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A few years back I was on the hunt for a Pierce birdcage.
I was in contact with a bird cage collector on the West coast.
He told me that Pierce did not tag the cages made, thus identifying a bird cage now as being of Pierce manufacture is not possible.
He stated that Pierce built high quality cages, and some collectors own what they think might be, or in the style of, Pierce.
What ARE identifiable are the glass feeders for water and seed which attached to the cage. They are marked “Pierce Buffalo NY PAT May 14 1878”, The two ribbed feeders say the samebut a patent date of August 30, 1876.
Thank you for the quick reply! We have over 300 birdcages in the Museum of Aquarium and Pet History (moaph.org) and the one pictured below is the only one I think is a Pierce Birdcage. The feeders this cage came with are similar to the ones you pictured but are unsigned. I also pictured 2 additional feeders that look like Pierce but are also unsigned. I am hoping someone in the club has any pictures of Pierce birdcages as the only one I have seen that I know was absolutely a Pierce cage was from a Pierce-Arrow ad in one of the older Pierce-Arrow books. Any help is greatly appreciated so we can correctly identify this cage and add this information to the history of birdcages.
Let me add the following information I have two water holders that have Pierce on the bottom , note that the one has a band in the center unlike the other ones that have been posted up to this point. The third one has very large Pierce script and I assume this is for food it has a May 14 78 Pat date. Karl
My Banded feeder/ Waterer? has the same date on the bottom, May ,14, 78. It is just like the one on the left side of your cage. Karl
Karl that is quite a nice embossment on the bottom of that feeder, mine seem to be more faint than that….
Interesting to look at early Pierce letterheads, some have cages shown of course. The one attached shows an ornate cage, though not as decorated and busy as the one pictured above.