Pennsylvania German Frakturs, ca. 1815
GUEST: I brought you Pennsylvania German birth certificates. They've been in our family forever. This one is my great-great-grandfather. The one on, uh, the other side is my great-great-grandmother. And then this is my great-great-great-grandmother. This is her son.
APPRAISER: Well, you have brought three wonderful examples of Pennsylvania frakturs. There was a huge immigration into Pennsylvania in the 18th and the 19th centuries, and one of the wonderful traditions that was brought to America was the tradition of making frakturs. And the two large ones are by a very well-known artist whose name is down here at the bottom, Martin Brechall. And he worked throughout Pennsylvania, in Lehigh County, Berks County, making these birth and baptismal records. The one that's next to you, we have the birth certificate of Gideon Barner, who was born 1810, baptized 1811. This would have been probably created in 1811. This fraktur commemorates the birth of Hannah Bear. She was born in 1813, baptized in 1814. So, we know that because it also says "Lehigh County," Lehigh County wasn't incorporated until 1812.
GUEST: Oh.
APPRAISER: So we know that it was actually produced 1812 or later.
GUEST: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: Martin Brechall was a very prolific artist. We see a lot of wonderful frakturs by him.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: And this is classic Brechall. They're very, almost, really primitive, very naïve-looking, and that's what makes them great folk art. Now, the one up at the top...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: ...that is by a, a, a quite well-known artist...
GUEST: Oh.
APPRAISER: ...that, at the moment, does not have a real name.
GUEST: Hm.
APPRAISER: Some people think it might be Henry Wetzel, but they call him the "Dotted One Artist," and that's because of the exclamation mark...
GUEST: Oh.
APPRAISER: ...after the title. And it's classic, with this asymmetrical flower...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: ...and this ground patch...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: ...and then these abstract shapes along the border. This fraktur is for
Elizabeth Old, born in 1774. She was baptized in 1774. But because we have
Lehigh County mentioned there-- that's Lehigh County spelled the German way-- we know that this couldn't have been done before 1812. So, decades after she was born, they produced this fraktur, which was quite common in Pennsylvania.
GUEST: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: And even though that's smaller...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: ...that's really a more rare fraktur.
GUEST: Oh, okay.
APPRAISER: So, these are all hand-painted, they're not printed.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: And they're made of ink and watercolor. It, it wasn't until the 1820s and 1830s that they started making them...
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: ...using a printing press to make part of them.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: They've suffered a bit condition-wise.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: So, that does affect value.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: They are bright, the colors are bright. That's a wonderful thing. But they, the condition does...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: ...affect their value. I know that you're probably never going to sell, though, right?
GUEST: No-- I have two children.
APPRAISER: Oh.
GUEST: I'm going to hand them down.
APPRAISER: I'd put an insurance value on each of these two, the, the Brechalls of $3,000.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: So, $3,000 each.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: And on the Dotted One, I'd put an insurance value of $4,000.
GUEST: Okay, thank you.
$10,000 Insurance
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Understanding Our Appraisals
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Value can change: The value of an item is dependent upon many things, including the condition of the object itself, trends in the market for that kind of object, and the location where the item will be sold. These are just some of the reasons why the answer to the question "What's it worth?" is so often "It depends."
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