Salterini furniture

I inherited three of these chairs a few years ago.

I had no idea what they were called, who had made them, or when they had been made. They were just sitting outside, always, either at my grandmother’s house or later at my father’s. A piece of (heavy) junk I thought…
Not so fast!
Just this spring, when I was getting ready to do some sort of make over on these chairs, I began to investigate… These are called “clam shell” chairs and they were made by John Salterini, in Brooklyn, New York! Then, when we went up to Hudson, NY there they were again…….at this shop:

Beautiful, rare example of a rocker:

And here are my chairs:

Ours were probably bought, by my grandmother, around 1950. She had a really lovely backyard terrace in Chestnut Hill, PA. I think I vaguely remember these….
But, of course, by the time these came to me fifty years had passed (really?)

You can see, the rust was there alright…

So I sanded and scraped and spray painted: