Bashford Dean Presentation Cabinet

Bashford Dean (1867–1928) was the founding curator of the Arms and Armor Department. Leonard Heinrich and Harvey Murton, the makers of this cabinet, were hired by Bashford Dean and both went on to work full-time in the Arms and Armor Department into the 1960s. Leonard Heinrich was brought over from Germany in 1923 by Dean to work in the Armor Shop carrying out restoration, installation and maintenance of the collection. Harvey Murton began working for Dean part time at age 12 and was hired by the Museum in 1929, shortly after Dr. Dean's death. The cabinet is a good example of their hand skills. The etching is said to have been done by Heinrich and the woodwork by Murton.

The small brown wooden cabinet is trimmed with iron hardware and decorated with etched iron plaques. The body of the cabinet is rectangular and fronted with two full-length doors bound with iron bands. The cabinet has a curved pediment on top and a molded rectangular base. The pediment is faced with an etched iron plate decorated with a helmet with a crest consisting of a lion between a pair of horns and surrounded by mantling. An inscription along the bottom edge of this plate reads: LEONARD HEINRICH FEC. HARVEY MURTON (made by Leonard Heinrich and Harvey Murton). The top the pediment is fitted with a scalloped edge in iron. Each door is fitted with an etched circular plaque: that on the left is decorated with an owl and that on the right with three plain shields. The interior of the cabinet is fitted with a rectangular iron plaque etched with the Dean family arms at the top supported by a pair of griffins and below this in Gothic script: Presented / to / Dr. Bashford Dean / on his / Sixtieth / Birthday / 1867 Oktober 1927. The back of the cabinet is undecorated.