Featured Tavern Table

Illielee,
That is a beautiful little table. And your pictures are amazing.
Very nice!
Kevin.

 

I like it too, I'd guess a country english piece, william & mary. I like the iron pull as well.

 

Here is the American table OP referred to in original post which has a similar stretcher.

 

An interesting discussion.

 

Late development but, better late than never! on those nailed on drawer bottoms in early 18th century american (probably english as well) construction. This chest on stand (rare form in america) has a rock solid Moon family provenance in lower Bucks County Pennsylvania (delaware river valley) and built in the 1st quarter 18th century.

The dust-boards sit slightly below the runners at the side and the drawer dividing rail at the front. This allows the nailed-on flush drawer bottoms to run on the side runners without binding on the dust-boards

The bottom of one of the small drawers in the upper case. The riven Atlantic white cedar drawer bottom is nailed to the sides and back and a rabbet in the front. All the drawers are similarly constructed.

 

Long story short, this is how drawer bottoms were attached all during the 17th & 1st half 18th century in america. They nailed em on! lol
We just didn't have the tools back then to do a lot of fancy schmancy cabinetmaking back in this era.

 

This one?

 

You can dovetail a piece of wood using paleolithic tools. It is about know-how, or the willingness to put in the time and effort. Or the willingness of the customer to pay for the time and effort.

 

lol, No! absolutely wrong Moon!

True! dovetailing has been around for thousands of years & on that drawer box above it is dovetailed as well, the back & front of drawer sides. The thing is though when it came to building early furniture, dovetails were abandoned in favor of mortise & tenon joinery built by joiners. Drawer boxes were usually assembled with nails & It pretty much stayed that way til the 18th century.
drawer box of Moon chest, side view

 

The reason all this drawer box construction came up is, @Jeff Drum was wondering about how the bottom of drawer were attached on OP table, he was familiar with a mostly 19th century method. There a groove or slot was cut into the drawer sides & the bottom was planed on edges and slid into those grooves. If this makes any sense!
19th century drawer bottom method of attachment

 

It does.

 

GREAT! glad we got all this cleared up! Now, if you wouldn't mind, stumble on over to the thread on unusual rocking chair & vote on restoration in progress! Paint or no paint?!
At the moment, it's running 100 to 1 against with poor old dad stuck on the 1 end!

 

Where?

 

https://www.antiquers.com/threads/cool-old-rocking-chair-i-am-working-on-restoring.29915/

 

Again, I don't see any age or wear on the OP's drawer like I would expect on a piece from the early 18th century and that is why I don't think it looks like it is from the early 18th century (based on the pics we've seen so far). Late 18th American (Revolutionary War era) has the later drawer construction in my experience.

I guess he isn't going to post any more pics - I just got back from vacation and it looks like we're still waiting.

 

Yes, by the 3rd quarter 18th century, drawer construction was all pretty much like pic above. Much thinner boards for drawer sides as well, where in early part of 18th century drawer sides were routinely 1" +, now they were more like 3/8". Naturally, this reduced the weight of furniture quite a lot.

 

Yeah, i dunno what happened to OP, 1 post and gone, gone gone! So the thread just kinda wandered along!
I did find another table with those same stretchers, replaced top as well, in walnut. Dunno if english or american (probably english with the price it sold for) but sold last year cheap, $160

https://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/56103251_walnut-stretcher-base-wm-and-mary-tavern-table-wdrawer

 

Too bad it doesn't show the drawer in this one (though it says with drawer repairs). I find the turnings on this one to be more what I'd expect (turnings were pretty wimpy on OPs). Back when I was still going to auctions I learned the hard way to never bid unless you get the chance to look it over first. Especially like in this case where the pics are so limited and show so little.

 

Still, for $160 bucks, how can you go wrong? you can't buy the walnut for that. If serious dollars are in play then yes, absolutely must see the piece in person, it's the only way to be sure.

 

Careful, that's how you end up with a house jammed with projects you'll never get to...