Rance Steed: Black Hands Turning A White Tradition In North Carolina Pottery

by Gary Dean Gardner, Independent Scholar of Southern Material Culture

Chrisco jug perhaps turned by Steed, photo courtesy Case Auction 

 Examples of stoneware marked by William Henry Chrisco but perhaps turned by Rance Steed

image of pitcher courtesy Mac Whatley

It’s amazing the energy and motivation one can find in frustration, and I seem to deserve a lot of frustration of late.  That was especially the case this week when I foolishly decided to post a few notes I had on file regarding a nearly unknown African-American Southern potter working a century ago in North Carolina.  When you start sharing scholarship on a subject virtually no one else knows about, you expect a modicum of appreciation and even, perhaps, a little respect, but when you are dealing with the antagonistic world of social media, you’re a fool to think anyone truly respects your effort.  In this situation I posted on a rather generic pottery group page and was soon accosted by a pair of “expert” & elitist antique dealers who went on the attack and demanded to know whether the bit of scholarship I offered was “copied and pasted” as if I’d plagiarized the work.  Well, my esteemed carpetbagger friends, I can assure you my research is my own, else I’ll cite the source for another person’s ideas!

Enough said on that distasteful subject.  At least it prompted me to dig deeper and compile my notes.

The subject at hand is the nearly forgotten Seagrove potter Rance Steed, a mulatto African-American potter who turned for many bigger white factories in and around Randolph & Montgomery Counties in the early 20th century. He was born Ransom Steed, erroneously by a few accounts as early as between 1854 and 1858, but more correctly in  1864.  He died in Seagrove the 10th of August 1933.

A pitcher attributed to the production of Rance Steed, author's collection

Known locally as Rance, aka Ranzy to his immediate family as a child, Ransom was the son of slaves George Steed (b. ca. 1820) & a not clearly identifiable neighboring slave woman. Rance himself was technically born free, but due to his birth toward the end of the Civil War, for all practical purposes he actually gained his freedom with the ratification of the 13th Amendment in December 1865.

His paternal history is well documented in surviving records.  There is first discovered a distinct tie between George Steed and the widow Nancy W. Hearne Steed (white, b. 11 Jan. 1789, d. 5 May 1872), for in the early years following the Civil War and Emancipation George is found as a neighbor to the widowed Mrs. Steed and most probably her sharecropper.  The 1870 US Federal Census enumerates George Steed as, somewhat oddly, living alone at Dwelling #143/Household #150 immediately following the entry for Nancy Steed and her daughter Sabrina.

 It turns out from surviving Randolph County estate probate records that George Steed was born the slave of Samuel Lewis (before 1759-1826).  According to Lewis’ will, he directed that, “As to Negro George- (my) will is that he be sold and purchased by some of my children if they can, otherwise to sell him where he wishes.”  And that provision was honored.  Of Samuel Lewis’ children, his daughter Elizabeth Lewis, who had already died by 1802, was the first wife of Clayton Steed.  Referenced in his father-in-law’s 1823 will as Samuel Lewis’ “son”, Clayton purchased George in the settlement of the estate.  

An Excerpt From Samuel Lewis' Will Referring to the Slave Named George

Thus, George began his new life as the chattel property of Clayton Steed on his modest plantation of some 494 acres along the Wharrie [sic’] River in Randolph County.  Not long afterward, though the location and record are apparently lost to history (but ca. 1826 per the birth of daughter Sabrina), Clayton took his second bride, Nancy Hearne.   Per the 1850 US Census Slave Schedules, Clayton Steed owned a total of six slaves including a single 27-year-old black male. This is without question Ransom's father, George Steed.  

 Clayton Steed died 20^th October 1857.  Per his estate probate file and its estate inventory and settlement records, his widow Nancy acquired George for the sum of $200, along with Faney (Fancy) and her child for $301 on 7 Dec 1854.  Most likely Fancy was one of George Steed’s enslaved wives, though apparently not Ransom’s mother, a woman whose exact identity is difficult to discover in post-war records.  Thus far no county records have surfaced recording a prior slave-era marriage for George Steed.  Few slaves, even when given the opportunity, found it necessary to legally sanction a marriage that might have been decades old once freedom was won and African-American marriages were finally recognized by the state of North Carolina with the passing of An Act Concerning Negroes & Persons of Color or of Mixed Blood in 1866.  And too, the western European concept of marriage was not always adopted by African slaves in the American South, nor was it necessarily pushed by Southern slave owners.  It was never uncommon for slave men, separated sometimes by great distances from their partners on other plantations, to maintain marital-like relations with slave women in closer proximity. This idea of plural marriage for enslaved African-Americans makes it difficult to define households and lineage, even long after the Civil War.

Graves of Clayton & Nancy Steed @ New Hope Methodist Cemetery in Randolph Co.

These genealogical problems are most manifest with the evolving household of George Steed, who on the 8th of July 1875 legally married the 41-year-old Ann Reeves in Randolph County.   Their union would not last more than a decade.  Ann died, after which George would go on to marry Nany Russell of the Hills Store community on 10th of March 1886.

Six years prior, though, George and Ann Reeves Steed are found together in the 1880 United States Census for Randolph County parenting 5 children, Adam (b. ca. 1862), Ranzy (b. ca. 1864), Robert L. (b ca. 1872), Lecora (daughter b. ca. 1876), and George Jr. (b. ca. 1878).

These estimated dates of birth provide for us now a clear separation of “marital” unions for George Steed and the subsequent fathering of children.  Brothers Adam and Ransom were clearly the children of another slave woman, though not necessarily the same person.  Adam’s death certificate from the 16^th January 1912 reveals further confirmation of this fact.  It states that Adam Steed’s mother was named Eliza Steed.  Oddly, his father’s name was recorded on the certificate, but later obliterated with “unknown” written over the smudged masking of the original entry.

Now, recalling the 1870 Census in which George is found alone, this leaves a most pertinent question as to just where his sons Adam & Rance were in 1870?  The search for these boys provides additional confusion rather than concrete answers.  A search for them in Randolph County 5 years after the War seemingly results in failure, indicating George Steed’s common law wife may have migrated outside the county with her children, or perhaps was sold and taken away before the end of slavery.  Ransom’s death certificate offers no help in identifying his mother, though it does confirm his enduring vocation as “potter.”  The survey of records thus far concludes Ann Reeves was his step-mother, though a witness erroneously provided her name as his biological mother and was not aware of his father’s name.  Then, considering his brother Adam’s death certificate, we look for an Eliza Steed, a woman not included in the slave inventory for Clayton Steed, implying she lived enslaved on another plantation but took, perhaps, George’s chosen surname.

Unfortunately, the 1870 Census for North Carolina disappoints us with no enumeration for a household in which both Adam and Ransom are included.  Even more frustrating is the revelation that no boys by said names are discovered at all!  They seemingly, but not surprisingly, disappear in the chaotic years of the late 1860s as the initial wave of the great African-American Diaspora begins.  And, while there is no Eliza Steed to be found, either, there is found a Leasy Rogers, b. ca. 1829, working as a domestic for the Henry Grady family of Monroe, NC in Union County, just to the southwest of Seagrove and Randolph County.  With Leasy (Eliza?) is her 6-year-old son, Ransom.  Now, if this is the potter, which seems logical, it still leaves the whereabouts of his older brother a mystery, for there is no Adam Steed or Adam Rogers to be found in the household or in any close by.  If we have found Ransom, Adam remains unaccounted for until, perhaps due to the death of Eliza aka Leasy, the children are at last reunited with their father by the time of the 1880s Census.  Without the discovery of specific deeds of conveyance for the slave Eliza, who may have been the property of either Thomas or Russell Rogers of Monroe, NC, it may be impossible to ascertain with any certainty the maternity of Adam and Ransom Steed.

Ransom married Alice Brower (this maiden name given on the death certificate of son Hubert, but Alice was also referred to as a Garner per the death certificate of daughter Etter) (b. Oct. 1863) at an unspecified date prior to 1900.  Together they raised a family of six children consisting of Hubert (aka Herbert) b. Sept. 1886, Norma E. b. May 1889, Thomas J. Steed b. Feb. 1891, Corrina Steed Spinks b. Feb. 1893, John W. Steed b. Aug. 1894, and Etter (Etta?) Patterson Matthews b. 1897

Steed died the 9^th of August 1933 in Seagrove, North Carolina with burial in the New Zion (AME) cemetery in nearby Moore County southeast of Seagrove.

Another NC pitcher thought to have been turned by Steed

Regarding Steed’s 30+ years of work as a potter in the Seagrove area, it is documented that Steed worked as a turner for Wright Davis (1838-1928), though other white-owned potteries have been identified as Steed’s employers.  The best documentation of his work comes from Michelle Francis’ 17 May 1983 interview with Harwood Graves in Robbins, NC.   They were joined by Clyde Graves in a discussion of Steed’s contribution to North Carolina’s pottery tradition.  In the interview they identified Ruffin “Ruff” Cole as one employer early in the 20^th century.  Clyde Graves explained, “(Steed was turning) For Ruffin Cole and he made us a whole bunch of syrup jugs to hold the sauger molasses in, or the syrup.  And they were mostly 5-gallon, and I know he put two handles on ‘em- one opposite the other one.  I guess the one knocked off, you’d still have on handle.  But a lot of ‘em had two handles.  And those provided the containers for us for our whole lifetime.  We still have some of ‘em.”  Clyde reminisced further to recall Steed having worked for J. (John) M. Yow, and that one of the Yow pots in the collection of the Seagrove Museum had been turned by Steed.  The Graves brothers went on to say that Steed as well worked for William Chrisco and the Owenses.

Stoneware jug marked for John M. Yow, but perhaps turned by Rance Steed

image from Liveauctions; Little Auctions

In discussing the aforementioned syrup jugs, Harwood Graves gave his account of Steed’s skill.  He recounted, “And he could turn, he could pull up a stone jug that would hold five gallons and that, that, if his clay was good, it wouldn’t be a quarter of an inch think.  And you’ve got to be an accomplished pottery to take and turn that kind of a decent pot.  You can look at somebody turning a piece of pottery and you can tell how, how good they are by how think they leave the piece.  Now a amateur can get up most anything, but it’ll be thick.  But whenever it comes down to the delicate…,that just less than a quarter of an inch thick…You don’t find those, too many.”

Others apparently knew of Steed’s mastery, though they may have coupled appreciation with a lingering degree of racial disdain and animosity.  Michelle Francis’s companion interview of 17^th May 1983 with Jack Kiser with Dorothy Auman revealed a somewhat more disparaging record of Steed abilities.  Kiser remarked, “I know Walter Lineberry told me about this nigger that used to turn over at (Skeen’s??)    Mill.  He broke the record, he turned a hundred gallons of pottery one day. " Ms. Auman interjected for clarification, “That was Rance Steed you’re talkin’ about now.*”

Harwood Graves, in his interview, touched upon the need of many potters to subsidize their work with the illegal production of whiskey, explaining that men, including Rance Steed, became so associated with the distiller through the production of jugs for them that they toyed with distillation themselves.  Interestingly, this is substantiated in the 5^th April 1917 issue of Asheboro’s local The Courier newspaper in which it was announced on the front page, “State vs. Ransom Steed, illicit distillery, not guilty.”

Only the 1900 Federal Census denotes Ransom's true lifelong profession.  Unlike other Census entries, it states that Ransom Steed was born February 1864, and in that year of 1900 was working professionally as a “ware turner” in the Little River Township of Montgomery County, NC.  Future enumerations define him simply as a farmer, despite the understanding that he was most likely making stoneware up until the time of his death.

It was Clyde Graves who summed up the debt we owe to African-Americans like Ransom steed.  Without the prejudice of many of his peers, Graves was adamant in his conviction that “Somebody ought to look up and give that old black man more credit than he’s been given.  Mr. Graves, I hope I’ve begun to do just that.

*The Francis interviews may be found in the digital collections of East Carolina University, Jenkins Fine Art Center.

For additional reference see Zug, Charles G. III, Turners and Burners: The Folk Potters of North Carolina, University of North Carolina Press.

Thanks to Mac Whatley who descends directly from W H Chrisco as well as collaterally from Wright Davis, two of the potters who enlisted Ransom Steed's services as a turner in their stoneware productions.  For clarification in regards to the spelling of the Chrisco surname, he explained that the "e" on the end was added by William Henry's children, thus the contradictory spellings found in print.  Per Mr. Whatley, Chrisco, sometimes spelled Crisco, was originally Christgau, a family name  of Hessian origin