About Justin W. Thomas

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A little bit about myself.

Based in Newburyport, Massachusetts, I am a collector, researcher, and writer specializing in American utilitarian pottery production from the 17th through the early 20th centuries. My writing is backed by two decades of experience working for various Boston media outlets, which provides a strong journalistic foundation for my ceramic research. Over the years, I have studied collections at archaeology departments, museums, and private archives across the country, publishing numerous research articles in regional and national publications. As a guest curator at Newburyport’s Custom House Maritime Museum, I assembled a nationally recognized exhibition of local colonial-to-20th-century pottery and co-authored its accompanying catalog, Potters on the Merrimac: A Century of New England Ceramics. Building on this success, future exhibition opportunities are currently in development with the Portsmouth Historical Society in New Hampshire and the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts.

My written scholarship includes deeply researched, fully illustrated feature stories ranging from 1,000 to 5,000 words. These original pieces have appeared in prominent national and regional publications such as Americana Insights, Maine Antique Digest, New England Antiques Journal, Antiques And The Arts Weekly, Antiques & Auction News, and Untapped New York. Beyond the page, I regularly present original research at major historical symposiums and institutions. My speaking engagements have included presentations at the 2026 Americana Symposium at Historic Trappe, the Annual Meeting of the Council for Historical Archaeology at the University of Delaware, Dish Camp at Historic Eastfield Village, the Ceramics Study Club in Boston, Historic New England, the Stoneware Collectors Group at the Bennington Museum, and the historical societies of Charlestown, Peabody, Beverly, Amesbury, Berkshire County, Old York, and Yarmouth, etc.

My collaborative research and consulting work extends to leading historical institutions all along the East Coast. I have partnered with the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History, the City of Boston Archaeology Department, the Baker Library at Harvard University, Old Sturbridge Village, Strawbery Banke, the New York State Museum, the Connecticut Historical Society, the Maine State Museum, the Peabody Essex Museum, and the Rochester Museum & Science Center, among many others. In 2021, I leveraged this network to organize and lead a specialized redware conference hosted by Historic Beverly.

That same year, I was selected alongside the head of ceramics for Colonial Williamsburg to provide the official written review for the Landis Valley Village & Farm Museum’s landmark two-year exhibit, “Thrown, Fired, and Glazed: The Redware Tradition from Pennsylvania and Beyond,” successfully supporting the museum in securing a prestigious AASLH Award of Excellence. Today, my primary focus remains on authorship; I have penned nine books in an ongoing American pottery series published by Historic Beverly. I am currently completing my tenth and eleventh volumes, An Early Industry of Household Wares: The Red Earthenware of Salem Village, South Danvers, Peabody, Beverly and Salem, Massachusetts, and A Monumental History: Stories of Red Earthenware Production in Western Massachusetts, the Berkshires and Vermont, both scheduled for publication later this year in 2026 or early 2027.

Click on the links below to learn more about or purchase each of my published books:

1. The Beverly Pottery: The Wares of Charles A. Lawrence
2. The Moses B. Paige Company: The Last of the Peabody Potteries
3. The Dawn of Independence, the Death of an Industry: The Pottery of Charlestown, Massachusetts
4. South Amesbury’s Red Earthenware & Stoneware: The 1791-1820 William Pecker Pottery
5. A Celebrated Industry: The Historic Wares of Southeastern Massachusetts, Bristol County and Cape Cod
6. A City on the River: The Early Red Earthenware of the Hartford, Connecticut Area
7. From One Town Came Many: The Red Earthenware Industry of North Yarmouth, Maine
8. An Influential Family of Early Potters: The Clarks of New Hampshire and Related Businesses
9. America’s Great Awakening and Migration: The Red Earthenware of Western New York