History: Delineating the Dynasty of Newport’s Townsends & Goddards

A Townsend bonnet top highboy

They set a standard of furniture making equaled only by Thomas Chippendale, and brought renown to their workshops, and to Newport. Today, their extant pieces bring tens of millions of dollars at auction, grace major museums, and are sought after by collectors around the world.

Newport furniture maker Jeffrey Greene, who dedicates his work to maintaining and reconstructing the exquisite carpentry techniques and designs of the Townsends and Goddards, gave a recent lecture at Rough Point on how to understand, and differentiate between, the Colonial masterworks of the two shops and their individual craftsmen. The family trees, and a fortuitous marriage between the two families, created a four-generation-long industry that only ended with the 19th century introduction of mass production techniques.

The engrossed audience at Doris Duke’s former home, a perfect setting, listened attentively to Mr. Greene’s exploration of the colonial furniture workshops of the Townsend and Goddard, assigning them their proper place in the larger Newport cabinetmaking trade of the era, which was robust, numbering 135 furnitue makers working in pre-Revolutionary War Newport.

Liz Spoden & Jeffrey Greene

“I am very Newport-centric,” Mr. Greene stated when asked about a rival Philadelphia workshop of the colonial period, and went on to describe in detail the rise of these extraordinary Newport craftsmen.

As many as twenty members of the Townsend and Goddard families were involved in the cabinetmaking trade in Newport in the 18th and early 19th centuries. The most prominent members of the families were Christopher Townsend (1701-1787) and Job Townsend (1699-1765), brothers from an Oyster Bay, Long Island family who began the cabinetmaking dynasty in Newport. Each established a separate cabinetmaking shop in the Point section of Newport.

Edmund Townsend (1736-1811) later established his own shop. He is best known for working in the block-front style, and a wealth of block-front bureaus and kneehole bureaus have been authenticated to him. John Goddard (1724-1785) came from a Dartmouth, Massachusetts family and apprenticed in the shop of Job Townsend. He married Job's daughter Hannah Townsend and established his own family shop where he trained and made furniture with his sons.

Audience at Rough Point: standing room only

The Goddard family shop's work has a sculptural quality and is often identifiable by a unique and realistic carving of ball and claw feet. John Townsend (1733-1809) took the Newport style to a high level, with architectural precision in his case pieces, crisply detailed carving, and tall, stylized ball and claw feet.

Pieter Roos, Executive Director of the Newport Restoration Foundation, spoke with Mr. Greene before the lecture, which was introduced by NRF’s Education & Public Programs Assistant Liz Spoden. The audience watched the fascinating historical slides, interjecting their particular questions and comments. Phillip Mello, the former Rough Point estate manager and long time Doris Duke employee, was there, as were members of the Society of American Period Furniture Makers. One couple, Thomas and Rita Marino, traveled from New York just to hear the saga.

“The abilities of these families are mythic,” Greene assessed.

A lithograph of Newport in 1790, by J.P. Newell 1864

Mr. Greene, an expert on 18th-century Newport furniture, is the author of American Furniture of the 18th Century: History, Technique, Structure, a book documenting the evolution of furniture design, tying its development to larger trends in art, architecture, and popular taste. For more information go to www.jeffreygreenenewport.com

Edmund Townsend kneehole bureau