A CARVED AND PAINTED FIGURE OF UNCLE SAM. CIRCA 1876

Carved and painted figure of Uncle Sam. circa 1876. The standing figure holds flag with original pole a painted and decorated base bearing the inscription, " July-4/1776-1876". Provenance: Kevin Keim; The above piece was displayed twice in the famed windows at Bergdorf Goodman in New York City, initially on September 11, 2002 on the first anniversary of 9/11 and secondly, on July 4, 2008. Literature: Kevin Keim & Peter Keim, A Grand Old Flag: A History of the United States through its Flags (2002), p106. BY 1876, Uncle Sam had evolved into the figure we now know; a slender,tall,white-bearded man. This splendid piece of folk art was carved and painted around the Centennial. Uncle Sam began appearing in the early 19th century. According to historic record and Uncle Sam's most authoritative biographer Alton Ketchum to be Samuel Wilson, a businessman in New York, who ran a meat packing enterprise. because mechanical refrigeration was yet unknown, pork and beef, if they were to be preserved for transport, had to be cured in salt and packed in wooden barrels. The Wilson brothers supplied and inspected such barrels of meat for the US Army during the War of 1812. To identify their products, workers stamped " E.A-U.S" on the barrels demarcating the procurement officers, Elbert Anderson, and United States. Wilson's workers, its written, joked that US actually meant " UNCLE SAM ", as their benevolent boss had affectionately come to be known. By 1814 reference to Uncle Sam began appearing in newspapers, including one New York newspaper that stated U.S troops called their meat " Uncle Sam's Beef." Uncle Sam stuck, and soon both the name and the figure became symbolic of the entire Federal Government.