Sam Smith (NY), Swan Island Club Hen Pintail

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Lot Details & Additional Photographs

Amityville, New York, circa 1875, carved and painted wood, shoe button eyes, branded W.H. FORBES / W. ENDICOTT / SIC on bottom.

Length 15 in.

Former collection of Bob Timberlake, former member of the Swan Island Club.

William H. Forbes was an original member until his death on October 11, 1897. Forbes was born on October 31, 1840 in Milton, Massachusetts. He enrolled at Harvard University in 1857 but was expelled in 1860. During the American Civil War he served in the 1st and 2nd Massachusetts Calvary. He was captured by the Confederate States Army on July 6, 1864 and imprisoned in Charleston, South Carolina until December 1864. After the war, he returned back to Harvard and received his degree in 1871. Forbes later married Edith Emerson, the daughter of poet, Ralph Waldo Emerson. He served as president of Bell Telephone Company from 1879 to 1887. Wendell Endicott (1880-1954) became a member on September 26, 1901.
He was an heir to the Endicott Johnson Shoe Company. He and his wife built a substantial estate property which was donated to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1955 after his death. MIT uses the Endicott House today as a conference center.
Decoys from the Swan Island Club are important American historical and artistic artifacts. This hen pintail is one of the finest extant.

Old gunning paint with light wear.