My Project: African American Decoy makers in the Chesapeake Bay Reigon

 

The main project I was working on at the Havre De Grace Decoy Museum was working on the installation of the African American decoy makers exhibit. Up until that exhibit was put in, all of the decoy makers that had specific focus on them were white. We did have decoys made by black carvers, but without much information on them. The exhibit itself was split into two cases: One which focused on black carvers in the Delmarva area from the past, and one which focused on those currently working in the present day. The latter had carvings from Doug Gibson, a highly skilled carver who mainly carves in the Havre de Grace style, though with a unique feature of using woodburning to detail his decoys, and James Johnson, a carver from Chesapeake City who does much simpler carvings in his own style. The carvers on display in the historical case have a very interesting story to them. That mainly holds decoys by Pied and Sherman Jones, a father and son pair. Pied mainly worked in the late nineteenth century, while Sherman’s carvings come from the early twentieth. Sherman specifically worked under a white carver by the name of Llyod Tyler. Due to racism at the time, Sherman was often unable to sell his decoys under his own name, so many of his were signed and sold by Tyler. Today, this fact does make it a bit difficult to identify which decoys are Tyler’s, and which were actually made by Sherman. Mostly this is determined by stylistic differences, though the museum had to work with local collectors who have been studying decoys for years to determine who made what.

When I got to the museum, the bulk of the research and identification for these decoys had been complete. My role was primarily in documenting and accessioning the decoys we received. The Jones decoys were largely either moved to the new exhibit from other places in the museum, or had to be borrowed on loan from local collectors. The Johnson and Gibson decoys, on the other hand, were mostly donations, which we received in large numbers from both the carvers. In documenting these I had to get pictures from multiple angles of each object, attach a catalogue number to each of them, and complete PastPerfect entries for each. Once that was completed, I also got to assist with the arrangement of the display cases. The older collectors and curators were the main ones deciding which objects were actually put on display, but I assisted with laying out the displays, and making sure the objects were organized in a visually appealing way that still gave each decoy full visibility.