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08-006.
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Every time I visit this one particular shop in Farmer City, a sleepy little farming community in central Illinois, for some reason I always find Jenfred Ware. Last time I ventured out that way, I came home with a larger variation on this same ashtray. Maybe I just missed this piece last time, which although unlikely is definitely possible.
Even if I did miss it on my last visit, the fact still remains that someone out there in the corn fields really was attracted to late 1940's modernism. Farmers purchasing modern decorative arts that early in the game is interesting, since the United States at large didn't start to really adopt the style until into the sixties. This was a very progressive family, and probably a bit more worldly that their neighbors, who likely decorated with much more traditional and rural styles.
I do wonder how widely Raymor distributed its wares, and if something like this could have been purchased in a little farming community or not. It seems more likely that this piece was actually bought in Chicago, where Raymor had a showroom, and then brought out of the big city and into foreign territory. This is definitely all just speculation, but I find it interesting to imagine the scenarios and situations that might have made up an object's live experiences. Objects have stories. Unfortunately they rarely can tell them to us.
Found on January 26, 2008 in Farmer City, IL.
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