A unique piece of American Folk Art History, this Sewer Tile Tree Trunk sculpture was produced in either the late 19th or early 20th century, making it one of the earlier works completed at the time. Sewer tile folk art were forms and figures made during off-hours (end of day or during lunch breaks) by workers with leftover clay that couldn’t make another sewerpipe. Oftentimes, these works were not for reselling or production but made as gifts which made them crude in nature but full of emotion. Most sewer tile and sewer pipe clay is contributed to Ohio as the state had the highest number of factories, however, other states with sewer tile factories included Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, New York, and Maryland. 

This work specifically was produced inside the Baltimore Terra Cotta Co. (often operating under Burns, Russell & Co.) factory. The Baltimore Terra Cotta Co. manufactured architectural and decorative terra cotta as well as pressed, molded bricks in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. N.M. Rittenhouse was a major figure behind these works, occasionally securing city contracts for supplies like terra-cotta pipe.