GATHERING GORGEOUS GLASS 

(INCLUDING THE THIRTEEN COMMANDMENTS AND 154 ABCs) 

Written and photographed by June Grayson 

 

 

God must love glass - the world has so much of it. And we are not apt to run out of glass anytime soon. Glass is made of sand and ashes. Sand is just the fine debris of what was first rock. The most common element in rock is silica, also called silicon dioxide, a compound of two of the most abundant elements in the universe - silicon and oxygen. Silica forms 59% of the earth's crust and more than 95% of the earth's rock, more than enough to supply the world's glass factories for the foreseeable future.  

Nature probably made the first glass when a bolt of lightning 

melted the sand on a deserted seashore. Reports from Kuwait today say that the heat from the burning oil wells has been high enough to melt some desert sand into glass. 

Intentional glass making started in prehistory, so no one can really say who invented it or where. Archeologists have dated stone beads covered with a blue glass glaze from 4000 B.C. in Egypt. Small glass vessels and decorative objects dating from 1500 B.C. have been found throughout the eastern Mediterranian. Glass artisans in the Roman Empire around the time of Christ knew how to stain, blow, and engrave glass. Only the rich could afford that glass - the Egyptian pharaohs, Roman Caesars, and Chinese Emperors.  

During the thousand year span of the Medieval Dark Ages, after the Barbarians overran the Roman Empire, glass production survived in small geographical areas, such as the island of Murano, the home of the famous Venetian glass. Glass production expanded throughout Europe during the 16th and 17th centuries. Glass workers became more mobile. World trade began to flourish. The expanding merchant class had money to spend.  

The first English settlement in the United States, Jamestown in 1607, had a small glass factory, but it disappeared along with the entire colony in a few years. Many small glass factories started up in the American colonies during the 1700s. It was the Industrial Revolution of the 18th and 19th centuries, however, that brought about mass production and the rise of the middle class making glass ownership possible for everyone. The fortuitous discovery of natural gas, a cheap new energy source to fire the glass furnaces, led to the proliferation of glass factories throughout the Ohio river valley around 1900. 

Glass products are now so plentiful that people take them for granted. But not glass collectors. They are the ones whomarvel at the miraculous transformation by fire of these common elements into thousands of delightful forms and colors - an embarrassment of riches.  

That is why glass collectors tend to be specialists. You can't collect everything - where would you put it? A collection starts innocently enough. You receive a gift of glass. Or you inherit a family keepsake. Or a piece of glass just speaks to you as you walk through a department store or antique mall. 

Some people collect by color alone. In fact, one womanwrote a book about her 500-piece collection of red glass. Others collect according to the type of glass and how it is made. Is it blown glass, blown and molded glass, pressed glass, or cut glass? You can collect by historical period: Victorian glass or Depression glass. You can collect by objects: a cruet collection alone can include hundred of kinds and colors of glass. You can collect by kind of glass - cranberry, Vaseline, opalescent, chocolate, or crackle glass. You can limit your collection to one glass company or to one glass artist. There are so many divisions within the broad field of glass collecting that there is room for every taste and pocketbook.  

This is a good time to start a glass collection because so many references books on glass are available. Glass researchers are even saving and publishing the catalogs of glass companies from years past to make attribution easier. 

Unfortunately, everything that looks like old glass is not always old by any means. Some 100 year old glass molds are still being used today to make glass. Reproductions are not fakes, at least not originally. If museum gift catalogs did not offer reproductions of old glass, today's collectors would never have a chance to enjoy some of the greatest glories of historical glass art. Ideally, such glass carries identifying marks and dates. Without such information, such glass may later escape into the marketplace and either innocently or intentionally be sold as the old and original glass.  

More disturbing to the glass collector, however, is the importation of unmarked reproductions of old glass made in Asia sold to the new or unknowing collector as the real thing by unscrupulous dealers. It is also fairly easy to engrave a fake signature on a piece of unmarked glass to seduce the unwary.  

Writers and editors of antique reference books and magazines do their readers an important service by continuously alerting them to possible fakes coming on the market. Gene Florence in his books and articles on Depression glass is very helpful to his readers about this. 

Here are thirteen commandments for glass collectors: 

1. Buy what you like. If you fall in love with a piece of cranberry glass, go for it. 

2. Start small. Then, if you make a mistake (as we all do), the lesson will be affordable.  

3. Deal with reputable antique dealers for expensive pieces. Have the dealer put the description in writing and warrantee your purchase. Then, if you buy something as Victorian art glass and you find it in the Fenton glass catalog of 1975, you can demand your money back.  

4. Do research. Go to the library and take out every book on your subject. Buy the antique reference books on your type of glass. Subscribe to a glass publication. Read everything you can about glass. 

5. Join a specialized glass collectors' society. There are collector clubs now for lovers of every type of glass or glass manufacturer: carnival glass, Cambridge glass, Fenton glass, forexample.  

6. Talk to every one you meet who knows more than you do. Most antique dealers love their work and the things they sell. They will be glad to share their knowledge and maybe even let you see and handle the kind of glass you collect, even if you cannot afford to buy it all in the beginning. 7. Buy one great piece rather than several cheaper pieces.  

8. Don't buy damaged glass. It may be impossible to resell if you ever have to liquidate your collection.  

9. Attend specialized glass shows, sales, and club conventions to learn, if not to buy.  

10. Stalk antique malls, flea markets, garage sales, church rummage sales, and thrift shops for that 10-cent lucky find. 1l. Don't buy for investment. That is what stocks are for. 

12. Share. Antique glass items make wonderful birthday and wedding gifts. Pass them down to your grandchildren. 

13. Above all, enjoy! Arrange your collection where you and your friends can see it. Use your glass for holiday meals and decorations. 

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