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2000, Shopping Feature, Country Living Magazine, Vintage Gavels
Country Living
“Vintage Gavels — Maintaining Order for More than a Century”
by Marie Proeller
October 2000, page 34
Country Living Magazine featured vintage gavels from the George Glazer Gallery in a one-page article in its Collecting section. The main text reads:
“Order is heaven’s first law,” proclaims an inscription on a wood-and-ivory gavel presented to the National Women’s Suffrage Assn. on March 25, 1888. And what more fitting symbol of keeping order than a gavel.
“Most people who see these pieces in shops or at flea markets wrongly assume that they all belonged to judges or auctioneers,” says New York City antiques dealer George Glazer, whose private gavel collection numbers more than 100. While some did hail from a courtroom or an auction block, Glazer plains, most gavels you find on the market today were presentation pieces at fraternal lodges and social clubs. “They were commonly given to a member upon his or her ascension to chairperson or perhaps upon retirement.”
Because of the formal nature of the gift, many gavels bear an inscription — often on a silver band or carved directly into the wood. “Very few antiques come with a written provenance,” Glazer points out. “These inscriptions tell you who, what, where, why, and when.”
When gavels are displayed in his Upper East Side gallery or in his booth at New York City’s annual Fall Antiques Show … Glazer observes, “People can’t seem to resist picking them up and turning them over. These pieces were made to be held, and I guess collectors respond to that.”
