Furnishing Friday: End Tables

So I realize that this week's Furnishing Friday is going up so late that for some of my readers it's already Saturday. My apologies, but I was on a roll in the bathroom today, and I just couldn't tear myself (and later J and myself) away! Enjoy!

This is the smaller and older of the two end tables.

Item: End tables

Who Purchased: My grandparents B. purchased the first; Grandfather B. made the second

Year Purchased/Received: first—around 1953; second—1958 or 1959

Location Purchased/Received: first—Swope family estate sale in Whitesville, KY (east of Owensboro); second—made in Owensboro

Description: Both are solid wood (I don’t know what type). It is suspected that the older table was also handmade because one of the legs is clearly a different type of wood than the rest of the table (the grain of the wood in the ‘off’ leg looks to be oak). The older table is smaller at 23 inches wide, 17 inches deep, and 29 inches tall. It has two drawers that are beautifully dovetailed together. The second table is stained to match and is roughly the same style as the first, but is much larger at 20.5 inches wide, 25 inches deep and 29 inches tall. According to my mom, my grandfather built the second table to accommodate the lamps I wrote about here. Remember when I said the lamps always sat on each end of the couch? This is when that started!

Markings: First—None that I can see; Second—a tag stuck to the inside of the top drawer with my mother’s name and several illegible words (Seems my mom’s penmanship was passed down from her mother!).

How it came to the MP: We got these tables at the same time we received the rest of my grandmother B.'s living room. As I said before, I remember them sitting on each end of a couch, as they had been (again, in three different houses, with three different couches) since the late 1950’s when my grandfather built the second table. The first table was actually a family piece before my grandparents purchased it at the estate sale. If I understand the trail correctly, my grandmother B.’s father (great-grandfather Corley)’s mother Julia was a Swope. Her two brothers (both bachelors) and two sisters (either spinsters or widow’s—we aren’t sure) all lived together into old age on a farm about 30 miles east of Owensboro. When the last of them passed away leaving no descendents among the four, their belongings (including the older of these tables) and the farm were sold. My mom and her parents attended the sale, which mom remembers being around 1953 or so. We don't actually know that these family members made the table, but we think it is the case.

So that's it for the end tables for now. You may have noticed that I went back and updated last week's post after I learned more. I'll likely do the same to this one, too!