Banjo made in the style of William Esperance Boucher, Jr.: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

Banjo made in the style of William Esperance Boucher, Jr. (circa 1850s). The banjo has a circular head, with a tension head pulled tight across the front. There is a slightly tilted bridge on the head, with a tailpiece at the bottom holding the strings bottom in place along the rim. Both the tailpiece and the bridge are made of the same medium brown wood. There are metal brackets surrounding the rim of the banjo. This banjo is an early style of five-string banjos, which has four full-length strings alongside a short fifth-string. The neck and fingerboard of the banjo is made of the same medium glossy wood as the back of the head. There are four wooden turning keys and pegs on the top, with a 5th string turning peg, also made of wood, about halfway up the neck or fingerboard.

Materials, dates and provenance

• Date: ca. 1850s
• Attributed to: Unidentified
• Subject of: William Esperance Boucher Jr., American
• Type: banjos
• Medium: wood , metal , animal skin or synthetic materials
• Dimensions: 37 1/2 × 12 1/2 × 3 1/2 in. (95.3 × 31.8 × 8.9 cm)
• Place made: Baltimore, Maryland, United States, North and Central America
• Cultural Place: West Africa, Africa
• Topic: African American
• Topic: African diaspora
• Topic: Craftsmanship
• Topic: Music
• Topic: Resistance
• Topic: Slavery
• Topic: U.S. History, 1815-1861
• Object number: 2014.311
• Credit Line: Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Gift of Robert Bockee Winans
• Data Source: National Museum of African American History and Culture

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of African American History and Culture through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed. The displayed image also has an explicit CC0 designation. The underlying object's rights statement is: No Known Copyright Restrictions Proper usage is the responsibility of the user.