An Unusual American Silver Arts and Crafts Twin Baby Tray, Tiffany & Co., New York, Dated 1913

Controversial businessman and author Thomas William Lawson (1857-1925) was born in Charleston, MA, the son of a carpenter. As a teen, he fled home to become a bank clerk in Boston, and soon began speculating in stocks, specifically those of copper mining companies. By the age of thirty, he had amassed a personal fortune of more than $10 million, and by 1900 had a net worth of more than $50 million, in part due to the 1899 formation of Amalgamated Copper Mining Company, which he founded with William Rockefeller and Henry H. Rogers. Lawson was a collector of both Tiffany and Gorham silver, having commissioned a number of yachting trophies from Tiffany and purchasing the Martelé silver dressing table and stool exhibited at the Exposition Universalle, Paris, 1900. In the spring of 1900, he launched his newly completed yacht Dreamer, for which he notably had custom Tiffany silver table games designed for him and his guests. The present silver-gilt baby tray represents a continuation of his lengthy patronage of Tiffany & Co.