“The report includes that the toast rack was valued at two pounds, which was probably quite high at the time,” says Harris.Īnderson was later knighted, but Cave and Partington were tried at the Old Bailey and condemned to death. The rack in question belonged to John William Anderson, a City of London alderman, and along with a significant amount of other domestic silver, it was stolen by two burglars, John Cave and John Partington. Put it on your desk!” Apparently I come from a line of toast rackpeople.Īccording to Cynthia Harris, who runs Sotheby’s silver department in London, the earliest print reference to a toast rack was in 1789. “I use it to hold letters, as my grandmother did with hers. As the youngest of the four Bainbridge children, not to mention the only female, anything that made me feel more adult was a very welcome thing indeed.īut what was it? Like Ariel the mermaid furrowing her ginger brow at a dinner fork before using its three prongs to detangle her hair, I wiggled the metal contraption, expecting it to somehow speak to me, revealing its purpose. I was fifteen, and the toast rack looked like the kind of formal tabletop item for which a bride-to-be would register-a marked difference from the the wooden or plastic toys of what was at the time my not-so-distant childhood. It wasn’t particularly ornate-the rings were smooth and devoid of any decorative etchings-and its maker wasn’t apparently of particular note, but it was being placed into my hands because it was to be mine, and that was an exciting enough proposition to attribute to it fine worth. It had five rings with one smaller handle ring perched like the head of a snowman atop the central base ring, and four paw feet. The first toast rack I ever received was sterling silver. Raise a toast to this odd, excellent object Crumbs get stuck in the groove and the part sitting in the groove tends to get moist again.Īnyway… you might enjoy this little trip into a more gentile era of elegance and time taken to do things right… Just a samplingįrom personal experience I don’t recommend the carved wooden ones where the toast sets in a groove. Since then I’ve had several others and they come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. That trip I found a little store that had a two piece, lightweight, rack I could squeeze into my carry-on luggage and I was happy as a pig in mud! My first toast rack looked pretty much like this! my British friends had changed my life for ever. It was brilliant! Finally a logical way of handling toast that didn’t result in two pieces having one soggy side each from being piled one-on-top-of-the-other. I was in my thirties, on a speaking trip in the UK before I had my first interaction with a toast rack. It’s funny the way the strangest passing thoughts can trigger the most curious memories.
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