GUEST: I brought a Philadelphia
lowboy. It's been in my family
for about five generations.

Originally, it was owned by
Dr. Jonathan Elmer, who was a
senator from New Jersey. He was

in the Continental
Congress for three terms.

APPRAISER: So, you
called it a lowboy.

GUEST: I did.

APPRAISER: Which is sort
of popular term for this
kind of furniture. But
we know from 18th-century

inventories that it was
actually a dressing table.

GUEST: A dressing table.

APPRAISER: Yes, and these pieces
of furniture were often made
in conjunction with a highboy,

or high chest of drawers,
with the same styles...

GUEST: Okay.

APPRAISER: ...to them, and
they were kept in bedrooms.

GUEST: All right.

APPRAISER: So, a lady would
have dressed in front of this.
Maybe there would have been

a mirror behind it. So it's
made of walnut. When I saw it
across the room, I knew it was

Pennsylvania because
of its trifed feet,
and it has wonderfully
carved feet. It's really

beautifully embellished. And
if you notice, up the top of
the foot, there is what we call

stockings. There's another
little telltale sign in here,
which, when you pull out one

of the drawers, you see the
interior has got what we call
a dust board. There were about

400 cabinetmakers in
Philadelphia during the
18th century, many of
them coming from Ireland.

This was a typical convention
in Irish furniture, and
they brought it here
to the Philadelphia

area and the Middle Atlantic
states. So I would date this
dressing table between 1730

and 1760.

GUEST: Oh, my goodness.

APPRAISER: It's a
Queen Anne piece.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: The secondary
woods, there's poplar,
there's also some yellow
pine. It has a wonderful

molded top with cut-- what we
call a cut corner, which, you
can see, it doesn't go out to a

rectangle, but they clip it
off to make a beautiful shape.
And then below, the brasses.

Now, again, from across the
room, I can tell that these
brasses have been replaced.

GUEST: Yes.

APPRAISER: And the brasses are
Victorian brasses. So if you
notice those, the little line on

the bail that you pull...

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: There's some little
circular carvings on that.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: That is more of a
Victorian convention, and not
an 18th-century batwing brass.

GUEST: Okay.

APPRAISER: These brasses would
have been bigger. You can see
the size of the batwings here,

and they would have lined up
with the one below, giving it
this very kind of rectilinear

form to it. This, I think,
is, is really the Pennsylvania
aesthetic of Quaker craftsmen,

and the Clifton and Carteret
Furniture Manufactory
was... They were Quakers.
So, you get beautiful

line, but you get simplicity,
as well. And I think that
that's very evocative of, of

this piece. Have you had
this appraised before or...?

GUEST: Uh, no. Um, just
estate appraisal, which
was, like, 15 years ago.

APPRAISER: Yeah, was this an
estate where there was a lot
of material dispersed among

family members or...

GUEST: Eventually.

APPRAISER: Did you get the
whole kit and caboodle, or...?

GUEST: No, I didn't
get the whole kit and
caboodle, no. (laughing)

APPRAISER: What made
you choose this piece?

GUEST: I needed furniture
in my house. (laughs)

APPRAISER: So, I'd give
the condition of this
piece a B-plus. And
the reason we don't get

an A is that there is
a section on the top,
which has been replaced.

GUEST: Repaired.

APPRAISER: It's a two-board
top. Probably an auction
estimate in today's market would

be in the $10,000
to $15,000 range.

GUEST: Oh, my goodness. (laughs)
Wow. (laughs) I may have to find
another place for it. (laughs)

APPRAISER: So, I would
say $30,000 for...

GUEST: For insurance.

APPRAISER: For a
fair insurance value.

GUEST: Okay. That's
good to know.