At first glance, Thomas Commeraw’s Stoneware Jar, on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, appears to be an ordinary vessel for food storage. The jar is unassuming in appearance, with a white exterior embellished on both sides by a simple blue foliate design. The use of a salt glaze and cobalt paint reflects the German style of stoneware, typical for the works of Commeraw. Stamped on the back are the words “Corlears Hook,” an area in Manhattan’s Lower East Side, where Commeraw lived and operated a kiln. Despite its outward simplicity, an understanding of Commeraw’s identity and the antebellum period (1820-1860) provide the jar with meaning. Born into slavery and manumitted at age seven, Commeraw emerged as a successful free Black potter and business owner during a time period characterized by the propagation of slavery and widespread denial of Black rights. While slavery was less prevalent in antebellum New York City, many African Americans lived in poverty, received threats from white mobs, and were prohibited from voting. Nevertheless, over two decades, in part due to his successful stoneware business, Commeraw amassed property and engaged in national political debates.1 This jar and Commeraw’s career offer insight into antebellum Northern Black existence and reflect a power struggle in which free Blacks aimed to fight prominent stereotypes and obtain their rights.
Based on quantitative 1850 census data, historians have concluded that many African Americans living in New York City’s Little Africa, like Commeraw, experienced poor living conditions and feared for their everyday safety.2 Centered around Bleecker Street and encompassing modern-day Chinatown and Greenwich Village, Little Africa became popular due to its proximity to most free African Americans’ workplaces. The 1850 United States census provides insight into African American living conditions, where one of the most compelling statistics is school attendance rates: only 53.1 percent of all African American children attended school in Little Africa, compared to 71.4 percent in Seneca Village, another ethnic enclave.3 This reflects two aspects of Black daily life. Firstly, families in Little Africa held lower incomes and were typically of the working class. Rather than attending school, parents required children to contribute to their family by working, either at home or through a job that contributed to household income.4 Secondly, parents feared for the lives of their children due to the high rates of kidnappings and race-driven neighborhood crimes. Throughout the 1820s, the number of white mobs increased, as did attacks on African American homes and businesses.5 Overall, Commeraw lived and operated his kiln in an area notorious for high rates of poverty and crime.
New laws throughout the 1820s restricting Black voting rights perpetuated a cycle of government neglect, allowing crime and poverty to continue to flourish. Though access to the ballot varied by state and district, Blacks in New York could rarely vote for candidates who sympathized with them.6 The undercurrents of this trend were political: from the 1800s onwards, both on a local and national level, politicians’ predominant voting base consisted of white men. Politicians constantly prioritized the needs of this demographic, who sought to preserve emerging Northern racism and, by extension, their power. If politicians instated voting rights for African Americans, they would “alienate potential white supporters.”7 Accordingly, politicians instead created laws to obstruct Black voting. In New York, state legislators required that Blacks wishing to vote submit a sworn statement, indication of free status, residency information, and a filing fee, amongst other long paperwork. This complex process altogether discouraged Blacks from electoral participation, and by the middle of the century, “only 100 of the 11,840 Blacks in New York City cast[ed] ballots.”8 By the end of the antebellum era, the Black community was largely ignored by their supposed leaders and lacked representation in local and national politics.
The 1830s was a critical decade in the antebellum resistance movement, during which the continued denial of Black voting transformed into organized protest through mutual benevolent societies and the Black church. The Northern resistance movement fully took shape by the 1840s, inspired by increasing slave escapes in the South.9 The continued plight of the Northern African American community fostered a shared determination amongst Blacks to improve their living conditions and claim their rights, creating the groundwork from which collective mobilization would eventually transpire.10 Movements also benefited from the expansion of mutual benevolent societies, the Black church, and the Black press. These institutions gained traction during the 1830s, as urban Blacks competed with European immigrants for employment. In the midst of frequent periods of unemployment and economic stress, Blacks sought a space of camaraderie, mutual protection, and an avenue for social participation. As such, by the end of the antebellum era in 1860, Philadelphia had 108 mutual benevolent societies with 9,762 members that gained an investment of $28,365.11 At their core, these organizations were “mobilizing forces heightening the community consciousness around the component of racial unity” and benefited resistance movements in two ways.12 Firstly, they allowed for the dissemination of ideas about equality within the Black community. In particular, the Black church united Blacks around discussions about rights, expanding the scope of the movement itself. Secondly, church and community leaders often helped spearhead and assist protests themselves. For instance, the New England Association, a mutual benevolent society founded in 1842, helped collect and provide food, clothing, and shelter to support slaves escaping from the South.13 Ultimately, a continued lack of access to the ballot and the expansion of Black mutual benevolent societies throughout the 1830s prompted a broader resistance movement, in which Commeraw’s art played a role.
While larger, organized movements played an important role in the antebellum era, free Blacks in New York City also resisted oppression in their everyday lives: by owning businesses, pursuing their own interests, and contributing to a free Black community. The 1800 New York City directory lists that Commeraw’s kiln was based in Pot Baker’s Hill, in the vicinity of modern-day City Hall and the East River. There, Commeraw operated a successful business for a quarter of a century, where he sold his jars to Black community leaders and manufactured specialized jars for the city’s oystermen. Historians have discovered jars with the distinctive typeface used by Commeraw dedicated to Daniel Johnson, George White, and William Brown, three of the most prominent oystermen from the free Black community. Towards the end of his career, Commeraw shipped his jars as far as Guyana and Norway, utilizing his proximity to the East River.14 On a practical level, Commeraw’s jars were an essential piece of kitchenware for storing a variety of food products, including milk, meat, beer, and molasses.15 Undoubtedly, Commeraw’s clients relied on his jars to store their own food or, in the case of the oystermen, to preserve their oysters for longer. In fact, Brandt Zipp, a stoneware historian and auctioneer, has even uncovered “tantalizing hints that the ceramist helped soldiers… during the War of 1812.”16 For Commeraw personally, his business both allowed him to sustain a living and offered a source of self-pride. Nearly all of his surviving vessels, including this jar, are boldly stamped with his name or the location of his kiln, Corlears Hook, and exhibit meticulous craftsmanship. In fact, according to Arlene Leis, an independent art historian, “[Commeraw’s art] exhibited exceptional characteristics of Manhattan manufacture… the coloration for which potters and manufacturers constantly strove.”17 Today, Commeraw offers a valuable example of how Blacks responded to oppression: undeterred and eager to contribute their talents to their own community.
For much of the twentieth century, however, research on Commeraw was tainted by assumptions about his identity that discredited his accomplishments. Scholars “spun [Commeraw] into a fictitious character named Thomas Commereau, a potter of probable French descent.”18 It was only twenty years ago that historians analyzed the 1800 and 1810 census to find Commeraw listed as a person of African descent. The jar’s cobalt paint and salt glaze may explain this mistake. Cobalt paint and salt glazes were typically used in Germanic stoneware and brought to the United States in the early 1800s by European immigrants. Commeraw adopted a style that was almost strictly used by European potters, making his art appear more or less identical to that of his white peers.19 Regardless of the technical explanations, it is evident that the loss of Commeraw’s identity was largely a consequence of biases about Blacks. By the nineteenth century, stereotypes that Blacks could not make art, lead independent lives, or be creative became widespread in American society. These stereotypes are perhaps best exemplified by a 1907 public statement from Dr. Edwin Atlee Barber, the director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, which remains a significant museum today. Barber stated that jars like Commeraw’s were “weird-looking… roughly modeled on the front in the form of a grotesque human face, intended to portray the African features.”20 These blatantly racist statements, especially those from high-profile art historians, may have fueled the disinterest to Black history and the disbelief in their ability to create art. At the core of the negligence towards Commeraw’s race was an apathy towards examining or accepting Black artists in the first place.
Recently, there has been an increased focus on highlighting Black identities. In 2021, this jar was on display at Before Yesterday We Could Fly, a period room at the Metropolitan Museum of Art that brings to life the house of a fictional Seneca Village resident. The exhibit combines the limited remnants of Seneca Village, including survey maps and images from recent archaeological digs, with elements of speculative imagination and Afrofuturism, a new genre that incorporates science-fiction and technology into Black history. The room is enhanced by interactive elements, including vision and sound, and acquisitions from artists Ini Archibong and Cyrus Kabiru.21 In that sense, the exhibit serves a function beyond education: it offers an immersive opportunity for visitors to firsthand experience Black history. As historians pioneer new ways to preserve Black history, projects like Before Yesterday We Could Fly offer an opportunity for people of African descent to finally come together and share their stories.