In 1850 Thomas Day, a free man of color, owned the most successful cabinetmaking shop in the state of North Carolina. In their book Thomas Day: Master Craftsman and Free Man of Color, Patricia Phillips Marshall and Jo Ramsey Leimenstoll outline the unique life of this artist, who was an anomaly in this region. They examine the idiosyncrasies of Day's style of furniture and architectural woodwork, which made him so sought after by the elite white population of the Dan River region of North Carolina and Virginia. To unravel the personal and professional history of an extraordinary man of the antebellum South, the authors make extensive use of primary source materials, such as census records, correspondence, real estate records, pattern books, and advertisements in local newspapers, as well as numerous examples of Thomas Day's works, many of which appear in...

© 2011 by the Society of Architectural Historians.
2011
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