Schwarz Gallery - The Green Tree: Highlights from the Collection of the Mutual Assurance Company of Philadelphia



Cover Title Page Copyright/Colophon Preface Introduction Category Portraits Fire Engines Firefighting Equipment Firefighting Articles of Clothing Firefighting Prints Fire Marks Hooked Rugs Silver William Birch—Views of Philadelphia Web Addendum The Flames Grow Warm The Mob Below	James and Mercedes Hutchinson (American, c. 1925-1945) “Fireman, the Flames Grow Warm,” Hooked Rug, c. 1910 Cotton, 50 × 32 1/2 inches Inscribed: “FIREMAN!/THE FLAMES GROW WARM/YOUR GLANCES LIKEWISE/SEAR/I PRAY YOU DO NOT/MEAN ME HARM/I CANNOT LINGER/HERE” RS 6235 James and Mercedes Hutchinson lived in Brooklyn, New York, and collected hooked rugs. During the late 1920s James Hutchinson began to write poems and epigrams for which his wife provided illustrations that they drew on burlap foundations. The couple commissioned others to make the rugs, and over a period of about twenty years they are believed to have produced hundreds of them, all with different designs. Firemen were among their favorite subjects and this example, with its double-edged risqué verse, is typical. This rug is discussed and illustrated in Joel and Kate Kopp, American Hooked and Sewn Rugs: Folk Art Underfoot (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1992), pp. 110-111. [Note: this entry differs from the print version of the catalog. It has been updated to reflect new information acquired after publication.] Copyright©2007 The Schwarz Gallery

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