s transcription of his account book in the Judd Manuscript at the Forbes Library, Northampton, Massachusetts, demonstrates that he made elaborate furniture forms. A cherry breakfast table of comparable work was owned by descendants of Smith when examined by the author in 1979. The work of the second generation (identity unknown), as illustrated in The Great River, appears to have been produced with somewhat less skill in southern Hampshire County in the Springfield area during the last quarter of the eighteenth century. Another craftsman, William Mather (1766–1835) of Whately, Massachusetts, also worked in a similar style. See Bernard and S. Dean Levy, catalogue 6 (1988): 85. Zea and Dunlap, Clock Making in New England, pp. 36–40. 26. John Dunlap, Account Book, Goffstown and Bedford, N.H., 1768–1789, as transcribed in Charles S. Parsons, The Dunlaps & Their Furniture (Manchester, N.H.: Currier Gallery of Art, 1970), pp. 230–31. 27. Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 238–39. 28. Garvin, Garvin, and Page, Plain & Elegant, pp. 124–27, 141, 146–47. 29. Morrison H. Heckscher and Leslie Greene Bowman, American Rococo, 1750–1775: Elegance in Ornament (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1992), pp. 137, and 167, 169, 182–83; Jobe and Kaye, New England Furniture, pp. 19–20. See also Morrison H. Heckscher, “Philadelphia Chippendale: The Influence of the Director in America,” Furniture History 21 (1985): 283–95. 30. Amelia F. Miller, Connecticut River Valley Doorways: An Eighteenth-Century Flowering (Boston: Boston University for the Dublin Seminar for New England Folklife, 1983), pp. 48–49; Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 66, 81–97. 31. For examples of foreign imports with histories of ownership in the Connecticut Valley, see Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 194–95, 270–71, 306–8, 311–14, 318–21, 325, 338, 374–75, 380–82, 384–85, 421–29, 432–39, 441–43. 32. Thomas R. Lewis, “The Landscape and Environment of the Connecticut River Valley,” in Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 12–13; Kevin M. Sweeney, “Gentlemen Farmers and Inland Merchants: The Williams Family and Commercial Agriculture in Pre-Revolutionary Western Massachusetts,” 1986 Dublin Seminar for New England Folklife, edited by Peter Benes (Boston: Boston University, 1988), pp. 60–73; Kevin M. Sweeney, “From Wilderness to Arcadian Vale: Material Life in the Connecticut River Valley, 1635–1760,” in Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 21–24; Winifred Barr Rothenberg, From Market-Places to a Market Economy: The Transformation of Rural Massachusetts, 1750–1850 (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1992), pp. 79–111; J. Ritchie Garrison, Landscape and Material Life in Franklin County, Massachusetts, 1770–1860 (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1991), pp. 18–35; All Sorts of Good Sufficient Cloth: Linen-Making in New England, 1640–1860 (North Andover, Mass.: Merrimack Valley Textile Museum, 1980), pp. 5–32. 33. Sweeney, “Mansion People,” p. 242. Diary and Autobiography of John Adams, 4 vols., edited by L. H. Butterfield (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1961), 2:28. 34. Barbara C. Batson, “Wells-Thorn Refurnishing Plan” (unpublished National Museum Act Internship Paper, 1985, on file at the Henry N. Flynt Memorial Library, Historic Deerfield, Inc., Deerfield, Mass..), pp. 15–24. Diary and Autobiography of John Adams, 2:31. 35. Elizabeth Mankin Kornhauser, Ralph Earl, The Face of the Young Republic (Hartford, Conn.: Wadsworth Atheneum, 1991), pp. 47, 73–76, 154–55, 217–18. Zea, “Rural Craftsmen and Design,” pp. 47–72. 36. Zea, “Rural Craftsmen and Design,” pp. 56–67. 37. Brown, “Scalloped-Top Furniture,” pp. 1092–99; Sweeney, “Wethersfield,” pp. 1156–63; Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 222–25. Philip Zea, “The Emergence of Neoclassical Furniture Making in Rural Western Massachusetts,” Antiques 142, no. 6 (December 1992): 844–45. 38. Margaret E. Martin, “Merchants and Trade of the Connecticut River Valley, 1750–1820,” Smith College Studies in History 24, nos. 1–4 (October 1938–July 1939): 7–17, 52–54, 61–65, 198–210. 39. Vermont Journal (Windsor), March 17, 1794. 40. Andrea Palladio, Quattro Libri dell’Architettura (1570); William B. O’Neal, “Pattern Books in American Architecture, 1730–1930,” in Palladian Studies in America, edited by Mario di Valmarana (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1984), 1:47; Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 66–67 and nos. 17, 18, 22, 24, 25, 107; Zea, “Neoclassical Furniture Making,” pp. 844–49. William Lamson Warren, “William Sprats and His Civil and Ecclesiastical Architecture in New England,” Old-Time New England 44 (Winter 1954): 65–78, and (Spring 1954): 103–14; William Lamson Warren, “William Sprats, Master Joiner: Connecticut’s Federalist Architect,” Connecticut Antiquarian 9 (December 1957): 11–20; Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, pp. 67–68 and no. 22; Trent, “Colchester,” pp. 132–33. 41. In the lower case of the high chest, the overall height is 34", the overall width is 44”, and the diagonal is 54.” The diagonal measurement also matches the height of the upper case. The author thanks Cheryl Chappell for sharing her research into the design of this object. For a similar analysis, see Zea, “Neoclassical Furniture Making,” pp. 845, 851; Ward and Hosley, eds., The Great River, p. 227. 42. Thomas S. Michie, “Joseph Griswold, Views of a Cabinetmaker Through his Account Book” (unpublished manuscript Historic Deerfield Summer Fellowship Paper, 1977, Henry N. Flynt Memorial Library, Deerfield, Mass.).