The
purchase of the Bird and Nest
paperweight* for 25 francs, marked the beginning
of Paul Jokelson’s romance with
paperweights. Little did he imagine that this
small crystal object, bought in a
modest shop on Rue des Saints Peres in Paris,
would later shape the course of
his life. The year was 1923. Jokelson
was
serving an 18 month volunteer enlistment in the
French Army.
Later, on leave in
London with Paul
Lorraine,** Jokelson bought three or four more
weights at a Bond Street arcade.
One was a rare Baccarat magnum scattered
millefiori on lace and, he recalls with
a smile, that the most expensive weight in that
group was L10. His first sulphide was a
plaque of
Henry IV, bought along with other weights at the
French auction house, Hotel
Drouet. By World War II, his collection numbered
120 paperweights.
Paul
Jokelson was born in Dunkirk,
France into a family of ship owners. Their ships,
26 in number before World War
II, carried freight between France and North
Africa and passengers across the
English Channel between Calais and Dover.
Jokelson worked in the family
business after his term in the service. He was on
his second trip to the United
States in 1939 when the war broke out and he
returned to France to serve in the
Army again.
Attached to a British
major as an
interpreter, he was evacuated with the British
forces at Dunkirk, coincidently
in one of his own ships. Jokelson remembers the
10th of June, 1940, as the date
he returned to Cherbourg with a few English
brigades. He remained behind when
the British forces finally returned to
England. He retreated to Albi, a city in the
southwest of France, where he was demobilized.
To avoid
internment by the Nazis,
he fled to the South of France, which was his home
base during the war. Sculptor
Gilbert Poillerat, a good friend, shipped his
goods - including the paperweight
collection - from Paris. His possessions were
detoured through German occupied
territory and it was good luck that the Germans
did not open the drawers of a
small chest that contained two guns! His
possessions and his paperweights were
delivered intact.
He returned to
occupied Paris for a
few months on a special mission for the French
Underground. A week before
liberation, he attempted to return again, but was
unable to get into the city
because all the bridges across the Seine River
were gone. He traveled to a small
village near Caen (150 miles N.W. of Paris) where
he stayed and was part of the
forces that destroyed the last retreating German
convoys.
In 1945,
Jokelson joined the United
Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Association. He
went to Germany as a director
of an UNRRA team and was placed in charge of two
camps of Polish Displaced
Persons and one of Italian Prisoners of War. It
was at this time that he met his
wife, Margaret, a U.S. citizen serving as a nurse
on his UNRRA team. His
position with UNRRA enabled him to secure the
special permission required to get
permits to attend the Nuremberg Trials, which he
found “most interesting.” He
recalls how, like all the observers, he was
searched to be sure he carried no
weapons.
After 18 months, he
returned to
Paris and resigned from his post with UNRRA. He
and Margaret were married, and
six months later, when his visa was granted, he
came to the U.S.
His first
position was with an
import-export firm and required the Jokelsons to
move to Montreal, Canada. Here
his work brought him into direct contact with a
Frenchman who was wanted for
prosecution as a spy for the Germans. Jokelson
recounts that the wanted man was
easily identified, having lost an arm in W.W.I
when he was decorated as a war
hero. For Paul, it was even more simple; he had
faced this man across a desk
every morning for five years before the outbreak
of W.W.II. Personal threats
against Jokelson did not deter his efforts to have
this was criminal
extradited. Government delays resulted in the
man’s eventual escape to Brazil,
where he was assassinated a few years later.
Jokelson left this position after 2
½ years and returned to the U.S.
It was during
his years as head of
Micomex, his own import-export firm in New York
from 1950 to 1954, that Mr.
Jokelson made his first attempt at having modern
sulphide paperweights made. An
admirer of Dwight D. Eisenhower, Jokelson went to
the Baccarat factory, where
they were finally able to produce a sulphide of
Ike. Taken from Eisenhower’s
campaign medal, these paperweights were not a
good likeness, but they had proven
the feasibility of such a project. A year later,
on the occasion of the
coronation, Baccarat made a successful
paperweight of Queen Elizabeth II and the
Duke of Edinburgh, from a sculpture by Gilbert
Poillerat, made expressly for
this purpose.
At Jokelson’s request,
the
Cristalleries de Saint Louis produced sulphides of
Queen Elizabeth II, also from
a sculpture by Poillerat. As a testament to the
success of these weights, both
artistically and commercially, Paul Jokelson
recalls that he returned to the U.S. with a total
of 2200
sulphide paperweights from Baccarat and St. Louis.
Marketed through antique and
paperweight dealers, they were sold out within two
weeks.
Prodded by Jokelson
during the five
years when he was their U.S. paperweight
distributor, the Baccarat factory
undertook production of lampwork paperweights in
addition to sulphides. These
weights also proved to be a success.
About 300 to 400
flower and
millefiori paperweights were made at Cristalleries
de Saint Louis between 1950
and 1970, evidence of the experimentation that was
taking place at that factory,
also at Jokelson’s urging. The scope and quality
of the St. Louis weights made
over the years, illustrate the success of this
venture and are a tribute to Paul
Jokelson, the man who advised and inspired their
production. He continues as the
U.S. distributor for St. Louis.
At a third French
factory, Cristal
D’Albret, Jokelson again provided the incentive
for the production of fine
sulphide paperweights, beginning in 1967. He is
the exclusive distributor in the
U.S. for these fine weights.
In 1953, after
Palmer Hart, a
prominent American paperweight collector, pointed
out that there were
associations for collectors of all types of things
but none for paperweight
collectors, Paul Jokelson took steps to organize
an association. A lawyer friend
drew up ten articles of the Paperweight Collectors
Association, still in use
today with only one revision. Among the charter
members were Evangeline
Bergstrom, Charles Kaziun, Paul Lorraine, Palmer
Hart and Paul Jokelson. An ad
for the PCA, featuring the Bird and the Nest
paperweight appeared in the July,
1953 issue of Antiques Magazine and attracted 75
members. Two years later,
publicity from a display of paperweights at a New
York Armory Show, resulted in
many additional collectors. The PCA membership,
says Jokelson, has been as high
as 3000.
Through his years as
President of
the PCA, 1953-1980, Mr. Jokelson wrote and sent
out to its members 42
Newsletters. He was - and still is - editor and
publisher of the beautiful
full-color limited edition bulletins, now issued
yearly. He has planned and
presided over the 12 Conventions*** that have
taken place in sites from coast to
coast across the U.S.A. Thanks to Jokelson’s
efforts over a number of years, the
major auction houses in New York and London
finally agreed to eliminate from
their lists of selling prices those lots which had
not reached the owner’s
“reserve price” and had not really been sold.
Certainly all
the ingredients
necessary for a paperweight renaissance in the
20th century existed. But, it
remained for a man such as Paul Jokelson, a
person of adventurous spirit and
discriminating taste to become the catalyst. Who
could have predicted such
effects from the offhand sale of a glass object to
a soldier on leave in Paris
back in 1923?
Recognized and
respected as an
expert on paperweights, Jokelson is considered the
foremost authority on
sulphides. He is the author of three books on the
subject of paperweights.
Paul and Margaret
Jokelson are
frequent visitors to Chelmsford, Massachusetts to
the home of their daughter,
son-in-law and two grandchildren, Sean, almost 7
and Ashley, 2.
*
This antique paperweight is the
only one of its kind yet discovered.
**
His boyhood friend who works as
a ‘liason officer’ between Jokelson and the two
factories of Saint Louis and
Cristal D’Albret.
***
At the 12th Convention in 1981,
Jokelson turned the gavel over to the new
President, Mr. Evan Pancake.
