It’s fair season, and what’s not to love? For me, along with anticipating ginormous tiger ears and smoked turkey drumsticks and appreciating previous perfect purchases — a foot massager and even a mattress — the best time is often an unexpected encounter with an exhibitor.
Talking with antique collector Alan Southern and hearing the story behind his award-winning 3-foot-tall cobalt blue and gold-stippled Admiral Dewey jardinière and matching pedestal — only one of five nationwide — was as refreshing as a glass of fresh-squeezed strawberry lemonade at the Eastern Idaho State Fair in Blackfoot last year.
Just as impressive as the Blackfoot resident’s rare ceramic pottery, a cherished family heirloom, was learning how his life for decades has been defined by his dedication to his eighth-grade Earth science students, teaching them in the same classroom for 40 years. He has inspired generations with his trademark enthusiasm that literally reaches from his classroom to mountaintops.
“Last summer, it was wonderful to check two things off my bucket list — displaying Dad’s Adm. Dewey jardinière and pedestal at the fair and standing on top of the Grand Teton with three of my former students,” said the 63-year-old.
Southern explained that a jardinière is a wide flower pot for displaying fresh flowers or plants. During Victorian times, it was often paired with a tall matching pedestal.
At the fair, his Adm. Dewey jardiniere was entered in the porcelain category and received a purple champion rosette at the fair, disallowing him to exhibit it for 10 years.
“This year, I’ll enter a flow blue turkey platter and plates that Dad always put out for Thanksgiving,” Southern said. “After our meal, we were always so careful when we washed and dried them by hand.”
Southern and his father, Richard “Dick” Southern, both share seemingly incongruent interests. Dick was a rancher in northern Idaho outside Craigmont near Lewiston and also an expert flow blue china collector. In 1986, he was a founding member of the Flow Blue International Collector’s Club Inc. It has 600 current members worldwide. He also wrote a reference book, “Victorian Flow Blue — A Look at LaBelle,” about the Wheeling Pottery Company’s pottery production from 1879 to 1908, particularly the LaBelle style.
When Dick died in 2021 at age 81 from COVID-19, his son was determined to not let his death be the end of his life story.
“I wanted to show the jardinière at the fair as a way of sharing Dad’s love of flow blue china and to honor him and his contributions to the club,” Southern said. “His interest started in 1972 when he found two flow blue china plates in an abandoned building.”
During 40 years of collecting, Dick accumulated 2,000 flow blue pieces.
To help fairgoers understand the significance of the jardinière and china, Southern placed a placard describing flow blue china’s history. First made in England in the 1820s, it got its name because the blue patterns, often flowers or scenes, looked like they had “flowed” or blurred during firing in the kiln. This effect happened when cobalt dye spread on the porcelain. Flow blue became very popular in Victorian times and was sold worldwide, especially in America. Collectors prize these dishes for their beauty and unique “misty design.”
Southern’s 22-inch wide jardinière and matching 35.5-inch tall pedestal were made in West Virginia at the Wheeling Pottery Company, renowned for producing pieces of unsurpassed quality. Several limited edition jardinière/pedestal combinations of that size were produced with two of them crafted specifically as a wedding gift for Adm. George Dewey, known for his victory at the Battle of Manila Bay in 1898. Dewey had extended family in Wheeling, including his distant cousin Orville C. Dewey, who compiled an extensive Dewey family history.
The pottery pieces made for the admiral were inscribed with “From the city of Wheeling to Admiral and Mrs. Dewey, Nov. 23, 1899.” He donated them to the U.S. Naval Academy Museum in Annapolis, Maryland. Two other copies are at the Oglebay Institute’s Mansion Museum.
Through club members, Southern’s dad knew of another rare Dewey jardinière-pedestal combination. In 2017, he purchased his from Florida resident and a Blue Flow China Club member Marilyn Hallock when she was ready to sell hers. They met at a club convention, and Dick drove his prized porcelain back to his Idaho ranch.
At the fair while answering questions about the jardinière, Southern saw several former students. Since graduating from the University of Idaho in 1985, he estimates he has taught 8,000 students at Mountain View Middle School in Blackfoot. There he met his wife, Cathy, who taught special education.
“She’s always been my biggest cheerleader with all my interests,” he said.
His principal and a former student, Wes Jensen, has described Southern as “the greatest teacher in the world.”
Southern also receives emails from students who tell him they have pursued science careers after being inspired by his lessons in geology, astronomy and meteorology.
Along with teaching thousands, he has also led more than 3,400 students on a tour of southern California every June since 1990. “When we started, I didn’t think many would come. Now, we typically have 100 per trip.”
Another career highlight was chaperoning students in 2011 to Florida to watch the final Space Shuttle Atlantic launch.
Southern’s former students have become his teaching colleagues and administrators.
“I work with wonderful people,” he said. “My students have become my mountain climbing friends too. I call then my ‘mountain goats.’ We’ve stood together on Idaho’s 12,000-foot-high peaks, Half Dome in Yosemite, and Angels Landing in Zion.”
He has climbed all nine of Idaho’s 12,000-foot-high peaks “and am one short of doing them all three times. I’ve done the highest point in 37 states, too. But my soul is in the Tetons. For years, we’ve talked about climbing the Grand Teton. Finally last year, we hired a guide and made it happen on July 24. It was an unforgettable accomplishment and feeling, standing there and looking in all directions, especially with three former students with two of them being my fellow teachers. We’ve come full circle. It’s really special.”
Southern said his mountain climbing enables him to teach about geological formations in a personalized way.
This year will be his 42st year at Mountain View with 40 years in the same classroom.
“My first two years, I was in the room next door. I still love my job and the kids. They mean the world to me and get inside my heart. After all these years, I realize the kids give more to me than I do to them. I have no plans to retire.”
Examples of pieces and the history of flow blue china may be found at flowblue.org.