Heintz Art Metal Trophy - 1917

What a great antiques find: a Heintz Art Metal trophy (loving cup) from 1917! The Heintz Art Metal Shop specialized in sterling silver designs on bronze – for a very beautiful Arts and Crafts look.  For great background and pictures, visit David Surgan’s site, HeintzCollector.com; he has a lot of info on the history and seems to be hooked on Heintz.

While this is a great looking example of Arts and Crafts design, the inscription is even more interesting:

“Presented by John H. Patterson President The NCR Co. to W.H. Johnson for selling 743 Receipt Printing Registers Sept. Oct. Nov. and Dec., 1917.”

Does this strike you as odd? Was this a common practice in the early 1900s? The National Cash Register Company would have been a big business (the IBM of its day?) – and their salesmen were given beautiful awards every four months by the president and founder of the company for selling receipt registers? Or maybe this was just a one-time event — a big sales push for NCR products.  Either way, Mr. W.H. Johnson received a gorgeous award for his hard work in 1917.

 Here is what their hallmark look likes (for when you are out junkin’), but check David’s site for different marks:

Hallmark for Heintz Art Metal