Photo Hunt: Old-Fashioned

For this week's Photo Hunt theme, old-fashioned, I'm showing off one of my favorite Christmas presents from this year. My Father-In-Law gave me this amazing antique tea set. I have a small collection of tea pots, cups, etc. so it was the perfect thing! Most of what I have though is just items I've picked up in my travels, but this set really piqued my interest. Grump decided to do a little searching to see if he could tell how old it was and where it came from.

Of course, the first thing you start with is the label on the bottom. Turns out this particular set is quite old. Here's what he found:

From 1843 to 1862, the company was under the management of Edward Challinor using the mark E Challinor. Likely Charles Challinor owned the company, and Charles was a coal industrialist. In 1862, Charles and Edward became partners, and moved from making Earthenware to Ironstone China, and goods were marked E& C Challinor. Partnership dissolved sometime in 1891, as company products bore the mark C Challinor for 4 years until it ceased in 1896 (source) Also, it says Fenton, rather than England so it is pre -1891

Quite fascinating if you ask me! Tune in next week for "narrow".