The Collaborative International Dictionary
Fireboard \Fire"board`\, n. A chimney board or screen to close a fireplace when not in use.
Wiktionary
n. A chimney board or screen to close a fireplace when not in use.
Wikipedia
__NOTOC__ A fireboard or chimney board is a panel designed to cover a fireplace during the warm months of the year. It was "commonly used during the later 18th and early 19th centuries" in places like France and New England. In warm weather, "a fireboard effectively reduced the number of mosquitoes and other insects, or even birds, that might enter a house through an open, damperless chimney." The "board or shutterlike contrivance" typically "of wood or cast of sheet metal" is "frequently decorated with painting and stencilling." Some fireboards have notches cut out of the lowest edge to accommodate andirons. Fireboards are also called: chimney boards, chimney pieces, chimney stops, fire boards, summer boards.
Among the many artists who have produced ornamental fireboards: Robert Adam; Winthrop Chandler (1747-1790); Andien de Clermont; Charles Codman; Michele Felice Cornè; Edward Hicks; Jean-Baptiste Oudry; Rufus Porter. Examples of decorated fireboards are in numerous collections, including: Historic Deerfield, Massachusetts; Historic New England; National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, USA; Peabody Essex Museum; Victoria & Albert Museum.
Usage examples of "fireboard".
Moss had her wits about her in a minute, and ran to put in the fireboard, and stop the draught.
The five-foot-square shaft, lined with metal-skinned fireboard, continued four stories above my position.
One girl holds the spindle and steadies the fireboard while the other does the twirling.