The History of American Glass at the 2013 “Vintage Glass & Antique Show & Sale”

The fascination with glass has continued to grow since the development of this creative art form which can trace its origin back to ancient Egypt. Considered one of the most popular of the antique collectibles, this is evidenced by the 39^th Annual Houston Glass Club’s “Vintage Glass & Antique Show & Sale,” which will be held again at the Fort Bend County Fairgrounds, August 16 through 18. One of the antique industries longest running traditions, and certainly one of Houston’s more popular events, the glass show features everything made of glass, from one-of-a-kind art glass, to high-volume, low quality glass produced for the masses during the Great Depression.

Believed to have been developed in 3500 A.D, the earliest known glass objects were beads, and were considered a luxury item. They say what goes around, comes around. The popularity of glass-bead jewelry and Daichroic Glass jewelry, has spawned a large number of cottage industries, and will once again, have a huge presence at the show.

Glass making In the United States first began in Jamestown Island, VA, in the form of windows, and evolved to produce drinking vials and bottles, but was eclipsed by the Massachusetts settlements of Boston and Cambridge which produced fine glassware until the Civil War. After the war. the industry re-emerged in Boston, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania and Ohio, to produce some of the most spectacular glass with ornately cut designs that it was and will be forever remembered, as the American Brilliant Period, which lasted from 1876 to 1917.

Aside from the fact that cut glass was expensive and only affordable to the affluent, the industry of approximately 1000 glass cutting shops dissolved because the Lead oxide, an essential ingredient in glass made for cutting, was needed for more military usage in the country’s next major military campaign…The Great War (WWI).

Other glass forms emerged, but never of the level of craftsmanship of the American Brilliant Period cut glass. But because the glass was not just ornamental, it became and still is, wildly collectible for its beauty and because it’s utilitarian. Depression glass manufactured during the Great Depression, and sold at low cost or distributed free as promotional items, experienced a resurgence in popularity in the 1960s-70s, and remains highly popular. A higher quality glass referred to as ‘Elegant Glassware of the Depression Era,’ was sold in the department stores as an alternative to fine china. It distinguished itself for its clarity and brilliant colors; some of which was elaborately etched or embellished with gold or silver trim.

Art glass is an art form in and of itself…one of a kind hand-blown pieces, collected for their artistic design and decorative qualities. Unlike cut glass of which many pieces were signed, fabulous artisans will go undistinguished because most of these works of art are not signed. Definitely a cross-over collectible because it’s prized as much by glass collectors as it is by the home décor market.

All the above will be on display and available for sale at the vintage glass show. For those who have eclectic collecting taste, the show is adjacent to the annual antique show which will feature everything from A to Z. This is a show with something for everyone, and a definite must see. Aside from the collectors, it’s a great opportunity for students of history to see and talk with the antique dealers who not only participate in the business for their love of antiques, but to preserve our country’s culture.

The Fort Bend County Fairgrounds are located on US 59 to Hwy 36, ½ mile south of Rosenberg. The show opens Friday, August 16, from 2 p.m. - 7 p.m., and continues Saturday from 10 a.m. - 5 p.m., through Sunday, 11 a.m. - 4 p.m. The $10 admission on Friday, is good for all three days; admission on Saturday and Sunday is just $6. The air-conditioned venue will have food and drink concessions, and parking is free. For more information, view the Houston Glass Club’s website at Houston Glass Club

A Toast to Glass!

Decorative drinking glasses are one of the consistent movers in the rolling inventory at antique shops. Prized for not only their functionality, but also for their aesthetic value. Among some of the most popular drinking glasses are the "Swankyswigs," introduced by Kraft® Foods in 1933. These festive and colorfully decorated glass tumblers held Kraft's cheese products and were the forerunners in recycling as they were collected and recycled for juice glasses. Their diminutive size was perfect for small hands and they remain popular to this day…over three-quarters of a century later! In fact, a whole book has been devoted to these charming glasses. “Swankyswigs” by Mark and Sheila Moore (Schiffer Books) is a wonderful pictorial of all the designs and even includes look-alikes.

Without a doubt, the most beautiful drinking classes were by the Culver Glass Company, an American glass manufacturer founded in Brooklyn, New York, in the 1930s. Known for lavish designs and use of 22 karat gold over those designs, the company gained notoriety and its products became highly collectible. The glassware was very popular in the 1950s and remains so to this day for home and office bars, and interior decorating. Not all pieces are “signed” with the Culver name. Culver glass collectors say that the original glasses from the 1950s thru ‘70s appear to be signed, whereas later glasses had paper labels. This might have been due to a change in the manufacturing process as Culver Glassware was moved in 1980, to downtown Rahway, New Jersey. This glassware is getting harder and harder to find in very good or excellent condition. Too many people ruined it by putting it in dishwashers. When found in antique stores the price can often be on a par with crystal.

An added note…the founder's son, Mark Rothenberg, ran the company until 1996, when it was sold. At that point, he headed another glassware company briefly until his death on 9/11. He was one of the passengers on the hijacked Newark-to-San-Francisco flight that crashed in Pennsylvania.

In the 1970’s glassware took a bold move to heavier stemware and tumblers with weighted bottoms. Preferred because it was more durable than fine crystal, it was popularized by Fostoria and came in a variety of patterns and colors to blend with the home décor. Brides registered their patterns and colors, often choosing something that would work well with both their china and their ‘everyday’ dishes. Men preferred the heavier style over delicate crystal too. This glassware is still plentiful in antique shops at prices not much more than the original price forty years ago.

Last month we provided a 350-year old lemonade recipe to quench your thirst during this summer’s drought. In the photo collage we’ve included some additional thirst quenchers to enjoy in your beautiful glassware. Especially popular today are glasses with clever themes or logos. They jazz up the home or office bar, and reflect the owner’s personality.



Internet sources
Photo collage by Collage

Going for all the Marbles

I must have lost my marbles to write an article on this subject. But don’t lose yours, because they’re becoming quite collectible. A recent increased interest in marbles peaked my interest, so I struck up conversations with marble collectors and basically it’s nostalgia that drives them to collect these miniature glass orbs. I rarely played with marbles, having lost my stash early on to my older sister who was the best marble shooter in the neighborhood. Typically a boy’s game while the girls were playing with their Barbie dolls, but not my sister. She beat the guys at their own game; a game that goes back to early civilizations. Marbles have been found in the pyramids of Egypt and in the remnants of Indian camps in North America, mostly made from clay, pottery, or stone.

Any marble champion worth his/her salt would have retained their trophies of war. So I asked my sister if she still had her marbles. My brother-in-law put in his two cents but keep in mind he’s one of the neighborhood kids who lost his marbles to my sister’s sharp-shooting skills, so consider the source. It only took a couple of minutes for her to retrieve her booty from the dark recesses of her sock drawer. Talk about a mixed bag of tricks…she had a little bit of everything. Her ‘shooter’ was among the biggest of the spheres; a huge stainless steel ball bearing and more than likely the secret to her success. Although prized in her day, stainless steel ball bearings are not a consideration for marble collectors. Also of little interest are the ‘crystals’ or ‘clearies,’ clear marbles in pale colors but with no internal swirls or bold coloring. But any marble to a marble shooter was collectible because it was all about volume. The objective was to capture all the marbles that were easy pickin’s, thus the term ‘go for all the marbles.’ Much like shooting pool, the objective was to set up your ‘shooter’ for the next shot, so marble shooters weren’t as discriminating as today’s collector.

Eye appeal is the primary consideration, but type and size also weigh heavily in whether they choose to add it to their collection. And as with almost every other antique or collectible, with the exception of primitives, condition is a major factor. The most highly-prized by marble collectors are the handmade glass marbles which are actually individual, one-of-a kind, miniature works of art glass. Although made in high volume by streamlining the process, no two hand-made marbles came out exactly alike, and among the finest were the German- produced marbles which dominated the market until imports from Germany were halted in World War 1. Among the hand-made glass designs, either rod or cane cut (the glass processes) were ‘swirls,’ which were clear glass with internal ribbons of color, and ‘opaques’ with surface ribbons of color. If handmade, it will have a pontil mark, the rough spot where the marble was separated from the rod or cane that it was produced on.

Multi-colored marbles without definitive bands of color were referred to as ‘end of day’ and were made with left-over glass, either with a clear core or a colored core. The more colors, the more collectible. Especially rare are marbles that are left-hand twisted. Inclusions like mica (metallic flakes) add to the value, especially if the marbles are swirls. And even more collectible are marbles with beautiful lutz bands, finely ground copper flakes or goldstone which were used to make metallic-like ribbons in copper or gold. According to the sharp shooter in the family, the shooters rarely played with them because their aesthetic qualities were highly prized even by marble shooters. They never risked losing their better looking marbles.

Lower on the value scale are the slags. Slag glass was a mixture of two different colors of glass, sometimes with a swirled pattern, but often irregularly patterned. On the low end of the collecting scale are the ‘clearies’ and solid-colored ‘opaques’ with no markings. They were made in such high volume and can’t command the price of one-of-a-kind art glass marbles.

Non-glass marbles in order of value include: china, which were often hand-painted; crockery, stoneware, and clay. And then there’s Agate; quartz which was hand-ground into marbles. Because agates are heavier and denser than other marbles, they were preferred as ‘shooters.’

The industrial age ushered in the machine-made marbles in the early 1900s. The first produced were actually ‘transitional’ marbles, partially made by hand and finished by machine, and were always slag-type marbles. There wasn’t much of a collector market for the machine-made marbles until the mid-1980s. Baby boomers began their nostalgic search for their childhood collectibles, and the market for hand-made marbles was becoming scarcer. Machine-made marbles were also produced in transparent (‘clearies’) and opaque, but the slags with their colorful patterns (corkscrew, swirls, and spirals) and unique names (Superman, Bumblebee, Christmas Tree, Tiger, etc.), have dominated the machine-made collector market. For in-depth information about machine-made marbles and the manufacturing companies, refer to Collectable Machine Made Marbles by Larry Castel and Marlowe Peterson. The machine-made marbles are most typical of the marbles you’ll find in the old gym sock of today’s aging baby boomer.

There are many informative books on marble values and collecting. Marble collectors would be wise to take a current issue of a book like Marbles, Identification & Price Guide by Robert Block, or Marble Mania by Stanley A. Block (possibly related to Robert Block), with them when shopping for their collection. These book s and the Internet provided much of the information contained here within.

Some of the best ways to display colorful marbles are in old Ball canning jars, in large art glass bowls, or prominently displayed on glass flower frogs. But many champion marble shooters like my sister, prefer to keep them tucked away in the back of the sock drawer, out of site from other sharp shooters.