A Serving Spoon, Early 20th Century

A blog post by Collections Manager Joanna Church. To read more posts from Joanna click HERE.

Even a butler has his favorites, and so too an honest Collections Manager.  In my case, I have too many a lot of ‘favorite’ artifact types, but I do have a particular fondness for elaborate serving utensils: pickle forks, grapefruit spoons, bon-bon servers, fish slices… they’re so delightfully specific.

Take, for example, this sterling silver spoon, made by Jenkins & Jenkins of Baltimore in the early 20^th century. Though the form resembles that of other utensils, its scalloped bowl is broader than a sugar shell, and it lacks the holes and slots of a tomato server: thus, it’s almost certainly a berry spoon.  Nonetheless, to the untutored – i.e., many of us in today’s hey-grab-me-a-plastic-spork world – it’s simply a fancy serving spoon, which could be put to many uses. To our better-mannered (or at least, more thoroughly trained) predecessors, however, it had a definite and correct use: serving berries.  (Not eating said berries, though – there are, of course, special forks for that.)

One needn’t be wealthy to achieve an elegant table. This boxed “berry set” was available from Sears, Roebuck & Co. in the 1897 catalog, for $2.90 (approximately $81 in today’s money).

This spoon’s owner, Fannie Wiesenfeld Friedman (1874-1967), would have put it to its proper use. The repousee-style handle – very popular in early 20th century Baltimore – is engraved FW.  The use of her maiden initial suggests this was part of a wedding gift or trousseau purchase.  A woman planning to set up her own household would need the correct dishes and flatware, in anticipation of entertaining friends, family, neighbors, her husband’s business associates, or anyone else who should be served in the best style.

Close-up of the handle reverse, featuring the engraved initials FW.