Turning Uncle Henry Bennett Folk Art into Chief Cuffee Decoys

Turning Uncle Henry Bennett folk art into "Chief" Cuffee Decoys for Fun and Profit


This is the story of how an unscrupulous Bridgehampton Long Island decoy collector /dealer turned a pair of William "Uncle Henry" Bennett decorative folk art shorebirds that were made in Springs, East Hampton, Long Island into a pair of Eugene "Chief" Cuffee shorebird decoys made in Southampton, Long Island on the Shinnecock Reservation, and sold by Abercrombie & Fitch Manhattan, NYC.



East Hampton decoy collector David Bennett began actively collecting Uncle Henry's work in the early part of the 21st century as he was completing his ground-breaking research proving Uncle Henry Bennett to be the maker of the folk art and decoys that had been called Chief Cuffee's for a little over 20 years.


Dave's family is one of the oldest Anglo families on Long Island. His ancestors first settled on Gardiner's Island with Lion Gardiner in 1639.  Early on, the Bennetts moved from Gardiner's Island to Long Island to the area called Springs on Accabonac Harbor in East Hampton.  Dave's deep roots in the area, coupled with the fact that he was an oil burner mechanic and fuel deliveryman for years, gave him access and opportunity to acquire decoys and information on local decoy makers and rigs from the East Hampton area.  Sometimes he was able to acquired entire rigs of retired decoys.  But there are also quite a few other collectors from the area also searching for decoys, so competition can be can be quite keen. 


In 2003, Dave got a tip that an East Hampton woman by the name of Nancy Reutershan had some decoys she wanted to sell, and among them he was told were some Uncle Bennett birds.  Dave went to see her but he was too late.  Mrs. Reutershan had already sold them a few months before in December of 2002 to our collector from Bridgehampton previously mentioned.  Dave had asked about the two Uncle Henry birds he had been told she had.  She did not remember his name but she told Dave the same thing she had told the Bridgehampton collector who she sold them to; that she, "Had bought them as a young bride in the early 1950's."  She also told him she bought them, "From an old Bonacker with one leg from Three Mile Harbor who had made them and sold them on the side of the road."  She told Dave the pair of birds had, "Golden Plover written under their tails in pencil." She also said that,"They had sat on her shelf for 50 years until she had sold them."


In the research Dave and I had been doing on Uncle Henry, it was critical to be able to tie birds that would be called "Cuffees" by dealers, auction houses and collectors at the time, to William "Uncle Henry" Bennett, eliminating Cuffee as their maker.  The two Reutershan birds did exactly that.  She did not recall his name, but there is no mistaking who she was referring to.  "Uncle Henry" was an old Bonacker.  He had only one leg.  He lived on Three Mile Harbor Road and he sold his birds by the side of that road.  So Dave thanked her for her information.


Then he contacted the Bridgehampton dealer she had sold them to.  Dave wanted to see if he could buy the two carvings from him, or at least photograph this pair that were documented as definitely the work of Uncle Henry, which was extremely important to our research.  When Dave contacted the buyer of the two Uncle Henry's, he told Dave that he had already sold the pair to a Cuffee collector from Watermill, Long Island.


What would a Cuffee collector want with a pair of carvings that were made by a "Bonacker" from  Springs, where he lived and "sold his carvings"?  Because the unscrupulous Bridgehampton dealer/collector had left those and other facts out about Mrs.Reutershan's two golden plovers.  The pair of plovers had been sold to a gullible "Cuffee" collector as "Chief Cuffee golden plovers"  that were bought by a woman who had purchased them from Abercrombie & Fitch in Manhattan.  The only truth in this string of lies was that they were bought by a woman.


The collector from Watermill was informed that the birds weren't "Cuffees" and how he had been taken for a ride by his Buddy from Bridgehampton.  He also was informed of the real history of the carvings and he was given Mrs. Reutershan's phone number and address to confirm what what he was being told was accurate.  But our William Henry Bennett collector, who considered himself a Cuffee collector, did not contact Mrs. Reutershan.  He didn't want to hear the truth.  He was sticking with the guy who screwed him because that guy had told him that the birds were Cuffee's, and that's what he wanted to hear.


Later Dave Bennett was able to get a photo of the pair of birds and when shown the photo, Mrs.Reutershan identified them instantly as the pair of birds that had sat on her shelf, and the birds she had dusted for 50 years before selling them.


So the real history of these two pieces of American folk art was changed without thought or care for the true history.  Some might say, well everyone called them Cuffee's at the time, so why believe this old lady who had actually bought them from their maker?  After all, she was no decoy expert like our Bridgehampton decoy collector/dealer expert.  But that does not explain the lie about A&F.  The fact that he had told his pigeon from Watermill that they had come out of Abercrombie & Fitch is a lie and a deliberate distortion of decoy history to guild the lily and put money in his unscrupulous pocket.  But why did he say that they had come from A&F?


Other than the obvious prestige of having been purchased out of the old tweedy "Gun Room" at the equally prestigious address of their old headquarters at Madison and 45th Street in Manhattan, NY.  There was a rumor or story, most likely started by Bob Gerard, that Cuffee's work had been sold by A&F.  Where the A&F story came from can only be conjecture.  It most likely happened when Bob Gerard interviewed Charles Bunn's daughter, Mrs. Martinez.  In Gerard's chapter in Dr.Stone's book, he mentions some of the wealthy sports who were Bunn's clients.  David Abercrombie founder of A&F is not mentioned.  But Gerard does write of Bunn's trip to Canada on a moose hunt.  On this trip Charles Bunn, accompanied David Abercrombie and Newbold Leroy Edgars.  Mrs.Martinez would not have mentioned the trip without the inclusion of her father's good friend David Abercrombie.


This A&F story interestingly was once backed up by decoy collector/dealer Joe Tonelli.  Joe at one time claimed to have an A& F catalog featuring "Chief Cuffee decoys" in it.  When he was pressed to make a copy of it and send it to me or Joe Jannsen, it was much like Ronnie McGrafth's non-existent " missing Bill Bowman photo."  Joe T. couldn't find it and it could not possibly have existed prior to Bob Gerard's Chief Cuffee fabrication around 1980 because they were not called Cuffees until then, and Abercrombie & Fitch closed in 1977 before anyone called the birds Cuffee's!


So now you have the facts surrounding how an unscrupulous Bridgehampton decoy collector /dealer distorted decoy and folk art history.  He lied to his fellow Long Island Decoy Collector Association member and supposed friend about the true maker of the two carvings he had bought from Mrs. Reutershan, and purposely changing decoy history for his self enrichment.  You also have learned of the stupidity of the so-called "Cuffee" collector from Watermill who is so invested in being a "Cuffee" collector, that he refused to contact the seller of the carvings to get the real story on the real maker.  And even after being told his pal from Bridgehampton had lied to him about the true maker of the birds, he was still his buddy.  That is a rare form of stupidly.


So now you have the truth about how two Uncle Henry Bennett folk art carvings became two "Chief Cuffee decoys".