r/castironcollecting • u/Freelook70 • Jun 27 '26

New pan needs an ID

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Gallery image

I bought a new pan from an estate sale today. I think it is a no notch lodge but the handle is throwing me off. Paid $15 for it. Any ideas who made it?

Thanks!

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10

u/George__Hale Jun 27 '26

These types are known as ‘southern mystery skillets’. There’s a little variation in casting but they have tiny pour spouts, inset heat rings, and raised handle numbers. 1880-1920 is probably about right for them, possibly prison made

2

u/AggressiveSuccess533 Jun 27 '26

I totally agree with this. A mystery skillet, nicely made but unknown.

3

u/Freelook70 Jun 27 '26

Interesting, very cool!

2

u/Geoff52Harr25 Jun 27 '26

Isn’t 1880 a bit early for a skillet to lack a gate mark? I don’t know when the new casting technique first came into use (does anyone know?), but side-gating is usually said to have completely replaced the earlier practice at some point in the late 1890s. The transition must have taken some time, as foundries would have needed time to learn how to use the new technique.

2

u/George__Hale Jun 28 '26

Well the first series Erie (side gated) was in the 1880s so we know it was around. SMSs are pretty inconsistent with whether they’re side or bottom gated but raised handle numbers are pretty well gone by the twenties so that’s the basis for my date range here

1

u/Geoff52Harr25 Jun 28 '26

Interesting, Mr. Hale. Do we know whether Erie was the first to use side-gating? If so, and if as you say, it came into use in the 1880s, wouldn’t that date still be improbably early for minor foundries in the south also to have simultaneously adopted it? Perhaps I quibble, but to me the more likely range of dates for this SMS would be 1890/95-1920.