Hunting & Fishing Collectibles Magazine's Denial of Charles Sumner Bunn. Why?

                                               

                                                                                                             

                                                         By Historian  Jamie Reason

Twice appointed  Mastic Beach Village Historian
Member of the New York State Public Historians Association
Instructor with Journeys into American Indian Territories
Curriculum Based Grade Level School Programs on Native Cultures With Emphasis on The Eastern Woodland Cultures
 Past President of the Long Island Decoy Collectors Association
Contributing Writer for Decoy Magazine
Member of the Society for the Preservation of Long Island Antiquities
Member of the Suffolk County Historical Society
Member of the Long Island Studies Council
President of the Narrow Bay Historical Society
            
Part 1

When I discovered the photo of Charles Sumner Bunn at the 1906 Madison Square Garden National Sportsmen's Show (wrongly dated at c.1920 in John Strong's book,. The Algonquian Peoples of Long Island From Earliest Times to 1700, page 268), I had thought the reattribution of the decoys from the fictitious William "Bill" Bowman to the real maker Charles Bunn would not be a problem, especially in light of the fact that the Bill Bowman story didn't hold water. As I researched for Bowman, it became apparent that there was no connection between a Bill Bowman and the decoys said by members of the Herrick family and Bill Mackey to have been made by a Bill Bowman.  No evidence for Bowman, overwhelming evidence for Bunn as the legitimate  carver of the decoys in question, but there was and still exists an irrational backlash by some to the research produced by Joseph Jannsen and myself on Bunn and his work.

In 2005, anthropologist Dr. Gaynell Stone, editor of  The Shinnecock Indians: A Culture History, after reviewing my research, wrote, "The preponderance of evidence appears to support Bunn as the carver of decoys formerly attributed to "Bowman".  None have been more strident that Hunting & Fishing Collectibles Magazine's Stan VanEtten and collector Ronnie McGrath.  Why?  Ronnie has never produced any evidence for Bowman in Ronnie's "articles"  In reality, Ronnie wrote two childish rebuttals to valid research, which are filled with speculation and outright distortion and fabrication.  Ronnie's only evidence is the discredited Herrick/Mackey collaborative story first   published in Decoy Collectors Guide 1966-67.

 The first critique published by Stan, and written by Ronnie, in Hunting & Fishing Collectibles Magazine  in May-June 2006 was beyond silly. And in fact, in many instances, it bolstered our claim for Bunn and not Bowman.  Such as the reference to New Jersey decoy collector Mort Hanson who had "hired a private investigator who was hired to gather information on Bowman.  After several months of investigation from Long Island to Maine this endeavor was ended.  Ronnie goes on to state that the "reports did not indicate any new information on William Bowman".  Which is to really say, .no information for Bowman at all.  Of course it ended.  Thank you Ronnie for pointing out there is no there, there.

And then there is Ronnie's ridiculous, imaginary, vanishing Bowman photo owned by Ronnie Bauer. I knew Ronnie Bauer and Bud Ward and Ronnie.  In fact, Ronnie McGrath and I partnered on decoy deals for a while when I had my shop in Eastport, Long Island.  There was never a mention of this "missing" photo in the past.  And if Ronnie Bauer had shown that photo to Bud, Bud would have bought it on the spot and sold it to Doc McCleery before sundown.  Unfortunately, many collectors today never knew Bud Ward or Ronnie Bauer, and anyone who was ever around Bud knows that to be the truth, including Ronnie.  Unfortunately, many collectors today never knew Bud Ward, Pop Combs or his son George, Malcolm Fleming, Ruth and Ed Call, and many other early L.I. decoy collectors who are all now deceased.  So Ronnie is able to spout quotes that can't be challenged by many.  One thing I am very sure of, Ronnie would not submit to an independent lie detector test as to the veracity to his so-called research, which I would gladly pay for.

 Over the next few issues of Hunting & Fishing Collectibles, after Ronnie's first rebuttal was printed, there were many letters to the editor on the subject.  Ronnie responded to many of them personally,   with what can only pass for the most ridiculous speculative, fanciful fiction ever written, as when he writes,  "...responsible researchers should be selective and omit all unnecessary facts and myths".  There are no unnecessary facts that are pertinent to the history of the subject, and Bowman as a decoy maker is a proven myth.  This is the myth that Ronnie supports and champions.  The only facts omitted by Ronnie are those that prove his unfounded and utterly ridiculous devotion to the Bowman fabrication and myth.  Ronnie never produces any independent research.  His statements are vague and unsupported by evidence.  He only attacks real research  .In fact, Ronnie and Stan only become active on  this subject when Joe or I publish new research for Bunn, providing more information for Bunn as the maker of the decoys.  The only people who find Ronnie's drivel compelling are those who want or need for Bowman to still be the maker.  Why this is so important for Ronnie be a flat-earther on this subject is beyond my speculation .

So it came as no surprise when after Joe Jannsen's article "Charles Sumner Bunn and the rigs of  Southampton" was published in Decoy Magazine, Ronnie and Stan would once again attack what they can't disprove, and fully support what they can't prove.  Ronnie's new so-called articles in the May-June 2015 and the recently published November-December 2015 Hunting & Fishing Collectibles Magazine in response to Joe and my latest articles in Decoy Magazine.

  I have not had a subscription to Hunting & Fishing Collectibles for years, but if the rest of the magazine's articles are filled with the same quality of research offered on the Bunn decoys, I would be very suspect of anything I read between it's pages.  Ronnie never shows any firsthand research.  He merely makes undocumented statements.  In this article, as stated before, he again brings up his fantasy nonexistent photo of old Bill Bowman.  What is really more unbelievable is the "Editor's Note" on page 12 where Stanley says "Readers should  see pp.11-12 of the author's Bowman-Bunn article in the May -June 2006 issue of Hunting & Fishing Collectibles Magazine."  Believe it or not, when you go to the mentioned reference, it is the exact same ridiculous story about a photo that doesn't exist.  Seriously!  They want to prove a nonexistent photo exists by having you read what you just read; that the photo does not exist.

 However a real documented photo of Charles Bunn in 1906 (not 1909 as Ronnie states) with a pamphlet sold at the show by Bunn, stating that the decoys in the exhibit are decoys he made. This is not enough evidence for him as the maker, not to mention all our other documented evidence we have presented?  But Ronnie would have you believe that a fantasy missing photo is proof for Bowman. Aahh, if he could only find it.  Photoshop might help him.
           
To really take apart Ronnie's rebuttals to the articles written by Joe and myself in Decoy Magazine, I would have to address it sentence by sentence. It is really that bad.  But I will point out some of the ridiculous things found in the May-June and November-December issues of Stan and Ronnie's continual crusade for the fabricated Bowman.  Oh and before we start, I should just state that all of Ronnie's arguments are mute because in my article in the May-June 2015 Decoy Magazine, "Dating the Shorebirds of Charles Sumner Bunn", I prove that the decoys were not produced prior to 1910, eliminating Ronnie's Bill Bowman completely from the picture. The Herrick brothers knew Bunn was the real maker.  So of course in the November-December issue  of  Hunting & Fishing Collectibles, Ronnie once again makes a fool of himself in an attempt to maintain the ridiculous Bowman story. He presents nothing  new or of any substance, and then then does a victory lap.

One thing you also need to know is that all the documentation that Ronnie uses and gives credit to the Long Island Museums, including the Nov-Dec. issue, all came from me.  Ronnie never received the documentation directly from Joshua Ruff from the Museums at Stony Brook. This is the documentation I had sent to Stan.  Ronnie and Stan have used those documents in Ronnie's ravings and they have implied they had acquired them directly from the museum, which they did not.
However, I have the cover letter from Joshua Ruff giving me the documents.  That is something they don't have, and a simple inquiry of Joshua Ruff from the museum would verify that.  Email jruff@longislandmuseum.org, or call 631-751-0066 ext. 224. I encourage interested collectors to contact Mr. Ruff at the museum and ask him what he thinks of the former Bowman attribution. I am sure he would love to answer your questions. That is part of his job.

But let us proceed to show how much Hunting & Fishing Collectibles Magazine and Ronnie have tried to distort documented decoy history in favor of the Bowman fabrication and myth.
Why will always be the unanswered question.

But then Ronnie has never done any real firsthand research himself, so he could have never found or even known what I would discover by really researching both Bunn and Bowman.. I discovered that the decoys weren't made until after Ronnie's Bill Bowman from Maine whose death is recorded as 1906.  That in itself should have ended his Bowman crusade, but no.  Did you ever wonder why there is no abundance of "Bowman" duck stool in Maine?  Think about that for awhile. That apparently never crossed Ronnie's mind.  What is Ronnie's answer for this? Aliens took them?  Bigfoot ate them?  But let's proceed and point out how far out on a limb Hunting & Fishing Collectibles Magazine and Ronnie McGrath have gone in their need to perpetuate the Herrick's and Mackey's Bill Bowman fabrication and the continued myth.

In Joe Jannsen's article on the Bunn rigs from Southampton he credits me for my "extensive research into Charles Sumner Bunn", which is in fact very, very extensive.  In Joe's article, a black duck decoy made by Bunn and once owned by a Mr. Ernest  L. DeMerci sold at Kaminski Auctions in 2013.  Joe Janssen was the buyer.  This decoy drew Ronnie's ire as he declared it to be a copy of a Bowman decoy by Bunn.  Bowman as a decoy maker never existed, so it would be very hard for Bunn to copy his work.  Another interesting thing is that Ronnie's very good friend, Timmy Seiger, mentioned the very same decoy from that auction at the 2013 LIDCA Christmas meeting, where he  described it as a "Bill Bowman decoy".  Tim said that "he had wanted to bid on the decoy but he could not get on the site."  Ronnie then goes on to write that the, "decoy has an anonymously written note", which states for one thing that it was, "Made by the last Full-Blooded  Male Shinnecock Indian".  Ronnie goes on to write, "The carver was known as Mary's Grandfather".  It was me who told Joe the label was incorrect in that Bunn was in fact the grandson of Mary, not her grandfather.  Charles Bunn's grandmother was Mary Cuffee.  As to the mention of Bunn as, "the Last Full-Blood Male", Ronnie rightly states that more than one male was identified as "the last Full-Blooded Male Shinnecock Indian from the late 19th to mid 20th century."  This is true, and in point of fact, Charles Bunn was not a full blood, however, Charles Bunn is the only documented decoy carver from the Shinnecock reservation of that time period.  Ron goes on to say "Mary's grandfather may have found the decoy".
Ron always has people finding decoys, except above he states it to be a "Bunn copy".  Ronnie also mentions,  "that people have claimed a family member made a decoy that was actually factory made". That is also true.  But that dog don't hunt here either because Ronnie had already declared the decoy a "Bunn copy" of the non-existent Bill Bowman's work, even though his pal Timmy Seiger had called it a Bowman.  Also Charles Bunn is a documented decoy carver, not just "someone's family member".

Ron also states how can it be said among the vendors in 1940 when DeMerci bought the black duck decoy.  First of all,l who said he bought it directly from Bunn?  We don't know how it came into his possession.  He may have bought it from one of the many antique and junk shops that were found in the area in 1940.  And what vendors?  Where does Ronnie come up with all these "vendors"?  Ronnie writes, "There were, and still are, vendors along the north side of the Shinnecock Reservation."
 More of Ronnie's flim-flam.  Today, smoke shops, delis and mini-marts line the north side of the reservation.  This is only a recent development, beginning in the last quarter of the 20th century, which was made possible when the New York Reservations began selling tax-free cigarettes. Before that, it was really for the most part scrub pine, oak, blueberry, Virginia creeper and goldenrod, not "vendors".

 In fact, the first trading post on the that stretch of Montauk Highway was opened by Charles Bunn's daughter Alice and her family in 1938.  It was called the "The Teepee In The Hills" and it was not on reservation land and was lost to the Bunn family in the late 20th century.  It is known that Charles Bunn's grandson David Martinez's carvings were sold at the site, with real photographs to prove it.

 As for Mary's Grandson in Joe Jannsen's article, that came from my research   Ronnie states that by changing the word, grandfather to grandson "the last quote Jannsen has restructured decoy history".
No I think whoever wrote it, just got things mixed up a little. Ronnie boldly states, "How can it be said that there was only one Mary among the vendors that day in 1940 when DeMerci bought his  black duck."  Ronnie also writes, 'The presumption that there was only one 'Mary' on the Reservation and that she was Bunn's grandmother questions the logic of Jannsen's interpretation."  Charles Bunn's great grandmother was Mary Ann Cuffee (1817-1903).  Charles Bunn's grandmother was Mary Emma  (Cuffee) Bunn (1847-1937).  It sounds pretty logical to me.  And Ronnie as usual cites no proof for what he writes.  He just makes unsubstantiated broad statements. He doesn't tell us how many Mary's were on the reservation at the time and who they were.  That would take real research.  And why would Charles Bunn's grandmother be there in 1940?  Charles Bunn was 75 years old in 1940.  Charles Bunn's grandmother Mary would have been dead three years in 1940.  These facts do get in the way of Ronnie's fabulous fiction.  Apparently all of Ronnie's research is done inside his head.

In one instance Ronnie calls the note on the bottom of the decoy as an "anonymous note" giving it the air of unworthy information.  Later he treats it as empirical history, when he writes, "How could anyone just reverse recorded historical quotes?"  Which is it?  Ronnie doesn't have a clue.  And it is research that reverses wrong recorded history as in the case for Bowman.

On page 16, Ronnie writes, "Orson Munn Sr. did hunt with Charles Bunn but that there is no record of his having purchased decoys from either Charles Bunn or Bill Bowman."  In the early1990's, Orson Munn Jr. stopped by my shop in Eastport, Long Island.  He had a bunch of repainted Wildfowler Decoys he wanted to sell.  I had told him that they would retail around $30.00 each and that I was not really interested in them, but the most I could do was $15.00 each.  Being very wealthy and definitely not needing the money, he decided not to sell them.  He later did consigned some of his broadbill stool and other birds to my shop around 2004.  At our first encounter I had ask him if he had any older decoys he wanted to sell, especially shorebirds.  He said yes he did have some but they were not for sale.  He then first mentioned the consigning of two of his father's shorebird decoys to Julia & Guyette auctions in the 1980's.  He also told me he had told the auction house when he consigned them, "His father had gotten them directly from the maker Charley Bunn from the Shinnecock Reservation".  He also said that he had told J&G that Charles Bunn had made the decoys, but that when he received the auction catalog they were listed as by William Bowman.  He toll me he had called J&G to complain, saying, "I don't know who William Bowman is but they were made by Charles Bunn from the Shinnecock Reservation".  At the time, I told him "If J&G told you they were made by Bowman, they were most likely right."  When I went home that evening, I took out the catalog they were in and saw what I would at the time have called two Bill Bowman shorebirds.     I then forgot about it until I found the Madison Square Garden photo with Bunn and his decoys. That is when I contacted Orson again to do an interview with him about the shorebird decoys consigned to J&G. I did many subsequent interviews with him over the next few years.

Orson, Joe Jannsen, Donal O'Brien and myself also met at the Long Island Museums to meet with Joshua Ruff, History Curator.  Joshua had no new information other that what was in Gunner's Paradise.  One of the things Orson did tell me in a later interview, was that his father had two baskets of snipe stool that had been in his basement at one time, but had vanished at some unknown date.
The interesting thing is that the two baskets of shorebird decoys matched the description of the two baskets of snipe stool donated by the Herrick's to the Museum.  When I showed the photographs of the decoys from the baskets to Orson, I ask him if he thought theses looked like his missing decoys. He answered in the affirmative, "Yes they do."  But then when I also asked him if he thought the Herrick's might have taken them at some point, he said strongly emphatically "No!  They would not have done that."  I never brought it up again.

But I am not so certain that the Herrick's didn't come into possession of them at some point. Back in the late 40's or early 50's the senior Munn may have even given them to his close friend and hunting partner's family. Remember, back then the decoys had no real monetary value.  It is possible that the two baskets the Herrick's donated to the museum's collection actually came from Munn's basement and were not really the Herrick's decoys.

 As to Ronnie's claimed interview with Orson? I know Dick Cowan interviewed Orson.  He gave his notes to Joe Jannsen.  Cowan's notes have none of the information in them that Ronnie claimed to have received from Orson on the very same date.  Two guys doing an interview with the same person on the same date, and they have different notes. How odd.

Regarding the redhead with the name Bunn carved into the bottom, Ronnie says this redhead is a Bunn. Why, because he can't explain away the name carved on what Ronnie would normally call a Bill Bowman.  The decoy has sold three times by auction houses listed as a Bowman by G&S in 1993. What is Ronnie saying, G&S didn't know it was not a Bowman.  Ronnie would write anything to prove the non-existent Bowman is the maker of the Bunn decoys, but as I have said, Ronnie has never done any research.  
 
That is why Ronnie would not know that the weight found on this redhead is the same Bunn weight found on many of the Bunn decoys Ronnie calls Bowman's.  These weight are a signature feature on these decoys.  A lead pad with a Brass screw running through it to attach to the decoy's bottom half.  Bunn also left a high spot inside the bottom half hollow body to receive the screw.  Now what Ronnie, did Bunn copy the non-existent Bowman's weights too?

Regarding the Charles Bunn display at the 1906 Madison Square Garden Sportsmen's Show, Ronnie has always tried to discredit  this authentic photo.  Ronnie says the booth "was not Bunn's booth.  Bunn is sitting at his booth surrounded by his decoys.  What's the problem?  Ronnie has repeatedly attacked this photo.  In his first rebuttal in 2006, he comes up with many scenarios to discredit the empirical photographic proof for Bunn as the maker.  The photo came from one of Charles Bunn's daughter's house after her death.  The scene was also described by another of his daughter in the Martinez' transcripts.  The pamphlet sold at the show says it is his booth and his decoys, but Ronnie says it could be the booth of any of the people seen in the photo.  Do any of those people look like Bunn?  He also writes "maybe the carver is not even in the photo".  Ronnie come up with other fanciful reasons that Bunn might not even be the real carver.  That the guys in the photo, including Bunn, were just watching the booth of the real carver.  So how do you explain the pamphlet stating that Charles Bunn had a booth at the show and Charles Bunn is sitting at his booth with his decoys? Case closed. But oh no in his rebuttal to Jannsen's article, Ronnie now writes, "it is not Bunn's booth.  Look closely at the sign that reads in part Capt. Will Graham Long Island."  What poor Ronnie, who doesn't do any research, does not know is that  Capt. Will Graham attended the Sportsmen's Show for many years, with his familiar and well known "South Bay Hunting Shack" mentioned in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle March 11 1902.  The shack is seen in the photograph with his sign in front of it, not in front of Bunn's booth.  Bunn's exhibit is the center piece of the staged photograph.  Graham was also Bunn's friend and is listed in the pamphlet for the 1906 show as the editor of that pamphlet.
                                                             End of Part 1
   



























 





 



 




   



 

Newbold Herrick, Charles Perdew & Charles Bunn's Decoys

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.

 

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.

 
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.

The T.F.Norton Decoys

Who the hell is T.F. Norton ?
   
I have been researching this question for over a decade and I have found no answer. We don't know what the initials stand for and we don't know where he lived.  I have found some possibilities, but none of the possibilities could be connected to the decoys made by Charles Sumner Bunn (1865 -1952).  This has become the eternal question when it comes to the Charles Bunn shorebird decoys donated to the Museums at Stony Brook by the prominent Long Island Herrick family who wrongly attributed them to a Bill Bowman.

The well-known story of the Herrick family states they purchased the decoys directly from Bill Bowman, yet the majority of the decoys donated to the Museums at Stony Brook have a T.F.Norton brand on them, which has always been one of the many puzzling parts of the Herrick family's Bowman story.  If bought directly from Bowman, why do they carry the T.F. Norton brand? Over the years, this glaring hole in the Bowman story should have by itself caused the reevaluation of the Herrick/Bowman story, yet even today that is glossed over by the people who won't give up the Bowman myth.

I am certain the T.F. Norton listed in Stony Brook Museum's book, Gunner's Paradise, as a carpenter from Hewlett, Nassau County N.Y. can be eliminated by his social status alone.  The clients of Charles Bunn who purchased this quality of hunting decoy were wealthy sports, not carpenters.  Many of the well-known clients of Bunn were not only from the same social circle, they were related by marriage and/or blood.  Many of these families repeatedly used ancestral names in succeeding generations.  These people were also bound together by wealth and business; attorneys, bankers, insurances company owners.  They belong to the same clubs.  They were not carpenters.

One of the ancestral names to descend through these families is the name Newbold.  According to the book, The Newbold Lawrence Family (1931), the name originated in America with Michael Newbold who came to America between 1665-1675.  We find this name reflected  in multiple examples; Newbold Trotter Lawrence, Newbold Leroy Edgar, Newbold Herrick, and many more.  You also find the Lawrence name used by many descendants

I have tried researching every name combination with Norton I could come up with and so far no luck.  The prominent Trotter family of Philadelphia is connected to the the Lawrence family, so I have tried to discover a person from the right time period.  A Norton with the first name Trotter, but to no avail so far.

The Herrick family at one time should have been able to establish the connection with T.F. Norton because without question, they had originally been made for this mysterious T.F.Norton.  So after years of research, the only thing I can confidently say is the decoys were made by Charles Sumner Bunn, and I still have not discovered who the hell T.F.Norton was, but I am still researching.  
   

Long Island Decoy Collectors Association “The Decoys of Long Island”

A vanity publication with little redeeming value for either the decoy collector or decoy historian

The next chapter of “Long Island Decoy Forum” was to be devoted to the so called “Blair decoys," but I feel that I must address Timmy Sieger and the Long Island Decoy Collectors Association’s latest agenda-driven project.  A small vanity book titled “The Decoys of Long Island," "A museum exhibit catalog" (from the “Decoy Magazine" ad found in the January/February 2010 issue).

First, the book is not a “museum catalog” and should not be considered as such.  I have never seen a “museum catalog” appear after an exhibit comes down.  Normally an exhibit catalog is available from the opening of the exhibit until the exhibit is removed.  After then, the leftover catalogs generally go on clearance sale.  This small publication was produced and funded solely by the Long Island Decoy Collectors Association after the exhibition of these decoys had been taken down at the Ward Museum.  The Long Island Decoy Collectors Association will be mostly referred to as L. I. D. C. A. hereafter.

From the June 1, 2010 e-mail response from the Ward Museum to my question as to who was responsible for writing both the text accompanying the photos and the biographies found in the publication: “The Long Island catalog was based on the Ward Exhibit, but the book was produced by the Long Island Decoy Collectors Association after the exhibit came down. The photographs were taken by Ray Graminski, and the text was written / compiled primarily by Tim Sieger, I believe."  Yes I believe so too.  The response from the Ward Museum clearly shows that the publication has only a superficial relationship with their institution and they neither claim nor state that they are responsible for the text found in what is clearly not a museum catalog, but an L. I. D. C. A. publication.  And if my guess is right, the rank-in-file members of the Long Island Decoy Collectors Association don’t have the foggiest idea that they have bank-rolled and what they have laid out for this rotten little egg Timmy Sieger has laid for the L. I. D. C. A. 

This is Dejavu.  Timmy’s last project using (losing ) the Association's money was the infamous "Gelston Print," a project spearheaded by Timmy.  Tim had persuaded the association members over objections of some of the more rational club members, to commission a painting of the imagined “Gelston workshop," which then would be translated into prints and sold by the club, for in Tim’s opinion, a great profit.  Timmy estimated eventually the club would realize over $20.000.00.  The profit would then be used to publish a book on the Long Island decoys and their makers.  Well Tim’s estimate of the profit was a tad too high.  The painting turned out to be flat-out God awful.  The so-called art was executed by Tim’s friend, local artist Vito DeVito.  The original painting was atrocious, but the most alarming element found in the work is a dog's head sticking up in the middle of the painting, rather like the gopher in "Caddyshack," but looking more like the “Wookie” from "Star Wars"; it’s a regular ET retriever.  Then the Timster had 300+ prints produced from this chromatic Titanic when the club had voted to fund only half that number.  However, without a revote from the club, Tim on his own upped the number of the run.  He got a great deal.  Timmy foresaw a huge fortune in the making; gold coins falling from the sky.  The original painting had cost the club $3,000.00 and was to have been sold at auction to recoup some of its cost.  The original to my knowledge was never sold and has mysteriously disappeared.  Where could it possibly be?  On who's wall does this hideous waste of paint now hang? In reality, how much money could the club have realized from the sale of the original?  It is doubtful any serious decoy collector would covet it.  It could only appeal to a person of undistinguished taste, say someone who might consider “Velveeta” a gourmet cheese.  On the other hand, it might appeal to a “Star Wars” collector, there’s that Wookie factor.  The print became the butt of jokes and was distained by the public and by most club members.  Not only did these prints represent some really bad art, they were way overpriced.  The club eventually sold only 30+ of the total run Timmy had insisted on buying. Ultimately, club members were forced to take them for free as a Christmas present; some present.  That must have made the other members of the club who had paid the full $100.00 price very happy.  Buy one get one free, don‘t buy one get one free.  At every show for years after, a print was one of the raffle prizes taken home by some unlucky winner.  The proverbial bottom line is, Tim’s project did not produce the thousands of dollars he predicted that it would.  In point of fact, it did exactly the opposite, it lost thousands of dollars, as had been predicted by some of the more astute members of the club who had counseled our young Einstein on this unwise project, but to no avail.  To this day, L. I. D. C.A. should still have enough of these un-sellable prints to wall paper the Empire State Building, unless someone has mercifully cremated the incriminating evidence of Timmy’s last great idea.  And I believe the L. I. D. C. A. publication, as with the great Gelston print, will be one of the raffle prizes at the annual L. I. D. C. A. shows for years to come. 

I do believe that sometime in the future, I will have to devote a chapter to this group of knuckleheads. An overview of some of the past antics of L. I. D. C.A.’s crew of whackos.  As a former president of this collection of miscreants, I know of which I speak.  Who by the way could be central castings dream team for the remake of the classic “One Flew over The Cuckoo’s Nest."  I can just hear the dialogue as they take the L. I. D. C. A. fishing trip, “This is the esteemed Dr. Murphy.”  But that little funfest will have to wait for another day.  It will suffice for the reader to know that in my opinion, most members of L. I. D. C.A. should not be allotted any credibility whatsoever in the identification or knowledge of who the real decoy makers were of Long Island’s most well-known decoys.  Timmy Sieger, as far as I know, has never done any personal research on the subject of Long Island’s decoy carvers.  He has never produced any research or proof for his claim for the “Seabury golden plover decoys” (see Long Island Decoy Forum, the “Seabury Fabrication”).  This publication has been Timmy’s great opportunity to fully establish his claim for the “Seabury Family”(and the decoys they did not make).  Now all he has to do is say read “The Decoys Of Long Island” with the Ward Museum’s logo.  Here is his proof the plovers were made by the “Seabury family."  It‘s in the book!  Nevermind the only source for this undocumented claim for The Seabury's is Tim Sieger.

 In this thin book brilliantly titled “The Decoys of Long Island,” we find the Long Island Decoy Collectors Association and a museum once again duplicitous in the perpetuation of myth and fabrication over fact, as was perpetrated in Gunners Paradise in 1979 by the Museums at Stony Brook.  This time it’s the Ward Museum who will supply the perceived academic aroma for the acceptance of non-documented carver attributions, and more than a few fabricated ones.  Not to mention the birds who's authenticity or factual condition are more than highly questionable, which includes the well-known so- called “Henry Ellison Herons.”  These last two birds look curiously just like the two herons that used to grace the front windows of the Combs' Bait and Tackle Shop in Amityville in the 1970's.  And even more curiously, they came from the George Combs' collection.  What are the odds? 

Back in the 70’s George Combs Jr. proudly said he had made the herons that look remarkable like the so-called “Ellison Herons,” And this is known by some of the older collectors from Long Island.  In fact, when I mentioned it to collector Dick Cowan that I thought the “Ellison herons” were really Combs' herons, he exclaimed, "How did you know that?!"  No denial of the theory.  An Ellison sidebar; there are also a pair of terns (not pictured in the L. I. D. C. A. publication ) that are said to be made by Henry Ellison, out of the George Combs Jr. collection.  Both were auctioned by Guyette & Schmidt in two separate auctions.  After I saw the first bird, lot #553 in the July 2002 auction, I informed many collectors that the tern was not made by Ellison, that they were really made by George Combs Jr., and that was confirmed directly to me in a conversation I had with him around the year 2000 at the Ward Museum‘s annual October event.  As far as I have been able tell, the Ellison name came from Richard Baldwin’s “Verity Family” book, and I have so far not found any documentation of Henry Ellison’s carving of decoys in my research of the man, who yes, really lived.  Anytime you showed George Combs a decoy, he would come up with the name of the maker.  Bud Ward used to jokingly say, “George Combs Jr. found his decoy maker's names in the phone book."  But these terns were fakes made by George with an "HE" carved on them.  The first time I saw them was when George had installed an exhibit of his birds in the L. I. D. C. A. display case at the Ward Museum.  As I looked at the case, it became quite apparent that about half the birds were by George Combs Jr. and were not old. The most glaring examples were a pair of terns listed as by “Henry Ellison."  When I saw Gorge outside, I said why are there so many new birds in the case, and what was the deal with the terns.  He was busted.  He got sheepish and stuttered that his dad had made the terns.  I thought to myself, your dad was better than that.  I said, "George, they look like your work."  He then said he just needed to fill the case.  No matter who made the birds, George Jr. or Pop Combs, George knew that they were not by Henry Ellison.  The second “Ellison tern” came up at the G&S November 2002 auction, lot #281 listed as a rigmate to lot #553 in the July auction.  Unlike the first bird, this one did not sell because by then many collectors had been informed of my information that they were really Combs' terns.  George had sold off most of his good decoys prior to his death.  What was left after his passing were for the most part the dregs, and birds he himself had made.  Many were sold by G&S and entrusted to collector Frances Murphy with their disposal.  Interestingly, at recent L. I. D. C. A. meeting, Frances had what he called a “Henry Elliston tern."  If I was to guess, it‘s the “Combs' tern” that did not sell at the November auction in 2002. 

Unfortunately, for the collector the Ward Museum's participation in the L. I. D. C. A. publication, no mater how minor, will tend to indicate to the reader an aura of scholarly knowledge, which with the exception of Geoffrey K. Fleming‘s chapter titled, “Long Island And The Decoy,” this is not the case.  A reader should justifiably assume that the catalog bearing the museum's logo and crediting the Museum’s Curator, would indicate that the reader would find documented research between the pages of the publication, or at least some statement that there are questions of the attributions of some of the decoys due to new published research.  What you do find in the publication is a rehash of previously published myths and fabrications, eventhough my recently published research has at the very least called into question many of the old attributed names that have been used for Long Island's decoy carvers in the past.  This recent research that has been published on the misattributed makers is totally ignored and not even mentioned in this publication.  And of course what is the most obvious slanted act in the book by Timmy is the use of the name, “William Bowman.”  Here we find the Ward Museum has played exactly the same roll that the Museums at Stony Brook did in 1979 in their catalog Gunners Paradise in the spreading the Gospel of Bill Bowman.  But somewhat to Stony Brook's credit they do state, “The Identity of William Bowman, decoy carver has not been firmly established," and it never has been.  This is not the case in Timmy’s little vacuous publication.

This is an agenda-driven vanity book pure and simple, by and for Timmy, at club expense where he not only gets to promote his Seabury nonsense, he acquires for himself, at little layer of prestige by being listed as “Guest Curator."  And by his slanting the entire publication to the side of those who want to retain the status quo of the mythical decoy carvers from Long Island, it’s the literary equivalent of covering yours ears and going,  "Lalalala, I can’t hear you."  But this will make Timmy the darling of the decoy power elite; the high end decoy collectors, auction houses, museums, etc., who have taken a stand in opposition to any new research that would upset their world order of Dilley, Bowman, Verity, etc. In this publication we find no mention of the recent research done on Charles Bunn, the true maker of the decoys Timmy lists as the work of a mythical William Bowman.  And unfortunately for the Ward Museum, no matter how minute their actual involvement was in the publication, by allowing the use of their logo they are aiding and abetting in the distortion of Long Island decoy history and the agenda of perpetuating the listing of mythical decoy makers over relevant recent research that refutes past attributions.

And it is not I think by accident that the cover bird on the the dust jacket is a Bunn curlew also found on the inside cover, and of course it is listed as a “Bowman."  A Bunn Redhead from Alan Haid’s collection is on the opposite page of the "Forward” which is a weakly written waste of paper by collector, dealer and Bowman cheerleader, Alan Haid.  Give me a B, give me an O, shake those Bowman pom-poms.  On page 9, Alan as usual touts non-decoy makers, Verity, Bowman and Dilley, and what a great exhibit it was. Alan has been one of the people who is violently apposed to the reattribution of the so-called Bowman decoys to their real maker Charles Sumner Bunn from the Shinnecock Reservation.  And no matter what evidence is presented for Bunn as the maker, he has ignored it.  Yet Alan has never presented and evidence for his beloved “Old Bill Bowman” nor has anyone else to date.

It could be said of this publication and to the Bowman supporters what was said to Guyette & Schmidt in the Maine Antique Digest in 2004 by the late decoy auction reviewer Jackson Parker. “It seems Guyette & Schmidt has not caught up with the latest research on who made the Bowman decoys."  In "Decoy Magazine" he said, “Bunn or Bowman” makes a case for Charles Sumner Bunn as the maker, but the Guyette & Schmidt catalog credits its yellowlegs to Bowman.”  It is a shame we lost Jackson Parker.  He was a person who had no agenda and could think independently.  Jackson went on to say that “until the disagreement was settled he would refer to the birds as Bunn/Bowman locating the maker to Long Island, New York," removing the trumped up Maine location from the equation.  In the same year, 2004, Jackson wrote of a Bunn short-billed dowitcher in Harmon’s July auction. “Recent research indicates the shorebirds credited to Bill Bowman may have been made by Charles Sumner Bunn of the Shinnecock Indian reservation on Long Island New York."  He went on to say that “Guyette & Schmidt said they needed more evidence to sell these birds as Bunn's rather than Bowman's."  He also says Ted Harmon used the name “Bowman” with quotes to show the “difference of opinion."

Eventhough there never was any evidence at all for Bowman as the maker, we were told we needed to provide more evidence for Bunn.  The fact that we have a photo of Bunn with his duck stool is not good enough, along with other documentation, and again there is no documentation for Bowman.  In point of fact, after our article on Charles Bunn was published in "Decoy Magazine," I had accumulated much more evidence for Bunn as the maker.  But I could not get "Decoy Magazine", "Hunting & Fishing Collectibles" or "Sporting Classics" to consent to publish the research.  It seems they were getting pressure to drop the whole question of Bunn as the maker and stick with status quo “Bowman.”  In fact, I was pretty much blacklisted when it came to publishing if it had anything to do with Charles Bunn. With no outlet to disseminate my accumulating research I decided to start the “Long Island Decoy Forum” where the only pressure I have is to get the facts right and present them no matter where the evidence leads.

I will sum up my review of Timmy Sieger's publication "The Decoys of Long Island” by saying if you want to purchase a picture book, then by all means buy the book, but I would wait until it goes on sale, which should be very soon.  Howeve,r if you want to avail yourself of relevant documented information on the decoys of Long Island, save your pesos and read Long Island Decoy Forum for free, presented for you to evaluate and comment on, and if a reader disagrees with my conclusions, please present your documented evidence that is contrary to what I have published.

As Val Kilmer’s Doc Holliday said to Johnny Ringo in the movie "Tombstone," “I’m your Huckleberry.”

The next chapter was to be on the so-called “Blair decoys,” and that will be included in the next chapter titled. “ Long Islands Greatest Decoy Carver.”

John Dilley, It’s a Dilley

The History of the Silly John Dilley Decoy Myth

When it comes to the myth of John Dilley decoy maker, as with many of the early decoy misattributions, I am reminded of the famous line by Claude Raines in the movie Casablanca, “Round up the usual suspects.”  In this case, it would be Joel Barber, Bill Mackey and Adele Earnest, their early books on decoys are once again the starting point of the investigation.  And of course, Barber’s book leads off the lineup, but in his book there is no mention of John Dilley.

In Wild Fowl Decoys (1934) by Joel Barber, on page 68, plate 54, we find a Plover that would later be called a “John Dilley decoy” beginning in the early 1970‘s.  On page 86, we have the description, “The group in plate 54 shows several decoys from different localities, The Black-breasted plover loaned by Mr. Frederick Becker, comes from Long Island.”  Mr. Barber gives the location of the decoys as Long Island, but does not link the decoy to a particular carver or town (Fredrick Becker lived in Babylon Long Island).

Then along comes Bill Mackey.  In his book American Bird Decoys (1965), Mackey is all over the place on the decoys that he would eventually attribute to “John Dilley."  In color plate IV, “This Black -bellied Plover (left); Ruddy Turnstone (second from left); and two Dowitchers, in fall plumage and spring plumage respectively, represent the “Jess Birdsall type”of shore birds."  There is a question as to their origin, but here he links them to New Jersey (Barber had placed a bird by the same maker on Long Island 31 years earlier).  Barber and Mackey both knew each other well and Mackey had Barber's book on his shelf.  But Mackey does not mention the Barber bird in his book?  Mackey (1965), “There is no question that the detailed, stylized painting is unsurpassed. They are beautiful examples from the hand of a fastidious workman.”  On page 124 Mackey tries to explain why he is not sure who really made the decoys.  He tells of receiving a group of six shorebird decoys from the widow of Captain Jess Birdsall of Barnegat N.J. in 1941.  Mackey tells of how awestruck he was with these beautiful mint shorebird decoys and says, “This unprecedented find left me excited to the point of paying less attention than usial to historical details.”  In reality this is typical of Mackey’s less than stellar documentation and it seems evident that he is trying to cover his tracks on his off the cuff, no frills research, as seen below.

“The fame of the “Jess Birdsall snipe” became established and for years there was no reason to doubt their origin."  Yes, and it was Mackey who established the fame and origin of the “Jess Birdsall snipe."

“Fifteen Years ago in 1956 a batch of identical decoys were discovered at Amityville, New York” (the town where Mr. Fredrick Becker lived).  It would appear Mackey never seems to make the obvious connection between the birds he had first called Jess Birdsall shorebird decoys and the bird in Barber’s book.  Mackey says the Amityville birds were not pristine, but well shot over and he concludes as they had no documentation, “they could have been from Barnegat."  And of course, Mackey never had any documentation for his original stated Barnegat, New Jersey origin.

Mackey finishes the page by saying that it was becoming apperent that most of these shore bird decoys were being uncovered on Long Island, not New Jersey. “Call them what you will, but I now have doubt that the able Captain Jess Birdsall ever carved them.  By what ever name they are called, their paint patterns are superb and their interest is enhanced by the fact they were made as working decoys, not as mantel ornaments.”  So Mackey does not know who made the birds, but he his looking for a new name, someone from Long Island, and it will be a Dilley of a name.

Adele Earnest’s book also published in 1965, the same year as Mackey's, presents two plates in her book showing the shore bird decoys that would be called "Dilley’s” on Page 60, plate 41, KNOT SHOREBIRD, text page 202, “By Jesse Birdsall, Barnegat New Jersey (Collection of Lloyd Johnson, Bay Head, New Jersey).”

Page 156, plate 156 KNOT, RUDDY TURNSONE, AND PLOVER

Text page by, “Jesse Birdsall,” same as above description.

It seems Mr. Mackey did not notify Ms. Earnest of his doubts on the Birdsall connection to the shore bird decoys, or for some other reason, she still refers to them as New Jersey decoys. 

The next major step in the Dilley legend comes six years later with the publication of the portfolio, “Classic Shorebird Decoys” by American artist Milt Weiler (1971), Text by William J. Mackey Jr.  This is where Bill Mackey inserts the most enduring pillar of the Dilley myth, a totally made out of whole cloth fabrication that if it existed, would not prove or give evidence as to who made the decoys.  In the last paragraph below of the entire text found on plate No.7, we find the first mention of the non-exsistent, never seen, half dozen shorebirds with name Dilley stenciled on them in a box with “John Dilley Quogue" stamped on it.  I will address the subject of the half dozen birds and the box that never existed, all so the stated location of Quogue as Dilley’s home town.  But before I progress further, I will tell the reader that there has never been a “John Dilley” recorded in any association with the Village of Quogue, Long Island.

The late Mrs. Pat Shuttleworth of Quogue, was the Quogue town historian for many years.  Mrs. Shuttleworth was a very sweet and intelligent lady who searched repeatedly and diligently for any information or documentation on both the names of “John Dilley" and "Thomas H. Gelston" at the request of decoy collectors/researchers, including Fred Reaver, myself, and many others.  Her conclusion was that neither “Gelston” nor “ Dilley” had ever lived or had any documentable association with Village of Quogue.

Plate No. 7

JOHN DILLEY

Quogue, New York

In 1944, I purchased six mint examples of Dilley birds from Jess Birdsall’s widow in their Barnegat, New Jersey, home.  Ever since then, handsome birds of this type have been in the forefront of the collectibles.  The birds I bought from Mrs. Birdsall showed very little evidence of use, and each one had been reverently tuck in an old black cotton stocking for protection.  Since Captain Jess was a dandy decoy maker, it was hastily concluded that he had surely made these.  The obvious fact, that no documented decoy of his resembled these little gems, was ignored by most of the collectors.  The myth grew. Rumor had it that he made them on his long ocean voyages, using skins he had taken aboard for that purpose.

These decoys had real class and were envied by fellow collectors such as Joel Barber and Edgar Burke, who left my house walking on air because I had given them each a snipe.  My monopoly of four didn’t last long, though, for here and there others showed up---many on Long Island.  However, when collectors are hot on a new trail, inconsistencies like this don’t deter them. The decoys began as Birdsalls, and Birdsalls they stayed.  For two decades, every now and again, someone would find another on Long Island.  The six in the black stockings from Barnegat were the only ones ever found in New Jersey.

The birds---plover, ruddy turnstones, yellowlegs (one size), dowitchers and knots---have unmistakable characteristics of finely carved plump bodies all in the one pose shown.  Some have lightly carved wings but only one, the yellowlegs, has a split tail.  The bills do not penetrate the head but are well-shaped and nicely fitted.  Most pleasing are the paint patterns, which are incredibly correct in color tones.  Note especially the white areas, which are feathered by texturing white paint over a base white.  It almost has to be seen to be believed.  Another feature is the delicate feathering, evident on all the areas, which extends under the tail.  This is a time-consuming gesture that pleased only the artist and the collector.  Once the decoy was staked out to lure counterparts, the time spent on such frivolities was wasted.

These incredibly well-painted birds have an origin that is still vague and uncertain.  Some have a stencil using green ink and the word DILLEY.  One collector saw six in a box that indicated they were sold as a commercial item. The box was also stamped JOHN DILLEY.  The cost of such a rig must have made any widespread use prohibitive.  Even a reasonable profit placed on the carving and especially the detailed painting would put them far beyond the means of the average hunter.  Mason decoys from Detroit retailed at $4.50 a dozen; Bill Bowman’s were bartered for the cup that cheers; Harry Shourds soaked the sports six bucks a dozen.  If the real John Dilley is around, please stand up; we’ll offer him a deal similar to the California gold rush.

From Classic Shorebird Decoys, a Portfolio of paintings by Milton C. Weiler, Text by William J. Mackey, Jr. 1971.

These shorebird decoys will be called Dilley’s by most auction houses, decoy dealers, museums, and collectors from then until the present, based solely on Mackey, who now out of the blue, begins attributing them to a John Dilley, from Quogue Long Island.  All based on a half dozen decoys and a box that has never been seen.  It will be trotted out in almost every article written on the subject.

Eight years after the Milt Weiler Mackey print text, in 1979, once more enter the Museums at Stony Brook with their myth enabling, non-scholarly book, Gunners Paradise, again we see they have the ability to walk two roads at the same time. On page 115, #187 “Black bellied Plover," page 124, #209 “Robin Snipe," both listed as by “John Dilley, Long Island,” and on page 150, “Index to Decoy Carvers and companies in the Decoy Collection of The Museums at Stony Brook, John Dilley, 115, 124."

The Museum's publication expresses no reservations as to crediting John Dilley as the carver, yet when you read the description on page 115, we find this statement, “To date there is no documentation on this carver who may have been dubbed John Dilley either because a box containing decoys by an unknown carver was labled “John Dilley, Quogue” or simply because a collector on seeing a fine decoy exclaimed, “That’s a Dilly!”  On page 124, we are told the Knot is branded “Henny and Squires, N.Y.”  It seems no one has ever investigated the brand found on this bird, though I have no evidence the brand suggests the name of a store or Business.

It is a shame that the Museums at Stony Brook, in their various name incarnations, their past and present stewardships, have consistently shown a total lack of professionalism in their presentation, research, and curatorial approach to the historical objects in their decoy collection.  It is a failure on their part to live up to their mission statement and a disservice to the people of Long Island and it’s history.

In 1980, one year later, we find the first book singularly devoted to shorebird decoys, their use, the times, and their alleged makers, by my friend, Henry A. Fleckenstein Jr.  Unfortunately the book is very disjointed and as to the “carvers,” none were researched or vetted to substantiate any evidence or facts to support the claim that the names stated to be the carvers are in fact really the carvers, and not just names.  This is the standard “documentation” used by decoy writers past and present.  The most rewarding part of Henry's book is the abundance of photographs and the historical information on the shorebird gunning era.

On page 15 Henry writes, “There are almost as many great unknowns who, like Bowman and Dilley, may one day be identified and their history recorded in a later publication.”  It is evident at least at the time that Henry wrote his book, not unlike decoy writers past or present, don’t have the foggest idea what the meaning of “identified” and “their history recorded” means.  There is no recorded history for either “Bowman” or “Dilley”and neither one was ever identified as a decoy carver using any form of evidence or documentation.  No, it’s quite the opposite.  Henry presents no facts, no documents are produced from his own independent research, all to the contrary.  Henry writes on page 37, plate 40, “Willit decoy- made by John Dilley, Quogue Long Island, New York.  Little is known of John Dilley and the attribution is suspect to many collectors.  Other collectors are just as certain Dilley made decoys.  Who ever may be correct, all agree that these decoys are superb examples of the art."  As nonsensical as it sounds, Henry like most other decoy writers, never seemed to understand the incongruities between writing that decoys have been “identified” and in the next sentence pointing out that they really have not been identified.

On page 49, plates 50-51, “Plovers by John Dilley”  Text with plate 50 tells of them being once identified as “Jess Birdsall’s" and “Birdsall type."  Plate 51, Color photos XIX& amp; XX plovers, “Little is known of John Dilley, but the exquisite paint pattern found on his decoys speakes for itself.”

This is more of the decoy writer's flim-flam, Henry says “little is known of John Dilley,” when in truth he should have writen NOTHING IS KNOWN OF JOHN DILLEY.  And the paint found on the birds can not in any way document who the painter was, if you don’t know who the painter really was to begin with.  Henry’s book adds nothing of substance to the identifacation of the true maker of the shorebird decoys, but it does point out that there is no evidence for “John Dilley” as the maker of the decoys.  This will be the mantra repeated by every writer on the subject, yet none ever question why they and others are calling them “ John Dilley” decoys.

Over the next decade, the “Dilley myth” will bump along like a round stone in a swift stream.  Never acquiring or presenting any evedience for Dilley as the maker,  but he will continually be listed as a maker in all the books and articles written on the subject, as found in The Great Book of Decoys (1990), chapter eight, “LONG ISLAND by Long Island Collector Fred Dombo, There is very little information about the maker of the shorebird that are referred to as John Dilley’s” (if nothing is a little information then I guess it’s as little as it gets).  He gives a synopsis of the Weiler/Mackey text, complete with the phantom box.  Then he goes on to say, “There is no proof that this person made the decoys and there is no information on who this person was."  Then he like all the other decoy writers, he does a tap dance about how wonderfully they are painted, etc.  In the next sentence he says that “In collecting circles, they are generally accepted as 'John Dilley.'"  This points out the problem with decoy collecting.  If collectors feel the birds are “John Dilley” decoys based solely on the only consistent fact presented that there is no proof that “John Dilley” made the decoys in question which means, sadly, most decoy collectors don’t really don’t care who carved the decoys in their collections. They don‘t seem to feel that the real artist deserves the credit.  Just as long as they and their decoys have someone's name attached to it, they are happy as clams.  No matter how illusory the gossamer claim for the name is, they can boast that “This Decoy was made by” and also sadly, most of these so-called decoy collector/experts can’t tell the difference between a real untouched decoy, a repaint, reworked, re-headed or out right fake bird.  As well you often find these self proclaimed “decoy experts” are many times rather pompous in their supposed knowledge.  Equipped only with the knowledge found in the unrehearsed books and articles that have been printed, but never fact checked and all so the knowledge of older pompous decoy collectors who generously share their great wisdom with the neophyte collectors, which is also based on the same unreaserched books and myths. All having  drank from the same Cool Ade tub they can now all nod knowingly to each other as to the "names" of the carvers who made the birds. As in"Yes that is a"John Dilley decoy" .  It has been said that around half the “Ward” decoys on the market today are fake and some swear Crowell is making far more birds today than when he was alive. This is the sad state decoy of decoy collecting today (what’s in your collection?)

Books like The Collectors Guide to Decoys Volumes I (1991) and II (1992) by Bob and Sharon Huxford and Collectors Guide to Decoys (1992) by Linda and Gene Kangas state no opinion on the existence of “Dilley” or his invisible box.  They just list him as the maker of the shorebird decoys.

In 1991 the second book devoted to shorebird decoys and their alleged makers was published. This one will be a typical evidence lacking non-researched decoy book, a heralding of names of America's greatest decoy carvers (who never carved, existed or both), SHOREBIRDS, The Birds, The Hunters, The Decoys by Somers G. Headley and John M. Levenson.  On page 71, plate 5-14, is a Red Knot listed as a “John Dilley Quogue, Long Island c. 1890” (since John Dilley does not exist, it seems it would be hard to date his work).  On page 72, plate 5-15, is a Yellowlegs and Black-bellied Plover also with the same description.

The accompanying text found on page 70 says, “For many years, William Bowman, Thomas Gelston and Obadiah Verity were considered by most collectors to be the three most prominent Long Island decoy carvers, but since the late 1970s another name has surfaced."  They are correct a name surfaced and nothing else, and the other “names” the authors mention as “carvers” have now been proven not to be the real carvers.  They like “Dilley” are all myths or fabrications.  But do go on.  “In decoy collecting circles they are generally accepted” as the carvers."  The text then goes on to say, “John Dilley is thought to be the person who carved and painted certain exceptional shorebird decoys about 1890.”  The authors say Dilley is “thought” to be the carver/painter.  What would that thought be based on?  Mackey’s never seen invisible box.  A thought might be, “I thought I left my keys on the desk,"  but the fact might be that they are locked inside the car.  That is the difference, but most decoy writers never let facts get in the way of the story, so thoughts are good enough.

Authors Levinson and Headley go on to say that “Figure5-14 shows a Red Knot with feather painting so realistic that you want to reach out and touch it.” “Figure 5-15 contrasts well the essential anatomical differences in a yellowlegs and the black- bellied plover.  Both decoys have German glass eyes the black bellied plover in early spring plumage has carved wings. Minimal wing carving is noted in the wings of the yellowlegs.”

“For many years Dilley’s were identified simply as “Jess Birdsall type," because the first six known came from Mrs. Jess Birdsall at Barnegat New Jersey and were thought to have been made by her husband, the late Capt. Jess Birdsall.  Although there is no real documentation on the carver, the superb workmanship is evident.”  The authors say there is “no real documentation for the carver” yet they still list him as the carver(?)  Then they pull this old chestnut out of the fire. “It is possible that the name John Dilley came from the expression, “That’s a Dilly”!  At any rate, these birds were carefully carved and often exquisitely painted.”

Let's address this often mentioned “That’s a Dilly” "It a Dilly” story.  First “Dilley” and “Dilly” are spelled differently and the most likely reason or the only reason they are called “Dilley’s” is due to the fact that a few of the decoys have the name “Dilley” written in script with green ink on their tails( not stamped).   That is the only connection to the word Dilley which most likely means someone with the last name Dilley once owned them at an undetermined date.  Now can you conceive naming decoys after adjectives expressed in praise and admiration of the workmanship or artistic ability exhibited in a decoy?  Shouldn’t we expect to have other decoys by such carvers as “John Wonderful,” “John Beautiful” or “John Fantastic” decoys? As to where the first name “John” came from is anybody’s guess.  Once again the only conclusion to be drawn from this book is there has never been a logical reason to credit the decoys to a John Dilley from Quogue, and the authors definitely say so, as they merrily go on to credit him as the carver.  And it is exactly the same with our next publication, the Dr. James McCleery’s Call to the Sky (1992), catalog/book accompanying the exhibit of the decoys from the James McCleery Collection presented by the Houston Museum of Natural Science, Houston, Texas.  The catalog text is by Robert Shaw.  It would appear again we find an author unwittingly undermining the claim for “Dilley” while still referring to the shorebird decoys as by “John Dilley.”  He writes, “John Dilley, of whose life virtually nothing is known." Once again we here it repeated nothing exists for Dilley other than the name. However, he still goes on to say he was “among the most technically skilled of all decoy painters.”

Mr. Shaw goes on to say, “Whoever he was, Dilley had intimate and detailed knowledge of the complex and often confusing seasonal plumage phases of shorebird species.” He extols, “the great paint found on the birds."  He writes of the complex painting techniques the (name) “Dilley” used on his birds.  This would be considered clinically schizophrenic, yet this is what you find written in most, if not all the books or articles written about old decoys and their supposed makers, and readily accepted by most collectors.  “Whoever he was” is most assuredly not documentation for a “John Dilley."  This book, as with most decoy publications, merely regurgitates previously published erroneous information.  No proof is presented for the great spectral carver/painter Mr. “John Dilley."

In 1992, the recently deceased pioneer decoy collector/writer Mr. Joseph B. French (1919-2009) wrote an article for Wildfowl Carving magazine. It later was reprinted with permission as the cover story in the January/February 1994 issue of Decoy Magazine titled. "The Dilley Shorebirds A collectors’ journey of discovery” by Joseph B.French.  To his last day Joe French thought and was convinced he had discovered the proof that a “John Dilley” from "Quogue Long Island” had made the shorebird decoys, as he claims in his article.  I believe Joe’s love for these beautifully painted shorebirds and his need to have the identity of their creator clouded his better judgment.  When he wrote the article he was not only deeply entrenched in the “Dilley” attribution, he was the Chairman of the Board for the claim for “John Dilley” carver/painter. Other collectors openly snickered at the “John Dilley” story and they were responsible for the “It‘s a Dilly“ story.  In point of fact, the only thing Joe may have proven in his article is that some of the shorebirds have the name “Dilley” written in green ink on their tails and that it was most likely written as he wrote “in the early ‘40s, before any collector had heard the name” (Dilley). Or at some other undetermined date that can’t even be guessed at.  Why Joe thinks that it was “Most likely in the early ’40s is unexplained.

Joe’s article sheds no light on who made the shorebirds, including and most specifically, a “John Dilley from Quogue Long Island."  However, there is a lot of information in the article, much of which strongly hurts his case for “John Dilley decoy maker," and as other decoy writers do, he will continually point out the glaring lack of proof for a John Dilley, decoy carver.  Yet he appears not to see the proverbial forest for the trees as seen in what he says of the famous non-existent “Box and 6 decoys," that elusive magical mystery Dilley shorebird box and it‘s never seen contents.

From French's article Decoy Magazine,1994: “The first obvious clue to follow was the box Mackey mentioned.  In checking with Long Island collectors I knew, I didn’t find one who personally knew anything about the green-labeled birds, nor have I ever seen one.  If someone has one, I’d appreciate knowing about it.”  What Joe should have written, and I am being charitable, is that the phantom box and the 6 decoys have never been seen and the story is more than likely a decoy myth masquerading as a fact.  The myth most likely is built around a few birds with the name “Dilley” written in green ink script, on their tails.  These few birds with the green ink “Dilley” written on them have been documented to exist, but not documented as having been made by a John Dilley from Quogue or even who or when or why the word “Dilley” was written on them.

But in the famous Sotheby’s/ Guyette & Schmidt January 22-23, 2000 Auction of the Decoy collection Dr. James (Doc) McCleery, on page 162 of the auction catalog we find this bio-description for “Dilley” under “LONG ISLAND SHOREBIRDS."  Guyette & Schmidt drag out the old Dilley Box Story eight years after the French article was first published.  They still are promoting the discredited “Dilly Box Story."  As collectors know, the decoy auction house of Guyette & Schmidt is the largest of the house’s specializing primarily in American bird decoys and decorative bird carvings.  They are considered by many collectors to be the pinnacle of expertise.  Sotheby’s used them and their supposed expertise to write the regurgitated dreck found in the bio and descriptions found in the catalog. 

From Sotheby’s / Guyette & Schmidt, James McCleery Auction 2000: “John Dilley is a cipher, little more than a name found on a single box of expertly carved and exquisitely painted shorebird decoys made in the decades of the nineteenth century" (The box does not exist but they even know the era it came from).  It is said patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel that is true, but I think decoy catalog description writers might be the next step in scoundrel-dom. “The box of birds was also marked “Quogue” a town on Long Island's south shore near Eastport.”  Guyette & Schmidt never mention that out of all the decoy related material they have handled that they have never seen the box.

They go on to say “it is assumed that their maker worked nearby, but no substantial proof exists” (to see the full text see the page 98 of the catalog).  And if you remember a certain episode of the TV series “The Odd Couple” we all know where assumptions can lead us, or should I say led Guyette & Schmidt.  In fact they are led there quite frequently.  And once again, I should reiterate that traditionally auction houses exhibit less defined moral bearings than most politicians, shyster lawyers, or slicked backed pinky ringed used car salesmen.  They just wear tweed instead of shark skin.

If the strongest evidence they have to present for John Dilley carver/painter is the fallacious, vaporous box that has never been seen and has never existed to anyone's knowledge, and the only real fact that is presented is that there is no evidence in any form of documentation for a “John Dilley” decoy maker from Quogue, then it would seem there would be no reasonable or rationale reason to refer to these decoys as anything other that “by unknown maker."  At least by a rational thinking person, or just a thinking person.

Time after time the Joe French article points out how he and other collectors could never find any information or proof for a John Dilley to have ever lived on Long Island, let alone in the repeatedly stated Quogue, and none could find proof that the non-existent Mr. Dilley carved at all.  How could they (HE DOES NOT EXIST, he is fiction ) as my youngest daughter used to say “A-da."

To get the full benefit of Joe French’s seemingly insanely written article, one should read it entirely, however I will present some quoted highlights to show how decoy writers like Mr. French never seem to see their irrational statements as being irrational.  They try to prove the existence of the non-existent by pointing out how there is no evidence for his existence.  I swear I can almost hear Patsy Cline in the background singing “Crazy.”  From Page 9 of the French article, Joe French tells how our mutual friend, the late well known Long Island collector/dealer, Charles “Bud”Ward, had not been able to locate any information by calling “anyone listed on Long Island with the name of Dilly or Dilley with no success.”

I don’t know how many people with those names existed on Long Island when Bud supposedly did his telephone research, but in the Suffolk County telephone directory in 1994, the year Decoy Magazine published the French article (Suffolk County the claimed home of “Dilley is the largest county in the United States), it lists one person with the last name “Dilley,” A Mr. Thomas W. Dilley Jr from Commack.  Today's directory, 2009/2010, lists not a single person bearing either last name “Dilley" or "Dilly."  So how many phone calls could Bud have made in his exhaustive telephone research for the elusive Mr. “Dilley.”  And once again Joe French points out there is no link found to a John Dilley or any Dilley family members found in Quogue (or on Long Island).

Joe says” he now takes up the hunt for Dilley," and he says one of the things he did was to contact “Elinor Lindsay in the Suffolk County Clerk's Office." Joe ask her to look for a John Dilley between the years 1890-1920.  Ms. Lindsay “searched all buyers and sellers in the whole county ( all the area from which Dilley was rumored to hail) between those dates.  She also searched for a Dilley or Dilly in surrogate files and found only one, an Alexander Dilly who died in 1980 (Dilly not the Dilley spelling found on the shorebird decoys).  Once more the search goes nowhere, no John Dilley or John Dilly found.  He goes on to write, “She was kind enough to call the Suffolk Historical Society as well.  Their contribution was they had a copy of a book by the Stony Brook Museum (Gunner's Paradise) featuring two Dilley’s but nothing more."

Joe of course already had a copy of that book himself and he also had nothing more.  Yet he does not mention the book's name.  He seems to infer that the listing of the name “Dilley” in this unnamed book somehow proves the existence of “John Dilley."  If they are listed by a museum, they must be “Dilley’s” yet he leaves out the part about the name “Dilley” having ”no documentation on this carver” also found in the unnamed mystery book.  It’s the decoy writer's little friend, the sin of omission, just use what part of the truth that will in some way support your agenda and leave out any facts that might hurt their agenda.

Next Joe says he went through decoy auction catalogs from Bourne’s, Oliver‘s, and Julia/Guyette, and he made a list of their sales, then asked them to identify where the birds had originated, of which he says they complied.  He also says he was unable to “pinpoint any specific region that they came from." Once again, a dead end and no connection to the stated Village of “Quogue.”

Joe adds more and more subterfuge to the article that leads only to more questions and no answers.  He mentions that “Bud Ward and others” which includes myself and well known carver, collector, dealer living legend Bob White who had a theory that there is a connection between the so called “Blair “paint" and the so called Dilley paint.  In fact I believe without a doubt that whoever made one group made the other and the maker's names are not “Blair“ or Dilley."  Joe never expressed his opinion on the subject of the two groups of birds having been made by the same person in his article.  In reality, he was vehemently opposed to this theory and the mention of it brought down his wrath without hesitation (once again there is no proof for a “John Blair” decoy carver either). 

The thought that an artist possessing the skill to create both groups of decoys being called “Blair” or “Blair school”who only made floating decoys, and that a name “Dilley”only made shorebird decoys, is a strange concept.  And the fact that both groups look like they were painted by the same person.  Any normal rational observer would be able to see a connection between those two groups of decoys. Another factor to consider is that neither group has a documented maker. Again would this would lead the rational person to deduce they may very well have been made by the same unknown person.  Fortunately for them, most decoy collectors are not overburdened with logic or rational thought in the critique of most decoy writer’s unsubstantiated claims.

In the next chapter of Long Island Decoy Forum I plan to address more of the “Blair" myth and its connection to the “Dilley” myth, and the intriguing possibility of who may be the real carver of both groups of decoys.

In an e-mail sent to me by Joe Engers from February 23, 2004, between Joe Engers, editor of Decoy Magazine and Jon Frank, of Frank & Frank Decoy Auctions we find Jon speaking frankly and unguarded in his reference to the research we were doing on Charles Sumner Bunn at the time (Bunn is the true maker of the decoys misattributed to another phantom carver, William Bowman; see Decoy Magazine Nov/Dec.2004).  Jon speaks of the absence of research used by self-anointed decoy writer/experts.  “Good work.  I'm glad to see that there is investigative work going on, and not just matter of fact, take it for granted attribution.  Bob White swears that the Dilley decoys are Blairs, if Blair made decoys.  But as you know, you could say anything back then and it stuck like glue.  Probably because there was no scholarship, and anyone that had written a book was in fact a scholar.”  Wrong attributions still stick like glue as has been pointed out in the recent Seabury fabrication.  The reason for the Blair/Dilley discussion in the e-mail was because of my expressing my theory to Joe Engers that I felt the so called “Blair’s” and the “Dilley’s” were made by the same person.

Joe French also says in his article, “Another theory was that the carver sent the birds to a school or group of artists to be painted.”  There is another theory that has been around that is known to decoy collectors Dick Cowan, Ron McGrath, myself and others.  It is a misty rumor that the art school where the shorebirds were painted was in Southampton, Long Island at William Merritt Chase’s “Shinnecock Summer Art School” at his “Art Village” just across the road from the Shinnecock Indian Reservation.  Where this theory’s origins spring from I have not a clue, but it has been circulating at least since the 1980’s.  I find it very interesting that while the shorebirds are said to come from Long Island's East End, the Blair’s have been said to come from Philadelphia and a rumor says they were the painted by a “Philadelphia portrait painter of considerable note."  Coincidently, a city where once William Merritt Chase also established an art school.  I find the possibility of a William Merritt Chase connection to the decoys intriguing and it is something that I have been working on for a few years.

As we progress to the conclusion of Joe’s article, I would ask the reader to notice that as I have pointed out repeatedly, there has been total absence of documentation and only vague unsubstantiated pseudo-facts have been presented for the late Mr. French’s false claim to have proven “John Dilley” was the maker of the decoys.  It is just more of the typical decoy writers subterfuge presented in place of verifiable research based facts.  Joe French, page 10, “Getting closer” “Bud Ward came up with a story.” “Bud Ward came up with a story,” this would not be my definition of research.  Joe French,  “Through a friend,  he (Bud) made an appointment to see a man who lived on the eastern end of Long Island.  Bud said that this man had a “Dilley that for years had been in the house owned by this very family.”  What is with all the vague references.  Who was this man?  What was his name?  "He lived on the East end."  In what town?  What “very family”?

Joe French, “this was what I was looking for in order to establish that Dilley was actually the maker's name, I had to find a bird and prove that Dilley was written on it prior to the late 50s when the name Dilley became known to collectors. Whether it had been written it had been written on there by the owner or by Dilley was inconsequential -just so it could be dated before 1955.” In what demented “bizzaro” world would this prove who carved and painted the shorebird decoys? The only thing this would prove is that at sometime in the decoy's history, someone unknown wrote Dilley on the underside of its tail, also at an unknown date.

Joe goes on to tell of his tracking down two decoys with the name “Dilley” written on their tails.  They are shown in a photo on page 11 of his article with this accompanying ridiculous illogical text, “Dilley’s written signature on two decoys.  The signature on the bottom bird proved that Dilley was there carver.”  Now again, how does this prove a someone named “Dilley was the carver”?  It doesn’t of course, but Joe couldn’t see it, he was way too invested in the maker of decoys being his beloved “John Dilley.”

Joe French, “Success!”  Eureka!  Here was proof the carver of these birds was named Dilley, as Mackey had deduced years before.”  Joe tells that he located a total of three decoys with the name Dilley written on them and that "They all came from original owners.”  Were any of the “original owners named Dilley”?  Of course not, and if as Joe assumed, Dilley was the maker, how could the three guys who had the three birds be the original owners?  And if Joe meant they were the original collector/owners, then this also sheds no light on who really made the decoys, for he presents no documentation from the “original owners” that “Dilley” was the maker.

Joe tells that all three signatures were by the same hand.  “And I was sure the signatures were by Dilley himself because the three shorebirds came from different owners.”  And this last pronouncement of course makes absolutely no sense on any level.  Joe goes on tell what a great discovery he has made. “I felt like Columbus must have when he sighted land.  I now felt confident in calling these exquisite shorebirds Dilley’s.  For me this is the grand finale of the mystery, but certainly not the end of the love story.”  Joe it appears was easily satisfied.  Love is blind, as they say.

The final quote from the French article I will use is by Bob Shaw, at the time curator at the Shelburne Museum, Shelburne, Vermont. It is a fitting quote from this insipid imbecilic article by my friend Mr. French, who by the way I knew and had great affection for.  Mr. Shaw, “John Dilley of Quogue, Long Island.  Nothing is known of John Dilley except that he created what are arguably the most exquisitely painted of all decoys.  Dilley's attention to plumage detail was in-comparable.”

That pretty well sums it up; “Nothing is known of John Dilley."  But he was one hell of a painter.  As with the other legendary decoy carvers from Long Island that have been enshrined in the hallowed halls of decoy-dumb; Gelston, Verity, Southard, Seabury, and Dilley that have been researched and featured on Long Island Decoy Forum has shown that there is absolutely no reason to identify any of these decoys any way other than as by “an unknown maker."

The only conclusion to be drawn from the Silly John Dilley decoy story is that someone else is the maker of the decoys, not a non-existent John Dilley of whom all the writers profusely and repeatedly proclaim the absence of documentation for as a decoy carver, or even (existing) on Long Island.  I do however have a very good candidate for the real maker of both the shorebirds and floating decoys that have been assigned to “Dilley “and “Blair."  He is a documented decoy carver of unsurpassed ability, and he can be found in Suffolk County where he really lived.  He has real birth and death dates.  In fact he was a real person.  I realize that is not normal for great Long Island decoy carvers they being mostly fabrications or myths and all, but let's try something new, someone who really existed.  Let’s see if we can link a real decoy carver to some Long Island Decoys.  How radical!

Oh yes I forgot, we did do that with Charles Sumner Bunn and William Henry Bennett in Decoy Magazine articles, didn’t we?  But if I remember correctly, the real documention we presented was not enough evidence for the same people who believe in mythic carvers like “John Dilley.”  The next chapter of Long Island Decoy Forum will be “Searching for the real maker of the so- called “Blair” and “Dilley”decoys.