So why, you ask, would anyone in there right mind paint an antique iron bed “barn red”. Over the years of dealing in iron beds I’ve come across “hundreds” of them that had been painted a very distinctive “barn red”. But then I’ve also come across a number or iron beds that were painted white,…
So it would stand to reason that a foundry wouldn’t just make iron beds, back in the 1800’s. If the bed market got soft they had to have other things that they could produce with the foundries they had. If one month was slow with iron beds…. maybe the easiest and fastest thing to produce…
Andrew William Mellon (March 24, 1855 – August 26, 1937) was an American banker, industrialist, philanthropist, art collector and Secretary of the Treasury from March 4, 1921 until February 12, 1932. This bed was said to have been a wedding present for his wife Nora Mary McMullen, from Andrews mother Sarah Jane Negley Mellon, who…
Here is a photo of an antique iron bed we converted from it’s original antique double size, to todays modern king size.
It’s very easy to tell the popularity and collectability of an item by the number of reproduction of that item you see in the market place.
For all of you wine connoisseurs and vineyard owners…….here’s one of the more unique and collectible antique iron beds I”ve come across.
Few iron beds have the bells and whistles this one does. Made by the E. Simmons Co., that today makes a top line of mattresses. Iron beds of that time were in strong competition with the more expensive brass bed market.
As you may have learned form some of my earlier blogs, Pittsburgh was the center of steel production in tis country back in the 1800’s.
I often wonder what type of person bent the tubing, poured the iron into the molds and laid their hands on what I’ve made a business out of the better part of my life
So why were these old beauties referred to as cast iron beds?