jacon4
Well-known member
Last week, Brunk in Asheville NC sold the Thomas A Gray collection of antiques, most of which were previously owned by Frank L Horton, founding father of MESDA. It all started in 1949 at Colonial Williamsburg Va when Joeseph Downs, then the curator of the American Wing at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, remarked in his address to an antique forum that "little of artistic merit was made south of Baltimore....." BAM
In addition to offending the hell out of southerners, that remark did alot of good as well. Horton led the crusade to prove Downs wrong, opening MESDA in 1965. The rest as they say, is history. Gray is an heir to the R.J. Reynolds tobacco fortune who shared Horton's vision and had the resources to make it happen.
http://mesda.org/collections/mesda_furniture_sprite.html
In addition to offending the hell out of southerners, that remark did alot of good as well. Horton led the crusade to prove Downs wrong, opening MESDA in 1965. The rest as they say, is history. Gray is an heir to the R.J. Reynolds tobacco fortune who shared Horton's vision and had the resources to make it happen.
http://mesda.org/collections/mesda_furniture_sprite.html