My trip to the Portland Antiques Expo….made four incredible finds!

[CarltonHendricks]

42" x 29"

I made the eleven hour (one way) drive to the Portland Expo Antiques Show this last weekend and did real good…made four incredible finds…well actually…three incrdible finds and one pretty good one….I‘ll be posting a detailed account of the whole trip on my site pretty soon. Above is one of the items I got; an incredible print titled “The Yale Fence”. It has a copyright of 1891 by C. Klackner, and the artist was Alfred Cornelius Howland. Framed it measures 42” wide by 29” tall.


Walter Camp sitting next to fence post wearing moustache


Title centered under image area

The print could easily be overlooked as it’s almost mundane. All you see is a bunch of trees and a boring looking street scene with a lot of small illustrations of people. However…it’s all in the neighborhood and who the people are. Had I not seen another example once I may have walked right by and never noticed it.


Example Hunt had

Here’s the whole story…back about a year ago Hunt had one of these in their March 2009 auction. Even that listing would have been easy to overlook. The photo didn‘t look like much, but the description was intriguing. See the Hunt listing here. The description stated it was a “Unique Harvard baseball print“, and that it depicted the “Harvard baseball team posed in a campus setting”
It was the first example I’d seen and the description said it was the first Hunt had seen…so if I hadn’t seen it….and Hunt hadn’t seen it…it’s rare!

I sensed it was a great piece and a potential sleeper that might not get a lot of action. I emailed Hunt with questions and requested closer detailed photos. They graciously sent multiple close in shots but I never got a reply to my question of whether the dimensions they gave were outside the frame or inside the mat or what ever. I ended up not bidding on it because, in short, I felt I couldn’t fully comprehend the piece….I wasn’t exactly sure what the print was all about… and I just didn’t feel like plunking down money for something that really didn‘t turn my head to look at. But it was one of those pieces I never forgot and left me wondering, as I sensed there was something important about it.

And then came Portland!….The Portland Expo show is a renown antiques show that’s been going for something like 30 years and it claims to be the largest antiques show in the country. The show is held three times a year. I had been considering going to this last one for a couple weeks, but decided not to go because of the cost. Eleven hour drive equals about $300.00 in gas…three nights in a hotel equals at least another $200.00.…so that’s five hundred just to walk in. Plus another $500.00 or so I was likely to spend at the show equals a grand…so I decided I’d pass. Then I was talking to Ron and Sue Fox at the last Alameda show and they said this particualar Portland show was the best one of the year on account it’s the biggest and had dealers set up inside and out. That did it…I figured if I was going to a Portland show I might as well go to the best one.

The show opens to the public on Saturday and Sunday but offers an early entry pass for $30.00 that lets you in on Friday while the dealers set up. Early entry can come in starting at 8:00AM…Of course I got in to my hotel about 11:00PM the night before and am not a morning person. So I got to the show at 9:00AM Friday…I hit the outside dealers first since it was already 75 degrees and was expected to get to 100 that day….

Within fifteen minutes, about the third row I spotted this print…the dealer had a wide assortment of medium quality stuff at best. And there among it all was this print on the ground propped up against a large crock.

Because of my experience with the one in Hunt a year earlier I recognized it immediately. It caught me completely by surprise….If you asked me beforehand what I expected to see at the show…..this print would have been the last thing….Particularly since it’s such an east coast thing….who would expect it sitting a pile of stuff way out in the Pacific Northwest.

As I recall the couple that had it were still setting stuff out and scurrying around. Naturally using the standard poker face I asked the price in a way that wouldn’t seem like I was too interested….but I was interested all right! It all came on so sudden, and I’m not a morning person…I had to kind of struggle to put it all together. It wasn’t like it was in perfect condition and nicely framed…The glass appeared to have been missing a long time and the print had yellowed/darkened….there was evidence of some water stains, but not too bad, plus there were tiny specks of paint….The oak frame seemed period and was very well suited, but needed refinishing….



but the part that really had my head spinning were two really weird 6 ½” by 4” rectangular areas that flanked the print’s title “The Yale Fence“. Each of the two rectangular areas had glue residue which had obviously adhered something that left a very defined outline. Naturally I knew the print would need to undergo restoration and most of my attention was on calculating how it would turn out. Essentially it was in very good shape and I expected a good paper restorer would be able to put it in very nice shape….all except those weird rectangle areas….Those I surmised would probably not come out….they were a total party wrecker. who in the…what the heck were they thinking I thought…I’d never seen anything like that on an antique print before!

So the lady shot me the price…$250.00 she says…and I went back to trying to figure it all out…so as I’m standing there trying to piece it all together, and the husband says to me…”it comes with these two cards”….and he goes to get them….yeah yeah sure I thought…I didn’t pay much attention to him since I was so focused on the print…Then the hammer dropped!…He slowly handed me two matching cards that had a small facsimile image of the print and a legend that gave the names of people in the scene.

Almost in a stupor….I look at the cards….I look back at the print….I look back at the cards…I look at the guy…I’m thinking….Oh shucks…Any previous confusion of the scene being Harvard immediately evaporated and I realized it was time to start from scratch understanding this print….The legend named fourteen Yale BMOC (big man on campus) with pointers to who was who….most were renown athletes of football, baseball, and rowing…..The list included Walter Camp the Father of American Football, William “Pa” Corbin, and Amos Alonzo Stagg just to name a few

I had never seen anything like it and I started to sense I had found the mother of all 19th century collegiate prints!

As far as I was concerned $250.00 was overpriced considering the seller didn’t understand it as I did. But to me it was basically worth what ever I had to pay it was so great. But the seller was savvy enough from the cards to know it had some importance. Without the cards…it was a $75.00 print at best….and whoever bought it would probably be buying it for the frame and trash the print!…So I countered with $200.00.…She was very skeptical and thought about it for about 12 seconds…$235.00 she said….Alright I’ll take it I said…



Now that I’ve thought it thru, I think the way to go is just reattach the cards right back where they were after it’s been restored. That’s probably the only way of ever hiding the rectangular areas. What’s very interesting is that there is a label on the back of the frame for Klackner, the publisher. Having that label there implies Klackner framed it or had it framed to their specifacations….which implies the placement of the cards flanking the title was the publishers intent. So reintroducing them back where they were would be restoring it back to original. I think it’s kind of a funky way to display the cards, but it certainly does the job of turning the print into an icon of collegiant sports,

One last but very interesting aspect I’ll mention is one of the people in the print indicated by the legend is named C.P. Howland…and the artist who painted the original was A.C. Howland…interesting indeed…Hopefully some information will eventually turn up addressing that.

More on my other other finds of the trip are forthcoming on my website. Considering stops at antiques stores along the way it took about 15 hours up and 15 hours back of driving…that’s what it takes to make it happen!


From The National Cyclopaedia of American biography
….Mr. Howlaud was elected to the Artists' Fund Society in 1874, the Century Association in 1867. was made an associate of the National Academy of Design in 1874, and on the merits of his pa'inting, "Driving a Bargain,"now in the Layton Gallery in Milwaukee, was made a national academician in 1882. Among his important works may be mentioned "On the Road to Seulis " (France); "A Morning Stroll"; "Monday Morning"; "A Pastoral"; "Ford's Glen." exhibited at the Paris Salon ; " The Pot Boiler." exhibited at Munich ; "Fourth of July Parade," exhibited at the World's Columbian exposition; and "The Yale Fence." purchased by Chauncey M. Dcpew, and presented to the gymnasium of Yale University. Mr. Howland makes a specially of laudscapes and genre subjects, having a preference for quaint New England characters….