Whiskey/Temperance Snake Jug, c. 1880-1890

​Snakes! Snakes fascinated and inspired Wallace Kirkpatrick (1828-1896), who operated a large stoneware pottery in Anna, Illinois, with his brother Cornwall (1814-1890) between 1859 and 1896. Wallace advertised for live ones in agricultural magazines and exhibited masses of "tamed" snakes in a wire cage at the brothers' pottery and at fairs. Individual snakes were modeled as palm-sized figures and life-size lawn ornaments; swarms of them slithered on his unique whiskey jugs.

This Anna Pottery whiskey jug, made by Wallace around 1880, cleverly juxtaposes twelve articulated timber rattlesnakes with three men. The snakes slither out from within the jug and tangle across its surface. Two young men dive head first into the jug, while the bedraggled head of an old man emerges from within, only to be attacked by snakes, one of which serves as the jug's handle. Is the jug warning against the perils of drinking whiskey? Or is it a cynical slap at the Prohibition movement then gaining strength in Illinois and throughout the country?

Cornwall Kirkpatrick, who served as mayor of Anna from 1872 to 1877 and again from 1883 to 1885, was alert to political and social issues. He produced outsized "directory" urns and floor vases across which he incised scores of proper names and advertisements copied from published sources, such as city directories, corporate reports, and prize lists for local and regional fairs.

Local flora and fauna also inspired the brothers' creativity. Pottery garden stools were shaped like tree stumps; one-of-a-kind cemetery markers like huge flower pots. Pig-shaped whiskey flasks featured incised railroad routes running over them from nose to tail; frogs peeked up from the bottom of mugs.

Such eccentric and whimsical novelty ware was made as a sideline to their regular business of utilitarian crockery, such as crocks, fruit jars, and jugs. Other useful items included firebrick, chimney pots, windowsills, roof and drainage tile, and stems for tobacco pipes.

The Kirkpatrick brothers exhibited their pottery at the Philadelphia Centennial in 1876 and the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893, as well as at numerous local and regional fairs. After Cornwall and Wallace died, the Anna Pottery remained in the Kirkpatrick family until 1900; it closed in 1910.