I’m a little teapot …

A brief photographic interlude before we return to Waldheim tomorrow (or so). Pictured below is an everyday teapot with a body, handle, and spout made of pottery and a metal lid. I am told that it is in perfect shape and still pours a mean cup of tea.

A masking-tape note on the top records the significance of the pot: “Grandpa Buller [that is, Grandpa to Matilda, Esther, Daniel, Darlene, Carl, Wayne, Ruth, and Alma] gave [the teapot] to Grandmother as [a] wedding present.” To state things a little more directly, Peter P gave this to Margaretha Epp on the occasion of their wedding 27 February 1890. The teapot is thus at least 126 years old; how much older it might be we cannot say. It is enough to know is that it is a piece from our family history a little more than a decade after our ancestors came to the U.S.