AMERICAN, LATE 19TH/EARLY 20TH CENTURY

The prototype for this weathervane is most likely the joined sheet copper Dove of Peace commissioned by George Washington from Joseph Rakestraw of Philadelphia in 1787. The weathervane and its placement atop the cupola at Mt. Vernon are both illustrated and briefly discussed in Bishop and Coblentz, A Gallery of American Weathervanes and Whirligigs (New York, 1984 edition), pp. 12-13, figs. 9 and 10. A modern plan for the installation of a descendant of this weathervane is illustrated in Klamkin, Weathervanes: The History, Manufacture and Design of an American Folk Art (New York, 1973), p. 18.