A two-day sale on behalf of the Clarke E. Hess estate took place at Horst Auctioneers’ facility in Ephrata, Pa., on April 26 and 27. Hess, of Lititz, Pa., was among the preeminent collectors and historians of all things Lancaster County. His primary interests centered on Mennonite genealogy and decorative arts.
Our community lost one of the giants when Hess passed away at 64, following a six-year battle with ALS. Hess’s 2002 book, “Mennonite Arts,” remains an authoritative reference on the subject. “Clarke had a genealogical mind,” mentioned Dr. Donald Herr. A passionate geneologist, Hess loved the cultural history and provenance of things and recorded an in-depth catalog of his collection, which numbered 5,560. The numeric records he kept of his things included any known family background and where and when he bought it. Number 1 was acquired in October 1966, and #5,560 in October 2018. Some items had very little information, and some contained thorough family lineages.
The auction catalog Horst produced was taken directly from Hess’s inventory and included as much information as possible. Some minor variations in spelling or terminology in the catalog represent changes and developments in Hess’s understanding of the items as the years went by. At the end of each description in the catalog was his inventory number in brackets. Posted on Horst’s website (which will remain there indefinitely) is the entire inventory list. The only exceptions are for items donated or sold before his death. This resource can be cross referenced with the catalog and serves as a fitting tribute.
Unlike many in today’s marketplace, Hess was less condition-conscious about objects he bought; he collected history. Simply put, Hess spent his life studying Pennsylvania German culture and arts. He was an immensely well-liked collector and researcher who was always willing to share ideas and information to others.
Hess gifted a large array of material to regional organizations, among them the Lancaster Mennonite Historical Society. His association with the society was decades in the making, as he served in various capacities, and the many items he gifted included archivial material and books, textiles, such as decorated towels, grain and seed bags, privy bags, quilts, samplers, and clothing, among other things. Most contained information of the maker, artist, or owner. Proceeds from his estate are going to several historical organizations, including the Lancaster Mennonite Historical Society, which is located at 2215 Millstream Road, Lancaster, Pa. They were very active buyers at the sale, buying several high dollar lots of fraktur, towels, and the sampler quilt, among other things. Steve Hess, the societies librarian and archivist, seated next to Carolyn Wenger, the societies museum curator, did the bidding at the sale.
One category the society didn’t need for its collections was a shrank. They own the sulphur-inlaid David and Anna Mumma walnut schrank dated “1768,” which came from the John Snyder Jr. estate. “Snyder gave it to us on loan before he died with the understanding that if he died before the loan came due, it was ours to keep. He renewed the loan one time before he died. From his estate we then received eight other furniture items of clear Mennonite provenance, largely due to Clarke Hess's influence,” wrote Wenger via email. The Mumma shrank sold for $23,400 on Oct. 24, 2008, at Pook & Pook’s sale of the Richard and Rosemarie Machmer collection. The sulphur-inlaid walnut schrank from Hess’s estate was dated “1769” and made for Peter Swar and Ada (Long) Swar of Manheim Township. Their farm was by the present-day Wegmans, near Long’s Park. The couple’s son, John Swar, built a stone house in 1799 that still stands today. In 1763, Peter and Ada Swar hosted some of the Conestoga Indians at the time of the Conestoga Village massacre. Matthias Slough took the Indians to the Lancaster jail for their safety. It was in the jail that the Paxtang gang broke in and killed them. Hess bought the shrank at Pook & Pook on April 18, 2008, for $70,200. It originally had five turned feet. It sold for $21,000 at the Hess sale to a private collector in the salesroom.
In terms of sheer rarity, the Ephrata Cloister fraktur drawing took the prize. Unframed, measuring 7-by-6 inches, with floral border, some areas of loss, the one-of-a-kind memorial done for householder Brother Obed went to a local couple for $29,500, underbid by Bob and Mary Ann Greenly. The Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission (PHMC) was in the running up to $27,000. “Brother Obed, whose real name was Ludwig Hocker, came to Ephrata from Germantown with his wife, Margaret, and daughter, Mary, where they divorced and all joined the celibate order,” stated Clarence Spohn. The last name was spelled Hacker in the catalog. “That is the anglicized spelling, but the correct name is really Hocker,” furthered Spohn.
The Ephrata Cloister was an early monastic settlement. Brother Obed would never have seen the “momento mori” memorial. Upon the death of a householder, the drawing is believed to have been tacked to the wall in the individual’s “cell,” as rooms were described. Of this type of fraktur from the Cloister, it is the only surviving example known.
Horst, who also sells real estate via auction, will be offering the Hess Homestead on Thursday, May 23, at 6 p.m. In 1985, Clarke bought his ancestral homestead just outside of Lititz. The 18th-century log mainhouse, frame tenent house, and stone spring house, among other buildings reside on four acres at 27 Lititz Run Road in Warwick Township.
A 5.9-acre parcel with a period 2.5 story stone house at 700 E. Front St. in Lititz will also be offered for sale by Horst on Thursday, June 20, at 6 p.m. It is adjoined to the Warwick-to-Ephrata rail trail and a park. This property was also originally built by an ancestral relative and part of the main homestead, which interested Clarke, who purchased it in the mid-’90s. Lee Stoltzfus’s sister, was the longtime tenent. This stone house (700 E. Main St.) was built by Christian Hess (1757-1816). It has a carved 1778 gable datestone along with initials “C.H.” Christian, and wife, Anna, had a 100-acre farm and also ran the Hess mill that was built by his father Johannes.
It didn’t take long at the auction for the trade to realize they weren’t coming away with much. It was a retail crowd, and prices realized were overall strong. Amish and Mennonite attended hoping to buy items with family connections. Among highlights were a miniature wrought-iron tasting spoon that went for $5,400. It had a copper bowl and four tiny copper inlaid hearts on the handle. A related example is at Winterthur, but not with four hearts. An excellent Joseph Lehn (1798-1892) lidded sugar bucket sold for $5,600 to central Pennsylvania collectors. It had a remarkably thorough family history. A green paint-decorated wooden slide-lid box attributed to Lehn and dated “1873,” illustrated in Herr’s booklet on Lehn, sold for $4,100. A John Long betty lamp engraved “Elizabeth Hershey March the 16th 1849, J. Long,” with replaced bird finial, brought $2,250. Master late-20th-century craftsman Larry Long made the bird finial. A very rare Peter Brubacher (1816-98) black painted wooden horse, roughly 12-by-12 inches, sold to Alice and Art Booth of New Jersey for $26,500. Brubacher lived very close to where Horst’s auction house is today.
Stiegel-type glass, decorated show (hand) towels, privy bags, pillow shams, pin cushions, toy animals, samplers, and much of the fraktur did well.
The second antique sale will be Friday and Saturday, June 7 and 8, and a third (date-to-be-determined) sale will take place, mostly consisting of antique books.
“Much of what I know about the PA German plain culture was disseminated from him (Hess),” said Wendy Christie. “He always took time for questions.”
The captions show a cross section of the material sold and for how much. Horst does not charge a buyer’s premium, and there was no sales tax for this sale. Online buyers were charged a buyer’s premium. The total gross was $583,715.
For more information, contact Horst Auctioneers at 717-738-3080 or visit www.horstauction.com.