Page 13 - Bonhams Hong Kong The Skinner Moon Flasks

The interest William and Sarah had in “the Orient” may have
inspired their children William C. and Belle, as Asian art
became a major focus for the two unmarried siblings. They
would inherited the house and spend the next three decades
remodeling it and the grounds, filling it with Asian art and an
extraordinarily important collection of musical instruments.
William C. and Belle traveled together to Japan and China,
twice… once in 1889 when they were 33 and 23; leaving
San Francisco on the City of Peking. Twenty years later, in
1909, they traveled around the world again.
On the first trip they arrived in Nagasaki on Nov 18th and
stayed for nearly a month. William C. would have met with
his suppliers. They were in Shanghai on Dec 17th, and the
following day William, “Called at the house of Russell &
Co.” the great American China Trade firm. The next night
they went to the theatre and a Chinese wedding. While in
China they were given an opium pipe and chopsticks as
souvenirs.
What William and Belle acquired on this and the subsequent
trip is not clear. They were in China for fifteen days in 1889
so it’s possible they acquired the moonflasks then, but it is
not recorded.
The house in Holyoke was the center of family life for William,
Sarah and their seven children. Sarah Skinner (1834-1908),
William’s second wife, spent much effort on the grounds
and the interior. In 1895 they traveled to Egypt and Rome
where Sarah purchased the two recumbent lions that now
flank a side entry way to the house. They are replicas of
those by Antonio Canova, for the tomb of Clement XII in
St. Peter’s.
Their daughter Ruth Isabel Skinner (1866-1928), known as
Belle, wrote in her diary, May 10th, 1898 “… work is to
commence this week on the Oriental Room. Mother has
planned to have it built into the little upstairs library.” In a businessman and philanthropist; and Sir Ernest Shackleton,
letter dated August 3rd, 1898 Sarah Skinner, wrote about
“the Oriental Room” and said that, “… so much was said
that I ran upstairs and produced the other Egyptian articles
I bought and they … were enthusiastic over them…” She
also wrote about the windows for the room which were
Oriental in design with colored glass at the top.
William C.’s position in Holyoke can be summed up with
President William McKinley’s visit to the city on June 17th,
1898. William is shown in the carriage with McKinley, the
25th President of the United States, and William Whiting
who owned a paper mill in Holyoke and was Republican
Senator from Massachusetts between 1883 and 1889.
Sarah took particular pride in the gardens and grounds.
She planted wistaria along the house during the 1880s,
which eventually had completely engulfed the house. By
1901 the name Wistariahurst appeared on Sarah’s private
stationary. Sarah wrote to Belle in May 1901: “Oh, you
should see my Wisteria – It is beautiful today and the place
is rightly named… Father has just come up from the mill
and is sitting out on the piazza taking in the perfume of the
flowers which he seems to appreciate.”
William Skinner died the next year, in 1902. He was said to
be worth $475million in today’s currency. An official of the
Silk Association wrote about him then: “His career furnishes
another illustration of the decided tendency by the United
States in recent years of transplanting the art and skill of
the foreign born to this side of the Atlantic in the up-building
of our domestic industries.”
William C. and Belle Skinner inherited the house, which
they used as a weekend retreat and summer home.
For the most part they lived in New York City, obviously
preferring the vibrancy of New York to Holyoke, particularly
the theater, fine dining and socializing, having met the likes
of Leo Tolstoy, the Russian author of “War and Peace” and
“Anna Karenina”; Diamond Jim Brady, the great American
the great Antarctic explorer.
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