The Herrick family donated over fifty shorebird decoys to the collection of the Museums at Stony Brook and according to the Herrick family, twenty of the decoys were made by a William (Bill) Bowman of Lawrence, Long Island. It is now known that they were made by Charles Sumner Bunn, Southampton, Long Island.
If you consider just these twenty Bunn decoys, you have a very large rig of shorebirds, but with fifty birds, you could cover quite a bit of ground. You could shoot multiple points. So here are some questions.
If Bill Bowman was the decoy maker for the Herrick's, why did the other 30+ shorebird decoys the Herrick's donated to the museum come from other Long Island carvers and the Mason Decoy Factory? Who else was Bowman carving for during the summer month or months he supposedly spent on Long Island, on a drunk out in the marsh, on his summer vacation, carving away and shooting snipe, away from his winter job in the saw mill in Maine, where one would assume he also performed his job in a drunken state. This is all part of Mackey's Bill Bowman fable.
We know the T.F.Norton birds were not made for the Herrick's. They obviously had belonged to someone else. The second question is why was Newbold L. Herrick trying to buy decoys from Charles Perdew in April of 1906? In Decoy Magazine July/August 2000, page 35, there is a piece titled "Perdew correspondence file holds a few gems". Nothing could have been more true. The dregs of Illinois carver Charles Perdew's possessions had come to auction, and among the lots were "thousands" of correspondence's to Charles Perdew, but the real gem that was found on page 35 is approximately 3"x4", a short letter to Charles Perdew from Newbold Herrick:
"at #22 Wes 12th Street New York, N.Y.
Yours very truly
Dear Sir (Saw) your very good advertisement in a sporting paper in this city showing
a very good crow decoy & also the words 'all other kinds of decoys etc.' I want you to
send me your book of cuts & let me pick out some yellowlegs and dowitcher decoys
which I will need during the up coming season.
Please send by return mail if possible & oblige.
Please send by return mail if possible & oblige.
Yours very truly
Newbold L Herrick"
If Herrick already had the twenty Bunn shorebird decoys, not including the other 30+ shorebird decoys also donated to the Museum at Stony Brook, and with all the shorebird decoys being produced on Long Island and in the neighboring states where many Bunn decoys have been found; Massachusetts, New Jersey and Connecticut, why was he looking for Charles Perdew to make shorebird decoys for him? The Herrick's had homes, family, associates and friends in all these areas, not to mention that Charles Bunn had just been exhibiting at Madison Square Garden only a month earlier.
These coastal Atlantic areas produced the majority of handmade shorebird decoys in America at the time. Why was Newbold Herrick reaching out to a Midwest decoy maker who made primarily floating stool, with the exception of crows and owls. Why was he asking Charles Perdew to make shorebird stool for his use in the upcoming 1906 summer season? Perdew assuredly never made the decoys.
I feel I can prove the decoys the Herrick family donated to the Museums at Stony Brook listed as Bowman's by the museum, could not have been produced prior to 1910, after Bill Bowman's stated death. So without a doubt, Newbold Herrick did not have the famous Bunn shorebird decoys in 1906 because they had not been created yet.
Among the Herrick's shorebird decoys donation to the museum were sixteen shorebird decoys listed as by Obediah Verity, or Verity family, and William Southard in Gunner's Paradise. As with Bill Bowman, we have possible dates for Obediah Verity (maker) of 1813-1901. If this Obediah Verity made the decoys (see Long Island Decoy Forum.com for Verity and Southard fabrications), Obediah Verity would have been dead for five years in 1906.
Due to the Harold Herrick gunning diaries, 1877-1926, in which we have the only references to Bill Bowman, once in 1890 and again in 1891 (references to his hunting snipe in Lawrence L.I. not making decoys), we know Harold Herrick was hunting over decoys at the time, but it was not the donated Bunn decoys because they would not be carved for at least eleven more years.
People have asked why the Herrick family would not know who really made the decoys, or why they would say they were made by someone who didn't really make them. I can not entertain the premise that Newbold L. Herrick did not know that Charles Bunn was the real maker of the decoys that he said were made by Bill Bowman. It also does not seem possible that the misattribution was a mistake.
The Herrick Family and the Munn families were very close. With the relationship between Charles Bunn and Orson Munn Sr., And Orson Munn's relationship with the Herrick's, most likely the father Harold Herrick, and without a doubt, the brothers Newbold and Harold Herrick, there can be no doubt that Newbold L.Herrick had to know who really made the decoys he said were made by Bowman.
Newbold L.Herrick also donated two black duck decoys to the Museums at Stony Brook. These decoys carry the N.L.H. brand. These are the same style of floating stool seen in the now famous 1906 photo of Charles Bunn at Madison Square Garden. Newbold L. Herrick had to have known who made the black duck stool he had been shooting over and carried his brand that he donated to the Museum as Bill Bowman's. That is assuredly not a mistake. Newbold Herrick was 21 years of age in 1906. His brand is also found on later Wildfowler black duck decoys.
Newbold L. Herrick and his associates were not overburdened with an abundance of ethics. Both Newbold L. Herrick and Orson Munn Sr. had been involved in baiting ducks at the Flanders Club. Their connections and wealth may have secured them a not guilty verdict, but the next year they both resigned from the prestigious club, most likely a quid pro quo as to not unduly embarrass them.
This may have had to do with something as simple as a tax write-off, and Herrick had help in the form of Mr. William (Old Bill) Mackey who did the appraisal for Newbold Herrick and the Museums at Stony Brook, establishing the "Bowmans" as great decoys from the 19th century, made by a Bill Bowman from Maine and Lawrence, Long Island. There were few people around to contradict this.
In 1952, the maker of the decoys, Charles Sumner Bunn, had died. Harold Herrick Sr. had died in 1931. Newbold Edgar, David Abercrombie, Arlington Carman, Captain Will Graham, and most of Charles Bunn clients and friends were deceased. One known exception was Orson Munn Jr., who at his father's suggestion, acquired a rig of cork duck decoys from Charles Bunn.
In April of 1959, the Museums at Stony Brook held a handmade decoy exhibit. The program for the exhibit lists Newbold L.Herrick as exhibiting an undetermined number of shorebird decoys, listed only as Snipe, Curlew and Plover, with no carver or carvers listed as the makers. One month later, on April 18th, Newbold Herrick makes his first donation of eight shorebird decoys to the museum; two are listed as by Bill Bowman.
It will be another eight years before Bill Bowman appears in print in 1966 in the famous diminutive article in Decoy Collectors Guide by Bill Mackey, coincided with Newbold L. Herrick's large donation of shorebird decoys to the Museums at Stony Brook. In the same year, Bill Mackey's IBM sponsored decoy exhibit opened in Manhattan at the IBM Gallery of Art and Sciences from August 29 to October 1, 1966.
There were at least 25,000 reasons for Bill Bowman to be listed as the carver of the decoys, and it was Bill Mackey who did the appraisal of the Herrick's decoy donation, a copy of which was generously shared with me by Joshua Ruff of the Museums at Stony Brook. The appraisal is dated September 20, 1966, written on Bill Mackey's stationary, we see the first group of decoys, numbering sixteen decoys, as by different Long Island carver's names, all which have been changed to other names today.
The total value of these sixteen decoys Mackey listed at $1070.00. The next group consisting of seventeen decoys listed as by "WM. Bowman", and this is where the 1966 money gets serious. Mackey writes that the seventeen decoys are "owned by Newbold L. Herrick" and made by "William Bowman". "He is now recognized as one of the greatest Shore Bird Carvers and painters of shore birds in America". Mackey goes on to praise the decoys as "unique" and writes, "individually the birds are of great value, collectively this group would be conservatively valued at $25,000." That is total of $26,070.00 in 1966 dollars for the entire group donated. That donation in 1966 would have been a complete tax write-off of the full appraised value.
The Museum was looking for old decoys, 19th century or even earlier. The Bunn shorebirds were definitely 20th century decoys. In fact, these decoys were at the very most, 56 years old in 1966, if not of an even later vintage. They were not 1875-1900 as listed in Gunner's Paradise. The 1875 date is the date given by Newbold L. Herrick as the date of their manufacture in his first donation in 1959.
In a letter dated July 17, 1962, Newbold L. Herrick writes to the museum that he is leaving all his decoys to the museum, "under my will". He singles out only two makers by name, Capt. Ben Verity and Capt. Bill Bowman. Herrick writes that he, Bill Bowman, "lived in the Marshes and sand hills area south of Lawrence." He writes, "He gunned there for a living and made beautiful decoys," (no mention of Maine). In this letter he gives the dates of manufacture for the "Bowman decoys as 1870-1875. "
What happened between 1962 and 1966 that made Newbold L. Herrick donate the decoys prior to his death? In 1962, N.L. Herrick was leaving the decoys to the Museums at Stony Brook after his death, which occurred in 1976. By 1966, Mackey and the Herrick brothers had collaborated on Mackey's article in Decoy Collectors Guide:1966-1967, and Mackey does the appraisal of the donated decoys for Newbold L. Herrick and the Museums at Stony Brook. There may have been other reasons for the premature donation and there probably were, but I think the tax right-off is most likely the main motivation.
There is no way N.L. Herrick could not have known that Bunn made the decoys. Why Newbold Herrick didn't credit Bunn is most likely to give an earlier provenance to the decoys. Herrick may have also had a problem with Bunn at some point.
In the Martinez transcripts, Mrs.Martinez says of her father that he, "was not Wishy Washy". There is also an instance of an angry encounter between Bunn and a member of the Lawrence family, a client who wanted Bunn to take him goose hunting on Sunday. Bunn didn't hunt on Sunday and he made it very clear.
Herrick may have also had trouble crediting a non-Euro American with the production of the greatest shorebird decoys in America. Prejudice is always there, but most likely it was just to disguise the age of the decoys. Bunn had only been dead for 7 years when N.L. Herrick had said that the decoys were made 1875. Newbold L. Herrick would have been 11 at that time. This would place the birds as his father's era and from his rig as they have been listed in the past. Bowman was mentioned in Newbold's father's gunning diary in 1890 and1891. This was put together with the Bunn decoys and was used to help turn 20th century decoys into 19th century decoys.
It is evident that it would have been impossible for Newbold L. Herrick not to have known that Charles Sumner Bunn was the real maker of the decoys, and not Bowman, given the fact that Newbold L. Herrick could not have possessed them until sometime after 1910.
Mackey had no problem slapping a maker's name on a decoy without any proof. He did it constantly. It was a different time when Herrick received his wink-wink nod-nod appraisal from Mackey for $26,000. At the time, that was an incredible amount of money to value decoys at. However, just 7 years later the T.F. Norton curlew Mackey had received from the Herrick's sold for $10,500, a record price for a decoy at the time. This was nearly half the amount of money that Mackey had appraised the entire Herrick rig for. This curlew was considered by Mackey to have been the centerpiece of his vast collection. In the year 2000, the same decoy listed as a Bill Bowman sold for $464,500.00.
