JOHN SCHOLL (1827-1916), GERMANIA, PENNSYLVANIA, 1907-1916

John Scholl (1827-1916) emigrated from Wurtemberg, Germany in 1853, settling in Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania. By 1870, Scholl had moved to Germania, Pennsylvania and he appears in the census lists of that year as a "house carpenter." He embellished his buildings with fanciful trim and decorative elements, such as carved garlands, wooden snowflakes and crosses. His distinctive sculptures, such as the example offered here, bear close comparison to his architectural ornaments, and additionally he employed the birds and tulips that reflect the influence of Pennsylvania-German craftsmanship. He painted his works in bright colors, such as gold, white, soft blue, green, red and mustard yellow. He kept most of his pieces, but eventually opened his parlor to visitors who came to see his work. After his death in 1916, the Scholl family retained his collection until 1967, when it was sold to Adele Earnest and Cordelia Hamilton, owners of the Stony Point Folk Art Gallery.

This unique sculpture by John Scholl is illustrated in a photo of his parlor in Adele Earnest, Folk Art in America: A Personal View (Exton, PA, 1984) p. 113. This piece was also displayed in Scholl's parlor during his wake. See Richard Miller, Avis Berman, Cynthia G. Falk, Lisa Minardi and Ralph Sessions, A Shared Legacy: Folk Art in America (Alexandria, 2014), p. 188.