Glass Circle News_No.142, Dec 2016

CLASS CIRCLE

Vol. 39 No. 3
ISSN 2942-652

Issue 142 December 2016

•
Cinzano collection

• Early table settings

•
Tales of glassmaking • Newcastle glasshouses

•
Ale or champagne? • Transporting valuable glass

.044 o

,
4

Dr Christopher (Kit) Maxwell appointed a
curator
of

European glass at the Corning Museum of Glass
Schloss Ambras, Innsbruck, Austria, home of the

Rudolf Strasse collection of
European
glass

CONTENTS

Chairman’s letter
Letters

Cinzano collection

Transporting glass
Ale or champagne?

Tales of glassmaking

Newcastle glass

Early table settings

Reviews

Diary

Glass Circle News

ISSN 2043-6572

Vol. 39 No. 3 Issue 142 December

2016 published by The Glass Circle

www.glasscircle.org
,E£.1.1..3.1•111

Editor

Jane Dorner
[email protected]

9 Collingwood Avenue, N10 3EH

Design and layout

Athelny Townshend

[email protected]

OMIM0/

Neither the Glass Circle one any of its officers or committee members

bear any responsibility for ehe views expressed in this publication,
which are those of the contributor in each case, Every effort has been

made to trace and acknowledge copyright in the photographs illustrat-
ing
articles,

The Editor asks contributors to dear permissions and

neither the Editor nor the Glass Circle it responsible for inadvertent
infringements. All photographs are copyright the aurhor(s) unless

otherwise credited.

Printed by

Micropress Printers Ltd

www.micropress.co.uk

Next copy date:

15th February for the April edition

Cover illustration:
The Constable Maxwell cage cup. See page 8.
Bonhams
LETTERS

his edition is a little

gm
,

late this year, but
considering it relies on

the goodwill of unpaid

professionals, what’s in a few weeks’
delay! Our designer, Athelny, has just

finished a long planned and lengthy trip

around the USA. Our editor, Jane, has
had an unplanned and irksomely

long sojourn in hospital. Indeed

she has effectively put this

edition to bed from Tower 14
of University College Hospital.

Looking to the future, both are

looking to relinquishing these roles.
If any member has time and skills as

an editor or designer please contact me

as societies such as ours can only exist
through the efforts of its members. This

will be my last year as Chairman, and I

am determined to hand over the Circle

to my successor in a healthy state.

Thanks to the generosity of our

member of 5o years standing, John Scott,

the auction of the glass he kindly gave
to the Circle raised £2,000, with many

of our members taking home a souvenir

and memento from his great collection.
Following our various reorganisations,

raising subscriptions, auctions, paying

for meetings, the Circle is now running at

a surplus and looks sustainable for many
years to come, although, in common

with most special interest societies, is

suffering a slow decline in membership.
Please try and recruit a new member.

In particular we will continue to have
regular meetings, currently at least
7
a

year plus outings, partially to encourage

scholarship, and also to provide material
for our Glass Circle News. In July

The Corning Museum of Glass
announced the appointment
of a curator of European glass,

after a two-year interregnum.

He is Dr Christopher (Kit)

Maxwell, (below left) who obtained his

first degree at Cambridge in
2001,
then

his Masters at University of London,

and his Doctorate at Glasgow. He has

worked both for The Royal Collections
and in the glass and ceramics department

at the Victoria and Albert Museum. In

2013 he moved to America. He will now

be working with the best collection
of European glass in the world, with

access to the best research library.
In October I visited Innsbruck to visit

Schloss Ambras, a large and wonderful

castle with a fine
kunstkammer.
But

the reason for my visit was to see the

collection of Rudolf Strasser (1919-2014).
He was an Austrian who was financially

successful in the USA and collected

Chairman’s letter

John P
Smith

Glass Circle
News
Issuc 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

LETTERS

An early 18th

century
German

tumbler from the

collection of Rudolph

Strasser
an amazing amount of decorated

European glass. Virtually all his

glass is decorated with engraving or
enamelling; he collected very little

‘form’ glass. He left it to the Austrian

state and some of his collection

may be seen in Vienna, as some of

us did on The Glass Association

visit to Austria and Hungary two

years ago. However the majority
of his collection has been sent to
Innsbruck, which is appropriate

as Innsbruck, and nearby Hall,
were the glassmaking centres of

Austria in the 16th/i7th centuries.
The illustration is of a early

i8th century German tumbler, the

design is amazingly oriental and

would not look out of place on an

Art Nouveau object. The collection

is large, the display spacious, and
the captions, in both German and

English, as some of the best I have

seen in any glass museum.

Letters o the editor

Books
Editor’s note:

In the News section we mentioned

David Giles’s offer of free

books. Unfortunately, InDesign

automatically hyphenated his

email address so it read as

[email protected] rather

than

[email protected].

Please contact him on the second

email if you would like to see his

list of books.
He still has over 13o books on

glass available free. There are about

5o titles that have been added
that were not on the original list

taking the place of books already

disposed of.

Tasting
glasses

I
sympathise with Hazel Bell

relating the enjoyment of wine to

the vessel from which it is drunk.
I once visited a
patient in a
London private clinic who had

smuggled in a bottle of the finest
claret — Chateau Petrus, no less.

He offered some to me, chilled

and in a plastic tooth mug. I can

assure you it was terrible!
Dr
Philip Edmondson

Stroud

Migration

I
was impressed with the breadth

and depth of the articles in this

edition. We have come a long way
from the narrow base of the Glass
Circle which I joined many years

ago!

I particularly liked John Smith’s

debunking of the myth that glass
fluxed with lead was an English

invention. I look forward to
further scholarship correcting
the common assertion that many

Dutch engravers worked on

glasses made
in England. There is
substantial evidence that lead was

used in Continental Europe to flux

glass prior to it being adopted in

England. Indeed as with virtually

all glass-making techniques, this
method of fluxing was imported by

migrants from the Continent — or
Englishmen who fled to safety on

the Continent during the 17c Civil
War and returned post 166o with
the skills acquired whilst refugees.

We are all the beneficiaries of
migration though many of us are

reluctant to admit it!
I also appreciated your

encouragement to add a

conclusion to my own article

which fitted nicely with John

Smith’s Chairman’s letter and the

appended four papers by Colin

and Sue Brian.
Christopher Maxwell-Stewart
St Leonards-on-Sea
East Sussex

All letters

about a
previous

edition

of the
magazine

refer to Vol.

39
No.
2

Issue no.

141 unless

otherwise

stated.

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

LETTERS

Crystal glass-making in

London 1642-1672

Eirst,
I want to express my

I
–
thanks and admiration for the

Brains’ research and preparation

of this paper. Having worked with

archival material from this period

to document London silversmiths,

I am aware of how much time

and effort it takes to find relevant

information. And then, when one

thinks one has found something,

there is sometimes the challenge
of having to read the hand-writing

and cope with phonetic period

spelling. I once had to consult

a badly faded document using

ultraviolet light. The ink was so

far faded that only under UV did

it fluoresce enough so that you

could read it. I also want to thank
the Circle and the Brains for

compiling these off-prints into a

special publication and making the
information available for a wider

audience. Actions like that greatly

advance research and knowledge.

My impetus for writing was

prompted by the interpretation of

the quote from Girolamo Alberti,

Venetian Secretary in London

(top of page XIII)

. . .
here [London] many furnaces

produce [drinking] glasses, but they

have no valid protector, only some

Italian masters working very well,
but unable to reduce the matter
to the clearness and fineness

of contesto cristallo.

I think there is a simple and logical

explanation of Alberti’s words
‘non

hanno
Protettori
de
qualita’

First, consider who is writing

these comments. Even today, part

of any official representative’s duty

in a foreign capital is to promote

trade. The international trade in

Venetian cristallo had proved a

big money-maker since the 15oos.

I can recall references to people

in England complaining that

silver drinking vessels were being

supplanted by imported Venetian

glass in the Tudor period. Alberti

needed
to document and report
on what was going on in London,

England, and to do some’industrial

espionage’. Thus, he is looking at
English glass production in terms

of how does it rate compared

to Venetian imports, which he
obviously wanted to continue and

increase.
One of the reasons that

Venetian glass enjoyed such a wide
market was its consistent quality.

Quality was often imposed by

Guilds. For example in the case

of silver made in London, all of

it was sent to be assessed and
hallmarked at the assay office. Any

item that was sub-standard or of

poor workmanship was destroyed.

That’s still the case today. This in
part is due to the fact that since the
late 13oos, the Crown ruled that
the alloy in English silver always

had to be that of the coin of the
realm, This allowed it to be melted
down in times of need or political

turmoil. Because of the important

role the Goldsmiths’ Company

played in maintaining the quality

of silver, even today they can
invite a member of the Royal
Family to one of their functions.

Maintaining legally established

standards was an important part

of any craft.
My interpretation of
‘non

banno
Protettori
de
qualita’
would

be that there is ‘no consistently

regulated quality control for the

product’. Guilds or associations

of manufacturers, even the fish
mongers in London, set standards

for what they were selling to the
public. This is a legal necessity if

one wants to encourage consumers
to consistently buy the product.

Has anyone investigated what

‘contesto cristallo’
means? Is this soda

lime glass produced to a level of
clarity and perfection as required

by a common agreement among

the glasshouses of Murano? Has

anyone discovered and published
the regulations that applied to

glass production and exports
from Venice? Quality control is a

very important factor. During the

i600s, English manufacturers and

consumers were often checking on

the differences between English –
usually London — made products

and what was available on the

Continent. For example, William

III sent his favourite, the Duke
of Portland, on a diplomatic

mission to Paris in the later 169os

(recorded in a furniture history

article I have read). One of the
instructions was to check on the
latest furnishing fabrics that were

available there. Rich furnishing
fabrics were important, especially

for palaces. Because of the great

influx of Huguenot weavers and

designers after the Revocation

of the Edict of Nantes in t685,
the Duke of Portland wrote back

to the King to say that there was

nothing for sale in Paris that you

could not find being made in
England by Huguenot
weavers,

ABOVE AND

OPPOSITE:

Two 17th-century

Venetian thin walled

glasses of the type
that Ravenscroft was
trying to emulate.

The more viscous

properties of lead

glass made this

difficult, and hence

his thicker glasses
introduced the

`English’ style.

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

LETTERS

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

often at a lower price. As a result

of the Huguenots, similar quality

improvements occurred in clocks
and scientific instruments as well

as in silver and furniture.

The standard rote that I was

always told was that the glass

industry in Venice was highly
regulated and that a craftsman

betrayed its secrets on pain of

death. Is this true? Has anyone
documented what the regulations

and punishments were Did

any workers succeed in leaving

and setting up elsewhere? If

those regulations and laws and

their consequences could be
documented, perhaps we could

stop automatically thinking that

the workers who made ‘Venetian’

glass were from Venice.
I am also wondering about the

workers from Altare. How was the

glass industry there regulated in
comparison to Venice? In certain

industries, notably the potteries

in Staffordshire, the workers

tended to be Protestant. Many

of the Staffordshire potters and

their employees were low church

or Methodist by the late 17oos.
Protestant tendencies are reflected

in the decoration of a wide variety

of English and Continental
pottery in the 1600s. Was Altare a

centre of Protestantism? Religious

affiliation was an important part of
how the decorative arts migrated

and developed right up to the
mid 20th century. Was it more

comfortable/safer for Italians
from Altare with non-conformist

Christian views to live in England?
In the 18th century, certain highly

talented cabinetmakers came to
London from Europe because

there were communities of the
countrymen there and protestant

churches of their own faith. Some

of them stayed and made a success.

Others learned the English

techniques and forms during

their
wanderjahr
as a journeyman

and returned to use them in their

workshops on the Continent. In

writing this, I am speaking from
my wider experience as a curator

who has done research in silver,

ceramics, furniture and glass and

studied guild and trade practices.

The one problem with protestant

congregations in England in the

1600s is that the non-conformist

ones where one is likely to find
the craftsmen and workers did
not keep as accurate records as the

Church of England.
It seems to me that London

is often under-rated by British
historical researchers as an

attractive destination and centre of

European innovation. It was one

of the largest and most important
European cities in terms of trade

and commerce when Gustav Jung
visited there in 1667-68. Little

wonder he decided to go there!
Although I have not been able to

find and verify specific statistics,
I believe that London was one
of the largest urban centres in

Europe throughout the 1600s.

Large urban centres are magnets

for new industries and innovation.
What I could find on line was an

essay compiled by scholars on ‘The
Emergence of Modern Europe,

1500-1648: Economy and Society’
from the History of Europe

section of the Encyclopedia
Britannica (last updated in 2015).

One short quote would seem to

support my assessment:
1..
with 400,000 residents by 165o,

London then ranked below only

Paris (440,000) as Europe’s largest

city. Urban concentrations of such
magnitude were unprecedented

in the Middle Ages, the largest

sise attained was roughly
220,000,

reached by a single city, Paris, about

1328.

Peter Kaellgren
Ontario

Blue or grey

I
have inherited a zo-volume

I edition of

The Windsor

Shakespeare,
edited by Henry H.

Hudson, LL.D.,
c.

1910, with

plentiful, somewhat quaint
editorial notes. In
Two Gentlemen

of Verona,
Act IV scene ii, Julia

examines a picture of Silvia, her

rival in love, and observes, ‘Her

eyes are grey as glass’. The editorial
note appended to this line runs:

What we call
blue
eyes were

always described as
grey

in the

Poet’s time. And
glass
was not

colourless then, as we have it, but

of a light-blue tint. So that eyes

grey as glass’ were of the soft azure
or cerulean, such as usually go

with the auburn and yellow hair of

Silvia and Julia.
I cannot vouch for the validity

of this information: but if it is

indeed right, then how well might
dwellers of the Tudor period see

through their light-blue tinted

windows?
Hazel Bell

Hatfield

COLLECTIONS

The Cinzano Glass Collection

LEFT:
Huge

English

goblet
1710-1720.
Height 24.7

cm. Lead

glass with
bell bowl,
placed

on double
merese.
LEFT:

Roman mould-

blown beaker.

1st century AD.

Relief of alternating

bunches of grapes

and vine leaves.

RIGHT:

Netherlands
17th century

crystal goblet.
175 cm

high.
by

David
Giles
n 1971 Count

Alberto Marone

Cinzano, of the
family that created

the famous Cinzano vermouth,

decided to start collecting

fine examples of ancient and

antique glass. The collection

was published first in 1974 and

again in 1978 under the title
The

Cinzano Glass Collection,
edited by

Peter Lazarus.

In recent times

the

collection

appeared

have gone from

public view and I

enquired of many

glass people what

had happened to

it. It was suggested

that it had been sold

and dispersed, and in
fact in one recent

London glass auction

catalogue it suggested

that a glass had come

from that collection. After
much searching I was
delighted to discover

that the collection was

still completely intact

and with additional glasses

added after the 1974-
78
publications. What

however had happened

was that the Marone

family sold the vermouth

business in 1992 to an
international drinks

company which
was absorbed

in 1997 into

the

large

British company

Diageo and the collection of

glass was included. Diageo is an
invented name and was created by

a marketing consultancy company,

The name is composed of the

Latin word ‘clia, meaning day,

and the Greek root ‘ged, meaning

world, and is meant to reference
the company giving pleasure every

day, everywhere.

So now the collection is known
as the Diageo Glass Collection.

Diageo actually sold the Cinzano

vermouth label to Campari in
1999

but kept the glass collection. It

was published again in 2005 and

edited by Rosa Barovier Mentasti
under the title ‘Glass Collection
Della Diageo a Santa Vittoria

d’Alba’. The catalogue is now out

of print but can still be obtained

on second-hand books sites.

When the collection was

published in 1974-78 there were

125 pieces in the collection but
after that the Marone family

added more pieces and in the

2005 publication there are 144
pieces featured. The oldest piece

in the collection is a wonderful
5th

century BC obsidian lobed bowl.

There are twenty ancient vessels

of Roman and Frankish origin

and two Islamic glasses. Twenty
Venetian glasses. Lots of glasses

from Holland and Germany and

also from England. Each one is
illustrated with colour plate and

full description in Italian and

English. Eight examples are shown

here.
The collection is now kept at

the Diageo meeting centre in Villa

Storica a Santa Vittoria d’Alba

Italy which is between Turin and

Genoa, It can be visited by prior

arrangement if you email deborah.

[email protected].

Readers might also like to look

at www.diageomeetingcenter-sv.

it/
Enter the site and click on Le

Cantine and you will see how
cleverly the glass is displayed in

cut-out old wine barrels. This

collection might be an idea for a

future visit of the Glass Circle.

David Giles collects ancient glass

and is disposing of his collection of

books on the subject. See
Letters
on

page
3.

Editor’s note:
If other readers

would like to tell us about little-
known collections, we might

alternate the ‘My favourite glass’
page with a ‘Collections’ slot.

LEFT:

German

‘Reichsadler-
humpen’ late 16th

century/early 17th

century. Height
32.5 cm. Enamel
decoration. Coats of

arms and

inscription: The
Holy Roman

Empire
with its

members.

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

LEFT:

English goblet

with twisted stem

1760. Height 15

cm. Lattimo
threads

in
stem.

RIGHT:
Venetian

16th century crystal
glass. Height 18.5

cm. Twisted filigree.

BELOW LEFT:

Roman
1st century

mould-blown

victory beaker.

Height 7 cm.

Inscription reads

‘Seize The Victory:
Very
rare
type as

an inscription is
normally
outside

of the garlands.
However, this

example
has
an

inscription within.
Only three extant

examples known.

BELOW RIGHT:
Venetian Glass

Beaker. Venice

1798-1805. Height

11.4 cm. Enamel
decoration.

The inscription

relates to political
regime changes

1797-1798

Glass Circle News Issue 140 Vol. 39 No. 3

COLLECTIONS

BUBBLE-WRAP

—
NANDANAAA,NNIMA

Packing glass: four layers and a hearse

…O
acking is as old

as travelling and

commerce.

doubt the Romans

lost countless phials on donkeys’

backs. John Greene bemoaned

breakage of the Venetian glasses

he imported to England. Such

problems were a motive for
developing the glass industry in
England and seeking more robust

metal. To reduce loss of valuable

finished products destined for
Europe, Chinese merchants

transported unpainted porcelain

some 600 miles from Jingdezhen
to the port of Guangzhou
(Canton) where painting could

be applied to white porcelain.

Indeed, this porcelain became
known as
guangcai.

More recently

the Blaschkas didn’t blink over

exporting their extraordinarily
fragile glass flowers to the US or
by

Simon
Wain-

Hobson
RIGHT:
Fig. 3

Thistle bowled

baluster goblet with

mushroom knop

BELOW:
Fig. 1

One of the original
packing boxes for

flowers shipped by the
Blaschkas to Harvard

in 1894.

Photograph by Hillel Burger
for the Ware Collection of

Blaschke Glass Models of

Plants, Harvard Photograph
by Hillel Burger for the Ware
Collection of Blaschke Glass

Models of Plants, Harvard

University, Cambridge,
Massachusetts, USA

BOTTOM:
Fig. 2 The

hearse being loaded for

the journey to
Harvard

The Archives of Rudolf

and Leopold Blaschka and

the Ware Collection of

Blaschka Glass Models of

Plants, Harvard University,
Cambridge, Massachusetts,
USA
©Laur
ie

Le
ig
h Ant
iq
u
e
s

Japan by sea and then overland

to the customer. They tied down
each piece with wire in numerous

cardboard boxes, using tissue

paper to cushion the glass and

keep the parts that could not be

wired from moving (fig. 1). Straw

padding was used to isolate the
boxes, and then a layer of burlap

over the entire structure (by this

time the height of a person). But

even then they had to survive
bumpy roads. This provoked

creative juices, notably in the US

where a hearse (fig. 2) was used to
transport Blaschka glass flowers to

the 1976 Steuben Glass exhibition

in New York. It proved an even

smoother ride than a limousine!

BOTAIVICA4, MUSEUM

I DI RAD. In 41,NA FLOWN/AN

AND 9,111-1
,

8
Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

IND

300

4 Layers

250

200
150

50
0
0.00
0.05
0.10
0.15

0.20
0.25
0.30

0.35
0.40

Static load (psi)
BUBBLE-WRAP
© Sea

le
d
Air
C

BELOW:
Fig.

Diagram
of cushion

curves

Dynamic cushioning performance of two, three and four layers of bubble

wrap® PD-230 (1/2″ thickness). Weights were dropped from 30″. Data
are for an average of 2-5 drops

Parcels still get damaged today.

Even with cardboard boxes,

bubble-wrap, polystyrene peanuts

and the like, gorgeous glasses
occasionally return to dust.
According to a major international
freight company, every parcel

experiences the equivalent of one

3o-inch drop (76 cm). On average.

So how should we ship antique
glass, most of which is poorly

annealed? There is probably no

one solution. However, almost
everybody in the antiques
trade uses bubble-wrap, or

BubbleWrap° cushioning to give

its full name. This led to a recent
flurry of emails among some

Glass Circle members. Could

bubble-wrap explode under low
pressure in aircraft cargo bays at

33,000 feet? After all air pressure

outside the aircraft is 3.8 pounds
per square inch (psi), only 26%

of what it is at sea level. Might
peppering by popping plastic

bubbles less than half an inch

from a Georgian baluster damage

it? To increase the angst let’s fix

on a large baluster goblet with a
mushroom knop (fig. 3 opposite).
The air pressure inside

commercial airliners is the
equivalent to that at 6-8,000 feet,

or 77% of atmospheric pressure.

The cargo bays are also at this
pressure. Santa Fe in New Mexico

is at 7200 feet. Glass collector
Dwight Lanmon used to live
there for many years and never

experienced burst bubble-wrap.
The standard vacuum cleaner

can generate a maximum suction

of around 3 psi, the difference in

atmospheric pressure between

Santa Fe and sea level. Turning

a vacuum cleaner onto half-inch

bubble-wrap, the most commonly
used sort for wrapping glass, didn’t

rupture any bubbles. Try it.
More serious depressurisation

is clearly needed. How much?

Sealed Air, the makers of bubble-

wrap have explored the resistance

of bubble-wrap using vacuum
chambers. The bubbles rupture

at an outside pressure equal to
that at 29,000 feet, which is close

to cruising altitude. So our well-

packaged baluster in the cargo

bay can rest in peace; it will not

suffer from popping bubble-
wrap while cruising. In the event
of severe depressurisation at

high altitude the bubbles would

obviously explode. What then? To
use engineering jargon this would

result in catastrophic stress. The

aircraft would be lost.
When at cruising altitude we

are reminded that the outside
temperature is something like

-5oC. Is our baluster being stressed
by large temperature changes?
Like the cabin the cargo bay is

heated. Some parts can be at 4°C

to cater for the shipping of flowers

or perishable goods. Other parts

are like the cabin for animals are

transported in the cargo bay. But

this had to be so. Baggage does
not normally emerge onto the belt

frosty or freezing cold. That bottle

of Margaux meticulously wrapped
in dirty linen never exploded as a

result of freezing.
For those living in remoter

places and who rely on small

unpressurised aircraft like Cessnas,

what then? These generally don’t

fly higher than
12,000
feet so the

bubble-wrap won’t burst. OK, but

the air inside the bubble-wrap

will expand which could pressure
fragile glass, right? The answer is
to be had via Boyle’s law. At these

altitudes atmospheric pressure

is roughly 4o% down on that at

sea level so that the volume of a
bubble will increase by about 6o%.

As bubbles have space around
them this will be taken up and so

the expansion is unlikely to impact

the glass. By the by, this is the same

Robert Boyle of the Royal Society

who wrote about crizzling in 1669,
a detail noted by Colin and Sue

Brain in the third article that was

reproduced and distributed along

with the last Glass Circle News,
issue 141.
Back to bubble-wrap. How does

it protect? How much should be
used? Imagine a one pound weight

wrapped in two layers of the stuff.

We will assume that its lower

surface is approximately 6 square
inches. Its static load would then
be 0.15 psi — or the red spot on

the cushion curve’ for
2

layers of

bubble-wrap (fig. 4). Now drop
it on a flat surface from 3o inches.

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

BUBBLE-WRAP

From the moment the bubble-

wrapped package first touches
the surface to being stopped the

weight undergoes deceleration

in a very short distance and time.

The bubble-wrap is cushioning

the impact. In fact the weight
undergoes deceleration of the

order of 200G — that’s about
200

times greater than the acceleration

due to gravity (G). Take the same

weight and add an additional
layer of bubble-wrap. Obviously

the package is a little thicker.

Maximum deceleration is now
roughly iooG (red square), or

half of that before. Add another

layer and repeat. Maximum
deceleration is approximately 8oG

(red triangle). By this reasoning a
fifth layer is better. However, the

cushion curve becomes shallower

with increasing layers of bubble-

wrap so the gain is less. Four layers

at least would seem to be a good

idea.
As drinking glasses are rarely

more than a pound in weight, and

when packaged have surface areas

easily in excess of to square inches,
this fortunately places them near

the bottom of the curves meaning

that they would undergo minimal

deceleration if dropped. For heavy

studio glass more layers make

sense.

As to the package itself the

advice from Mike Osber, Project
Packaging Engineer with FedEx

Services, is not surprisingly
the double box technique. The

bubble-wrapped glasses should
not be closer than
3

inches to the

cardboard box. That is a 3-inch

layer of polystyrene chips between
the cardboard and the bubble-

wrap. The chips should be piled in
tightly such that ‘you have to fight

to close the box’. If not vibrations

during shipping will cause the

wrapped glass to sift to the bottom
and touch the cardboard box,

which is not good.
Obviously there are several valid

techniques for packaging ranging

from well-heeled transporters to
piping. Cut it to the desired length

and stuff the bubble-wrapped

glass inside. You have a formidable

first package. Stand on the pipe –

it will not give.

From there it is best to pack

it in a cardboard box with poly-

styrene peanuts for the vagaries
in shipping should never be

underestimated. The forces on

a cubic parcel are comparatively

slight if it hits the deck on one
of its surfaces. If it drops on an

edge they are considerably greater,

while if it drops on an apex they
are maximal. Or imagine a forklift

truck missing the wooden pallet

stacked with boxes — the forks
could pierce the one at the bottom

that just happened to be yours.
Even if the trip home is only
45

minutes, someone in the London

Tube could still crash into your
exquisite, yet unfortunately lightly
bubble-wrapped Roman glass

amphora (fig. 5). Put it this way,
bubble-wrap is cheap compared

to the glass and two layers of the

stuff really isn’t enough. Don’t
economise.
Everyone agrees that the glass

should be wrapped first in tissue

paper, preferably acid free. No tape

of any form should be applied. It

is important that the bubble-wrap

does not contact directly the glass
for it may leave an imprint. This

is especially important if the glass

has enamelling or gilt work, since

the bubble-wrap could adhere to,

and remove it. The other issue is
how to secure the bubble-wrap.

Our Chairman remarks, ‘When I

was at Mallett Antiques it was a

sackable offence to use any form
of scotch or sellotape on bubble-

wrap. If tape was used, which was

rare, we used paper-based masking

tape because it is easy to tear off’

The trouble with sellotape is that
people sometimes end up fighting

the packaging, especially if the

bubble-wrap is taut. Becoming

distracted can cause distress to
the contents. So the science of
packaging is one thing, but human

ABOVE:

Fig. 5

A Roman glass

amphora, 1st

century AD

BELOW:
Fig. 6

Stephen Pohlmann’s

sweetmeat
commercial foam packing systems

available but they nearly all need
expensive machinery to operate

— which is beyond most of us.

Dwight Lanmon’s one liner “if

it is valuable take it in the cabin”

is fine especially as bubble-wrap
will not pop at cabin pressure.
Be especially careful when going

through the security check.

There are some simple yet rather

ingenious solutions. Athelny
Townshend’s is to use one eighth
inch (3 mm) thick plastic draining

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

BUBBLE-WRAP

behaviour must be factored in too.
Stephen Pohlmann, the Glass

Circle correspondent who started

the thread, contacted his shipper

in the USA to find out how his

latest acquisition, an opaque twist

sweetmeat (fig.
6
opposite), was

to be sent. The formula was lots

of tissue paper, no tape; several
layers of lightly applied bubble

wrap, not heavily taped; double
cardboard box with styrofoam.

The shipper added, “From that

point getting the items delivered
undamaged is up to a higher

power than I”. Some people don’t

use bubble wrap at all, for example
Frides Lameris of Amsterdam.

Phoenix Antique Art of New

York use cotton wadding instead.
Colin Brain considered that a

bowl rim less than
1
mm thick and

loo mm in diameter (0.04 x 3.9″)

would be subject to uneven loads
and that the tension components

of the bending stresses are likely
to be surprisingly high even for

loads of a few pounds. He notes
that Glass Notes
8
by Arthur

Churchill (December 1948) page
24, advocated soft newspaper.

And that: ‘From a professional

perspective, both Sandra Davison
in her book Conservation and

Restoration of Glass, and Steve

Koob in his book Conservation

and Care of Glass Objects discuss

packing glass for transportation.

Their favoured materials are acid-

free tissue paper and specially cut

foam’.
The above suggestions hopefully

will interest collectors. The ground
rules change when transporting

museum or extraordinary pieces

like the £2-6m Roman cage-cup
on the cover of this edition. Simon

Cottle notes: ‘When I was in the
museum profession we would

always use acid-free tissue as
the first line of protection. Large

sheets folded into z-inch narrow

strips, flattened out, were wound
around the stems of glasses and

the rims of bowls and feet firstly

in a lateral and then horizontal
manner and secured by tucking

in the ends. Once a ball had been

created — the strips would be built

up to even out the surface area —
the whole was wrapped in two or

three further sheets of acid-free

tissue but not taped. Around this

ball we would then wrap a sheet

of bubble wrap forming at least a
double-layer with short pieces of
coloured tape fastening the ends
(but not wrapped around the

whole):
‘We experimented with those

expensive and fancy methods

of flowing foam into a box to

surround the object thus creating

a mould. The object would be
covered in a layer of thin plastic
— similar to a bin liner — and

then the foam squirted into the
box. The method required the

solidified foam to be split in half so
that the object could be removed

safely. Our concerns were that this
process might create a build-up of

heat and/or unnecessary pressure
on the object:
Clearly packaging is com-

mensurate with the value of

the glass. No matter how many

layers of tissue paper and bubble-

wrap, going into an aircraft hold

surrounded by a wooden crate
is going to be safer. The costs of

course are going to be beyond the
reach or practicability of most

collectors. Fortunately when it

comes to bubble-wrap we can be
pretty confident. With four layers

of bubble-wrap, the Blaschkas
wouldn’t have needed a hearse.

Simon Wain-Hobson is Professor of
Molecular Virology at the Institut

Pasteur, Paris. The author thanks

Colin Brain, Simon Cottle, Jane

Dorner, Dwight D. Lanmon,

Stephen Pohlmann, John P. Smith

and Athelny Townshend who made

invaluable comments to the email

conversation from which this article

grew. Bubble Wrap° is a trademark

of Sealed Air Corporation (US).

Editor’s note:
We would like to

hear from readers about their
experience of packaging and

accidents. This might help all of us
in preserving our collections.

BELOW:

Fig. 7

The Constable

Maxwell cage cup,

c. AD 300, sold at
Bonham, in 2004

for £2.6m.10

cm H x 18.2 cm.
See also the cover

picture

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

ALE GLASSES

The collector’s c ilemma: a glass of ale, beer
or champagne?

Fig.1 Greene beer

glasses
c.1670

-n my talk to the

Circle on 12 May,

I focussed mainly

on the type of

English glass that may have been

used to drink strong ale or beer or

champagne between the start of

the English lead glass revolution in

the last quarter of the 17th century
until the end of the 18th century.

During a period of 125 years, the

design of the drinking glasses used

for strong ale or beer changed from

being influenced by the Venetians

to the tall, slender, round funnel
bowl glasses with which readers

are no doubt familiar. I shall look

at the form of champagne glasses

and the controversies surrounding
them a little later in this article.

For the first part of the last

millennium ale was one of

the most popular drinks in
England. Around 1400 hops were

introduced from Europe to give

us the alternative of beer. There

was some resistance to hops at
first. Hops were not easy to grow

but eventually the crop became

established in Kent which had a

suitable climate and soil for this
vine to flourish.

Brewing

Ale is brewed with a high quality
barley known as malting barley

which goes through a roasting

process to produce the malt which

gives the drink its flavour. Much

of the production was brewed in

the home or on the estate with
commercial brewing steadily

increasing as the 18th century

progressed.

Non-commercial

making was often carried out by

women in the home. The brewing

of ale is a complicated process
requiring considerable skill, good

quality ingredients, the right type

of water, temperature control

and careful timing. Brewers yeast
is added to the brew to provide

fermentation and a limited

amount of hops might also be

added.
Brewing beer follows a similar
process but hops were always

added at the end of the cycle to

provide the distinctive taste. The

more hops applied, the darker the
beer. Pale ale however, could be

brewed using a best quality pale

malt.

The main difference between

the two drinks is that ale may

contain no hops but if it does,
it is generally likely to be lightly

hopped whereas beer will always

contain hops and may be darker in

colour than ale. This may explain

the reason for the engraving

of both hops and barley on ‘ale

glasses’.
Ale and beer can be brewed

to give a wide range of alcoholic

content. The strength of the drink

would seem to govern the size of
the glass to hold it.
Identification

To help with identification of
the glass type and drink to fill it,

some of the best evidence in the
latter part of the 17th century
comes from the correspondence

between a London glass seller and

his Venetian supplier. In 1668 the

glass seller, John Greene, wrote to

his supplier Morelli of Murano

and placed a large order for z86
dozen beer glasses. In 1671 some 3o
beer glasses,
20

claret and 6 glasses

for thick beer were ordered. What

thick beer may have been is not

clear but it probably was a beer of

high alcoholic content. Later two
dozen flutes were ordered.
Greene’s correspondence was

accompanied by detailed drawings
(fig. 1) which have been preserved

illustrating the shape of the glass

required. Interestingly in the
letters of John Greene
to his supplier that

I have seen quoted

there is no mention

of an order for ale

glasses, only beer

glasses.
Robert Charleston

scaled some of

Greene’s

drawings

and found the beer

glasses to be 16.5 to 17.3

cm (about 6.5-7 inches)

tall, the claret glasses

being about 2. cm (i in)

shorter.

By the time Ravenscroft

came on the scene beer was

an established drink on a

par with ale. Until recently,

Ravenscroft was considered

to be the founder of the

English lead glass tradition

which, as time went by

introduced a much clearer and

heavier glass than the cristallo

of Venice. Ravenscroft’s 1677

price list included beer glasses

ribbed and plain, weighing 7

oz and costing is 6d each. The

ribbed glasses would have had a

moulded bowl. Beer glasses with

nipped diamond waies weighing

Graham
Vivian

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

ALE GLASSES

8 oz cost is 8d each. The nipping
of the diamond waies would have

required hand work to give the

reticulated
effect.
The weight of a

glass and handwork required was
likely to be reflected in the price.
A montage in Robert

Charleston’s
English Glass

shows

the form these plain and ribbed

beer glasses would have taken.
(fig. 2) As in the case of Greene, I
have not seen any reference to ale

glasses in Ravenscroft’s price lists.

The glasses are somewhat similar

to those ordered by Greene from

Morelli.
Beer and ale were very important

drinks across all societies and were
considered both nourishing and

health giving. From time to time

the drink would be given additives

in the home to increase its

nutrition or to combat a medical
condition i.e. scurvy grass.
Based on an estimated UK

population in 175o of between

6.75 and 7 million persons and a

consumption estimated at about
43 million barrels a year (one bar-

re1=-35 gallons), I calculate that the

average person, including children,
drank about 5 pints of varying

strengths of ale and beer per day.
Types of beer and ale

In the period under review there

were mainly four types of ale and
beer brewed. Strong ale or beer

would have an alcoholic content
of about ii% by volume although
it could be brewed even stronger

when it was known as hum cup

because it might cause a humming
of the head. At the end of the 17th
century strong ale and beer were

probably drunk initially from
short ale glasses and later from
balusters and then from elegant
round funnel bowled glasses. The

nearest equivalent to strong ale or

beer today is barley wine.
Table beer which encompassed

many types and strengths of less

alcoholic beer and ales would have

been drunk from larger vessels

such as tankards or mugs. Small

beer was drunk by the working
classes in considerable quantities

as it was the least expensive of

the various strengths generally

available. There is no reason to

suppose that the better off did not

enjoy this as a thirst-quenching

drink. The alcoholic content of

small beer was thought to be

around 2%.This also would have

been drunk from large tankards or
mugs some with a capacity of up

2
quarts .

Porter was not introduced

until 1722. It reflected the quality

of brown pale or old ale and was

very dark in colour and heavily

hopped. It had a relatively high

alcoholic content. It was popular

with manual workers and London

porters from which it derived its
name.
Glass vessels because of their

expense and particularly their

fragility, would not have been used
for drinking beer or ale by the

working classes.

Champagne

Champagne was introduced to
England in the last half of the

17th century from France. It was
the most costly wine available and

was favoured by the aristocracy
who could afford it. Champagne

was regarded as a sparkling wine

although it was not as effervescent

as the wine that we drink today.
It also had a fair amount of

sediment. It was mainly drunk

from flute-like glasses and poured

from bottles and decanters.
Champagne glasses are the

most difficult to identify because

of their similarity to i8th century

ale or beer glasses. Bearing in
mind the expense of this drink it

would seem reasonable to assume

that a limited number of fine 18th-

century long-stemmed and tall-

bowled engraved glasses would

have survived. In its simplest form

any engraving would probably be
of grapes and vine leaves. I have

not seen such a flute shaped glass

illustrated in any of the leading

books on English i8th century

glass.
As far as the i8th century is

concerned Charleston opts for a

stemmed unengraved ale type of

glass probably with around a 6fl oz
capacity. There is a controversial

view that champagne may have

been drunk from a mead or

sweetmeat type of glass.

Fig.

Ravenscroft

beer glasses
diagrammatic.

c.1677

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

Other factors

In price lists and inventories of

the period under review, drinking

glasses, if described at all, would

generally not be measured by

height. Where a measurement

was given it would relate to the
capacity of the glass normally

from a gill, which is a quarter of a

pint, to
2

quarts which would have

been a massive tankard used to

drink weak ale or beer.
The familiar short stemmed

(fig.
3)
strong ale or beer glasses

range between
14
and 15 cm (5.7-6

inches). The tall stemmed glasses
for strong ale, beer or champagne

range from 17-23 cm
(6.75 -9.2

inches) with the champagne

glasses probably being the tallest.
(figs
4,

5 & 6).

Before the 19th century sediment

was a real problem in alcoholic

drinks particularly strong drinks.

Ale or beer would be allowed to

settle in the barrel before it was

served although it was also served

in decanters. Champagne was

probably purchased in bottles
and when it was safe to do so

served from the bottle, otherwise

decanted.

There were various ways of

dealing with sediment. It could
be visually obscured by moulding

on the lower part of the glass.

The glass could have a pointed
base which would contain the

sediment or the drink could be

filtered or decanted before it was

served. The presence of sediment
affected the shape of the drinking

glass. The taller the bowl the more

space for the sediment to settle at
the bottom of the bowl so it would

not make its presence known until

most of the content had been

consumed.

In the case of beer or ale in

the middle of the 18th century

additives were used to improve

the quality and clarify the brew.

Beer or ale which had no or very

little sediment was known as fine

ale or beer.

Decanting an alcoholic drink

was a convenient way of allowing

the sediment to settle before the
drink was served. Eighteenth

century decanters often had

the name of the drink they were
designed to contain engraved on

the bowl. Alternatively a silver

label was hung round the neck

of the decanter. In the context

of this article the most common

appellation is ‘beer’ with very few
decanters engraved with the word

ale’. This is in line with there being
far more glasses in inventories or

price lists described as beer rather

than ale. It would seem that the

majority of decanters with beer

or ale inscriptions were designed
for strong ale or beer as low

alcohol beer or ale was drunk in

much larger quantities and would

have been drawn straight from the

barrel.

Andy McConnell states in

his book on decanters that

champagne was stored

in glass bottles and

decanters with an

ice pocket in the

bowl was used to
cool the champagne

BELOW LEFT:

Fig 3 Beer or ale

c.1700 (6 fl oz)

Venetian influence.

BELOW RIGHT:

Fig 4 Champagne?

c.1700 (6.5 fi oz)

BELOW FAR RIGHT:

Fig 5 Ale or beer

c.1760 (4.5 fl oz)

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

before serving. From time to time

the bottles exploded as some were
not made of sufficient strength to

contain the effervescence. Andy

quotes the story of the cellarman
walking around in a helmet with a
visor and chain mail body armour
to protect himself.

Cost of alcoholic drinks

Over the period covered by this

article the cost of ale or beer was

affected by duties imposed by the
government and often more so by
the quality and quantity of the

barley harvest which could vary

considerably. In 1675 small ale

purchased by the Russell family

for Woburn Abbey cost 13s 3d per
barrel (280 pints) and strong ale
cost 17s 3d per barrel.
In 168o records of Parliament

state that beer was being brewed

so strong that it cost 4d per
quart and that it burned

like sack. At that time
sack was a term which
applied to any strong

wine imported from
Southern Europe and especially

sherry from Spain.
In 1691 small beer was again

purchased by the Russell family

this time at 7s 3d per barrel which

would give a wholesale price of a
little more than a farthing a pint

while cider cost £3 6s 8d per bar-
rel which would be about
25

iod

a pint. This would put it on a par
with French wine. Around 1720

table and small beers cost between
id and zd per pint .
An interesting window on the

cost of alcoholic drinks enjoyed by
fashionable Society in 1762 comes

from a pricelist published by the
Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens in

London as follows:

Champagne
Burgundy

Claret
ReciPort

Sherry
Cyder

‘rage beer a great mug
Development of ale

glasses and champagne
flutes

In the i7th century the main dis-

tinction between the drinks served

in glasses was reflected in the ca-

pacity of the glass, the largest for

beer, the next size for French wine

and the smallest for Spanish wine.

The capacity rule largely applied
to the 18th century. Other consid-

erations were the alcohol content,

the amount of sediment and to a

lesser extent the colour of the liq-

uid. The higher the alcohol con-

tent the smaller the glass.

A wrythen or engraved or

moulded bowl would disguise

the sediment to some extent. A

tapering or pointed bowl helps

to contain the sediment. A clear

glass, where appropriate, shows
the content to its best advantage.

Coloured drinking glass are used
more for the colour of the glass

than for the visual enhancement

of the liquid they contain.
By the end of the 17th century

and start of the 17oos there had
emerged a tapering glass usually

on a short stem decorated by
mould-blown ribbing. This two-

piece glass was usually called a

short ale and when the bowl was

set directly on the foot, a dwarf

ale. The standard capacity of

theses glasses was generally
4
–
5

A oz which is a reflection of the

strength of the beer or ale for
which they were designed to hold.

The tall narrow bowl could be

mounted on a baluster or other

stem (fig.8) to make a three-piece

glass and later in the century these
might be engraved with ears of

barley and hops. (fig.5) It is not
clear why the tall narrow bowled

ale glass shape for strong ale, beer

and champagne or mead (fig.9

CENTRE:

Fig 8 Ale
or
beer

c.1720(6fioz)

FAR LEFT:
Fig 6

Champagne? c.1780

( 7.5 fl oz)

LEFT:
Fig 7 Tall Ale

beer or champagne

c.1760 (6.5 fi
oz)

a bottle

Ss
25
(d

overleaf) evolved as it did.
At one time it was believed

that glasses with hemispherical

bowls were used for champagne
but Robert Charleston finds no

factual support for this believing

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

ALE GLASSES

Fig 9 Mead glass

c.1765-1775 (4.5

fi
oz)

BELOW:
Fig 10

Sweetmeat or

champagne glass?
c. 1740 (6 fi oz)
these glasses were for sweetmeats

not champagne. Indeed Bickerton

in his book i8th Century English

Glasses must disagree as all
his illustrations of champagne

glasses show the sweetmeat type

of glass as does Harold Newman
in his dictionary of glass (fig. io).

Similarly it is believed that a small

goblet with a hemispherical bowl

commonly called a mead glass

was not made for this seldom

drunk liquor but contrary opinion

suggests that these glasses may
have been used for champagne,
certainly not mead.

On the assumption that

there could be a fair amount of

sediment in champagne, a flute is
much better designed to contain

the sediment at the bottom of

the bowl than a glass with a
hemispherical bowl.

Documentary evidence

In trying to ascertain what types

of early glass were used for beer
the best evidence that I have

obtained was from the drawings
that Greene sent to Morelli and

to some extent those 18th-century

glasses in collections engraved
with barley and hops. Thereafter,
except from a limited number

of paintings and illustrations in

books on drinking glasses, I could

only find written accounts with
minimal descriptions of the types

of glass under consideration from
the price lists and other material

available to me.

Charleston whose opinion

I value highly, shows the i8th-

century champagne glass to

have the form of a tall stemmed

unengraved ale glass with a round

funnel bowl which bears no
resemblance to the tall stemless

flutes of the previous century

with their narrow tall pointed
bowls stretching down to a wide

base. Evidence that champagne

was drunk from flute-like glasses
is demonstrated by a
1773
bill

from Colebron and Hancock

who supplied the historian
Edmund Gibbon with one dozen

champagne flutes for
8

shillings.

Thomas Betts was described

as a glass scolloper and polisher.
Scolloping was the name given to

a glasscutter and polishing prob-

ably applied to the work necessary
to finish glass mirrors. During his

life Betts will have published many

price lists. He refers to green half-
moulded egg-form champagne

glasses which is the green mead
type goblet which supports the

belief that champagne was not

only drunk from flutes in the i8th

century.
Looking at the inventory of the

io,000 glasses that was made after

he died in 1765 it is interesting to
note that there are many varied

glasses described to contain beer
but none specifically for ale.

Whereas for champagne there

were plain flutes, half moulded

glasses presumably to obscure
the sediment and air twist gilded

glasses.

The household accounts of the

Duke of Bedford discussed by

Julia Poole in the Glass Journal no

II are a rich source of information

on i8th century ale and beer

glasses. The only champagne flutes

acquired were purchased in Paris.
The information in the Duke’s

Household Accounts does not

support the view that by the
mid 18th century the distinction

between ale and beer glasses had
ceased to exist, as both types are

listed, yet in practice, this may well
have been the case.

Conclusion

My talk dealt principally with the

drinking glasses for strong ale or

beer which would have an ix% or

greater alcoholic content. In the

18th century, in particular, the

distinction between ale and beer
had become blurred. Contrary

to what many believe ale could

contain hops in the brew whereas

beer always contained hops. From

the last half of the 17th century to

the end of the 18th century there

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

ALE GLASSES

appears to be more emphasis on
the beer appellation than ale as far

as drinking glasses are concerned.

This is supported by the fact that
there are many more decanters
engraved ‘beer’ than ale extant

today.
Strong beer as well as ale was

almost certainly drunk from the
dwarf and short stem ‘ale’ glasses

at the end of the r7th century.
The long stemmed and long

bowled glasses that followed

were of a form that could equally
be used for champagne, mead

or cider glasses. The capacity of

strong ale or beer glasses would
vary between approximately

4
and
6
fl oz. It is probable that

glasses engraved solely with barley

stems and those engraved with
hops in addition were used for

both strong ale and beer. In many

cases glass sellers would appear
to distinguish their glasses and

decanters by engraving as far as ale

and beer are concerned.
The term champagne flute in the

mid i8th century did not signify

a tall narrow pointed funnel
bowled glass placed on a hollow

ball knop above a folded foot. The

shape of champagne flutes was

derived from the long stemmed

ale glasses of this period (fig. iz).
A typical champagne glass would

have a capacity of
6-7

fl oz. It has

changed very little today. Because

of the cost and limited availability

of champagne, relatively few

glasses specific to this drink would
have been produced. Champagne

glasses may also have been
engraved or decorated in manner
that would identify the drink the

glass would contain. i.e. vine leaves

and grapes.
There is a body of opinion
that champagne was not drunk

from sweetmeat-styled glasses
but may have been drunk from a

goblet with a part moulded bowl

referred to as a mead glass (fig. 11).

Whatever the designation of the

glass I still believe that in the long
stemmed, long bowled glasses of
the i8th century we have some of
the most attractive and affordable

glasses that a collector may place

in his cabinet.

This is an abridged version of a

lecture Graham Vivian gave to
the Glass Circle on 12 May 2016.

The co-hosts were Maurice and
Margaret McLain, David Giles and
Lawrence Trickey

Graham Vivian is a glass collector

and Committee member of the

Circle. The majority of illustrations

of glasses are from his collection.

BELOW LEFT:

Fig 11 Betts-type

champagne glasses

c1750

BELOW:

Fig 12 Modern

champagne left, Ale

beer or champagne?
glass right c 1750

(6.5 fl oz)

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

Tales from the

glasshouse

tg
–

t was after taking

the Kiln Club

in Scotland on a
tour of the Alloa

Glassworks that Dr Jill Turnbull,

the author of two books on the
history of Scottish glass, remarked

that she was surprised, with all the

modern technology and the purest

of raw materials, that anything

could go wrong these days in the

manufacture of glass. This was

just prior to my retirement from
the United Glass Company, where

I had spent all my working life,

completing my career by running
this massive factory, one of the

largest glass container factories in
the World.

Admittedly today’s glass

manufacture can in no way be as
hit and miss as the early glass-

making enterprises, but it does

have its moments. On the
(thankfully) rare occasion we
ever had a complaint from a

customer over the quality of
our bottles and prior to a

review meeting concerning

the complaint, I always

took the customer on a

tour of the plant. From

what could have been a
difficult situation they

invariably came back
by

Mike

Noble

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

Glass Circle News Issue H2 Vol.No. 3
GLASSHOUSES

full of awe at the complexity of the
operation and, might I say, at the

amount of control we did actually
maintain over the processes. On

more than one occasion I did

humbly suggest that making glass

bottles was perhaps more difficult

than making whiskey, gin, vodka

etc., a sentiment they invariably

did not dispute.
However problems, often

serious and costly, did sometimes

arise, four of which I will narrate
here.
The first that springs to mind

is when the glass turned slightly

green in our white flint furnaces in

Alloa. It was a Monday morning

when, arriving at work, I was

met by a delegation of people

informing me that ‘the glass has

gone off’ We were at the time

producing well over a million
white flint bottles per day in the
factory, predominantly for the

spirit companies whose demand

for a pure clear non-coloured glass

was an absolute requirement. They

wanted the colour of their liquor
to be show-cased by the bottle and

not offset by a slight tinge of green

in the glass, which we were then

unfortunately producing.
Assembling the appropriate
team we set about trying to

identify what had gone wrong, how
to put it right, and how to handle

the current situation? Was there

too much or poorly processed

recycled cullet, had there been

some cross-contamination of the

green and white batches, or was it

one of the raw materials that was

out of specification. In addition
we had the problem of what we

should do with the glass being
produced; carry on producing and

throw it away or pack it off for

later culleting, or stop production

and let the furnaces idle without

getting the contaminated glass out

of the system. All very difficult
choices.
The immediate actions involved

sending samples of all the raw

materials and glass to a couple of

laboratories for analysis, which

would take two or three days to

complete; take out all the recycled

cullet; post people on the batch

conveyors on a 24-hour basis
to make sure there was nothing

untoward happening there; get

in touch with all the raw material

suppliers to find out if they had

any problems and to send their

analysis, and lastly and most
importantly to keep our fingers
crossed.

The following day nothing had

changed. Taking the recycled glass

out had had no effect, there was

nothing adverse to report on the

batch conveying systems, and the

suppliers had confirmed all their

materials were in specification.

In other words they were saying

`not me guvr I could almost have

believed them if it were not for
the fact that we were throwing
hundreds of tons of glass away.This

certainly keeps the mind focussed.
The glass analysis did finally come
back shortly after lunch time. We

had too much iron. That then

eliminated anything to do with

cross contamination where green

glass contains chromium and not
iron as a colourant.
It was at this stage that I made

an executive decision, i.e. one
based purely on instinct and

not on fact. It was the sand. The

quarry was located about fifteen

miles away and so I went there

and actually watched the sand
being analysed by a small portable

x-ray fluorescence machine. The

foreman at the quarry thought I

had gone mad when everything

still showed to be in spec. but I just

could not believe it.
What then followed was a

stand-off with the quarry manager
who refused point blank to move

to a different part of the quarry

as I requested. I could fully
understand his position. The XRF
results were satisfactory and to

move all his heavy equipment, take

off the top soil, and start on a new

area of the quarry was something
not to be done lightly. However….

Sand from the new part of

the quarry started to arrive later

that evening substituting what I

considered to be ‘bad sand: The
following day there was some

improvement of the glass and

results from the two laboratories,

although differing between
themselves, showed the iron

content in the sand to be between

o To% and
0,15%,
the results from

OPPOSITE LEFT:

Alloa Cone works

BELOW:
United

Glass (UG) Harlow

factory in 1996

GLASSHOUSES

the quarry showing only
0.04%,

which was what it should be, the

higher level being enough to give

the glass a green tinge.

I never did bottom out why

the portable XRF machine gave

such spurious results. Perhaps

some technowhizz out there
has a theory, but certainly at our
round up meeting all the glass

technologists did not have an

explanation. It took a week to get

back to normal, and I really would

not like to say how much the whole
episode cost, but it certainly ran

into tens of thousands of pounds.
My second story concerns the

United Glass factory in Harlow

which I ran just prior to Alloa. At
the time amber beer bottles were

the main focus of production,

and suddenly and for no apparent

reason we started getting seed or

small bubbles in the glass from

certain forehearths. A forehearth

is a channel ten or more yards

long, about a yard wide and
contains about four inches of

glass. Its purpose is to transport
the glass at a high level from the

furnace to above the bottle making
machine while at the same time

homogenising the temperature.
At its end there is a rotating

refractory cylinder called a sleeve
which controls the flow of glass

into the machine. Through the

centre of this a needle pumps up

and down and pushes the glass

through orifice holes in the form

of gobs. These are then cut into

pieces by shears, and the gobs

are directed into the machine

by troughs and deflectors.

Although difficult to describe

here, the system is most elegant

in operation, with the gob of

glass being controlled to within a
couple of degrees centigrade, and

each gob weighing not more than

a couple of grams from each other.

The bubbles, when they existed,

could be seen when looking

down into the sleeve, something
not easy to do bearing in mind

temperatures of around Imo
degrees centigrade. This totally

baffled me, as it did many experts,

some of whom came from various

parts of the world to help resolve

the problem, and all of whom

thought it was connected with the

glass or furnace in some way.
One of the characteristics

associated with the bubbles was

a very fierce heat coming up
from the sleeve, even though the
temperature readings from the

thermocouples were showing

normal. An American forehearth
expert who was visiting the factory

for something quite different took

a look at the operation for me and

asked ‘why is your race cooling set

so high?’

I had never heard of race

cooling before, but apparently
it was the cooling applied to the

ball bearings in the race that

allowed the sleeve to rotate, and
was cooled by compressed air. The
pressure should have been fixed at

iopsi but, in this case, a pressure of

ioopsi was being applied.
On questioning the engineers

responsible, they said that they

had been having problems with

the race occasionally sticking

and that they had increased the

pressure to keep it cooler to

stop this happening. Once the
correct settings had been applied

the problem not unexpectedly

suddenly stopped. They never,

it has to be said, increased the
pressure ever again!
My third tale again concerns

seed or bubbles in the glass,
but this time originating in the

furnace.

Because certain Scottish spirit

companies are so particular about

glass colour, particularly when

bottles for their premium brands

are being produced, no recycled
cullet, which does have a slightly

detrimental effect to the colour,

was used.
The problem was that when

the cullet was taken out, with

a corresponding increase in

furnace temperature, seed started
to appear, which took an awful

amount of jiggery-pokery to sort

out. This was usually done by
substituting bottle bank cullet
with much better cullet from our

own off-ware, which was usually

in pretty short supply.

As the campaigns for these high

quality premium products came

and went so the problem continued

to persist, and it was not until one
of our furnace-men, teasers in old

language, spotted a single black
particle in the batch that we finally

BELOW:

Amber beer

bottle production

2003. UG’s

investment
in
high

speed production

technology was

coupled with
investment
in

quality control and

engineering skills.

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

GLASSHOUSES

ABOVE:
Clear spirit

bottle production

2001. All bottles
produced at UG

Alloa were visually

and automatically

inspected to identify

any defects quickly.

resolved the problem.

It transpires that certain

deposits of sand contain a very

small proportion of a carbon
particle called lignite, a substance

I had never come across before.

It appears in such small amounts,
parts per million, that it is

virtually impossible to detect, and

who, after all, would have thought

something so inconsequential

would have such a large impact.
We probably still had our fingers
crossed from the previous problem
because it was certainly luck, and

of course a very observant furnace-
man, that resolved that problem.

Once lignite had been identified,

we kept a pretty close watch on the

sand afterwards.

My final story concerns a very

young and naïve me, and how my

career in the glass industry was

almost terminated permanently.
My first job when I moved

to the Harlow factory from the

relatively calm atmosphere of the

central laboratory in St Albans

was as their batch and furnace
manager. The batch plant, where

all the raw materials are stored,

weighed, mixed and transported
to the furnaces, was very old at
the time and took an awful lot of

looking after.
One problem concerned the raw

material soda ash, which is prone

to pick up moisture and become

solid. We had large silos about

fifty feet high to store the material,

and occasionally some hard lumps

of soda which had formed on the

sides of the silo would fall off the
wall and restrict the exit at its base.
On one occasion I was fed up with

a particularly hard lump of soda

ash which was restricting the flow

so severely that it was virtually
impossible to operate.

I therefore decided to go inside

the silo from the top, being

lowered the fifty feet on a bosun’s

chair, and break the material up
using a sledge hammer. As I say I

was very young at the time.
Anyway I had the riggers
fit up the chair from a tripod

contraption at the top, and they

would then lower me down to the

silo floor. To co-ordinate the effort

a graduate trainee from head office

who happened to be on site as part
of his training was put in charge

of this side of the operation. I

was lowered down by the riggers,

broke up the lump of soda ash,

and shouted to the top to haul me

back up.
I was steadily raised until a

couple of yards from the top when a

plaintive voice criedl can’t hold you!’

‘Don’t panic’ I retorted ‘DONT

PANIC! just lower me down

slowly; keeping my voice as calm
as possible, and without the use

of any expletives I might add. It

appears that the riggers, sensing

it was near tea time and having
become rather bored, had decided

to go off for a break leaving the

graduate trainee, who was even
younger than me, to look after

things. When I shouted to be

lifted up he foolishly decided to
undertake the task himself rather
than interrupt the riggers. When

the tea break was finally over they

came back, raised me up, and all

was well. That was something

I never did again, the graduate
trainee received a number of choice

words as part of his training, and

yes, I did live to tell the tale.

Mike Noble has been a glassman

throughout his working life. Having
obtained an honours degree in phys-

ics, he joined the UK Company of
United Glass, at their research and

development establishment in St Al-

bans to set up an x-ray fluorescence
and diffraction analytical section.

His first factory position was as the
Batch and Furnace Superintendent

at United’s Harlow factory in Es-

sex, becoming the Factory Manager

there in the early 1990s. By the end of

the decade he was managing Alloa

Glassworks in Scotland. Since that

time he has been kept fully occupied

by researching his book
Eighteenth

Century English Glass and its An-

tecedents:
see review on page

26.

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

The noppr,v1

GLASS HOUSES

Some \ewcastle glass houses in 1793

V11
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Op
n 15 March 1983,

Dr. Catherine Ross
resented a paper to the

Glass Circle:
The Flint

Glasshouses on the Rivers Tyne and

Wear during the 18th Century,
based

on the work in her PhD thesis’. Her

paper, as she acknowledged, used

as its basis two papers published
by Francis Buckley in 1925
2
and

1926′. This was later published in

The Glass Circle Journal
No. 5. This

paper emphasised the importance

of bottle glass production and

sheet (broad) glass production in
Newcastle and also mentioned the

relatively small production of flint
(table) glass. She also questions
the then accepted view that most

‘Newcastle style glasses were made
in Newcastle, as proposed by Thorpe

in 1923. We now know that these

were produced in large quantities

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

411 Ng Mill ‘With

7
774sTraZoTgrore..17/ZrairaVoi;;;;M=Vales
earearariarraniZZVW=”4

a
kaw

4M.1•111.141/PIIIIP.M….

John P
Smith

OPPOSITE TOP:
The Corning

Museum of
Glass’ pen and

watercolour
plan

showing Newcastle’s

glasshouses.

OPPOSITE
BOTTOM:

The Newcastle

Broad and
Crown

Glass Company.
Left glasshouse,

`The Middle Broad

House; right

glasshouse ‘The
Eastern Broad

House:

ABOVE RIGHT:
Mrs Catherine
Henzell and
Company’s

Bottlehouse

RIGHT:

Unidentified

glasshouse off the
plan
to the west,

probably ‘The

Western House’
GLASS HOUSES

in the Low Countries. However it
is interesting that in the review of
Nostetanger glass in
Glass Circle

News
140 pp26 mention is made

of a James Keith who came from
Newcastle and designed ‘Newcastle

style glasses for his new employers.
Late in 2o15 the Corning Museum

of Glass purchased a very large
(129 cm x 76 cm) watercolour and
ink drawing: A plan of the middle
& eastern broad glasshouses &
premises belonging to the N(ew)

castle and Cr(ow)n Glass Company’

with ‘A SW perspective view of the

low glasshouses: Signed Robert
Turnbull 1793.4
This has two sections, a plan of

the glassmaking area by the quay

in Newcastle, and a quayside view
from across the river. It is confusing

that the plan and the sketch do not

line up.
The plan shows the two

glasshouses of the company
commissioning the drawing, ‘a &

just to the left of centre of the plan,
and on the very far left of the plan

the’Western Broad Glasshouse’, and

above it the ‘Ms Catherine Henzell
& Company’s Bottlehouse:
The smaller illustration, although

water stained, shows very clearly ‘a’

& `I’ the ‘Middle Broad Glasshouse’
and the’Western Broad Glasshouse’,

None of the glasshouses shown are

built around a cone, as might be
expected, but have large rectangular

chimneys. At this time, before the

large scale introduction of canals,
all glasshouses were built near the

waterside, all the raw materials were
imported by sea, and the bottles and

window glass exported by the same
method.

References

i. The Development of the Glass Industry
on the Rivers Tyne and Wear 1700-

1900.
Unpublished PhD thesis,

University of Newcastle 1982.

2:Glasshouses on the Wear in the 18th

Century:
Transactions of the Society of

Glass Technology,
Vol. 9

1925

3:Glasshouses on the Tyne in the 18th

Century’.
Transactions of the Society of

Glass Technology,VoLio
1926

4.
CMGL

146905

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol.
39 No. 3

18TH CENTURY TABLE SETTINGS

Falmouth lunch party 1788

John P.
Smith
ABOVE:

Table set for

meat and

fish — with

side detail

LEFT

hen the Glass

Circle visited

The Netherlands a few

years ago, we visited the
Gemeentemuseum in

The Hague where Jet

Pijzel-Dommisse kindly

took us to the museum’s
basement where she

had assembled some of

the finest items of the

museum’s glass for us to

see and handle. In 2015

Jet curated a wonderful

exhibition concerning

dining in The Nether-

lands over the centuries,

with over 20 tables
displaying how the dif-

ferent classes ate over the

last 500 years. The tables

were laid with contem-
porary items. At least

two Dutch families had
to eat in a different room

for the duration of the

exhibition as the entire

contents of their dining
rooms had been trans-

ported to The Hague.

Jet edited a book to go

with this exhibition’, il-

lustrating a sketch in the
Rijksmuseum, Amster-

dam’ This drawing, from

a series of sketchbooks’,

was done by Jan Brandes

(1743-1808), who trav-

elled the world sketching
what he saw: flora, fauna,
topography and cus-

toms. In 1778 he visited

Falmouth and, as well as

sketching several views

of the town, he pro-
duced a plan of a lunch

he attended given by a

Consul Dowes, of whom
I have been unable to

find any information.
Many towns and villages

in England have been

depicted by artists in

the i8th century but this

sketch, is, in my experi-

ence, unique. We have

documentary evidence of

eating habits in the UK

in the i8th century, but
not in this detail.

At this period service

was a la
Francaise,
that

is, all the food was placed
on the table for guests
to help themselves, first

the soup, meats and fish,

and then the table was

cleared for the dessert.

No glasses were on the
table during the meat

course. It was not until
the early 19th century

that service
a
la Russe

was introduced into
polite society, and even
then its acceptance was

slow. In service
a
la Russe

dishes of food were not
placed on the table, but

on a sideboard and the
4

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

18TH CENTURY TABLE SETTINGS

ABOVE:
Table set for

dessert

BELOW:
Opaaue

twist wine

flute c.1765

BELOW:

Silver wine

label

servants would have

offered food to each

guest by standing by

them with the dish while

they helped themselves,

or the plate would have
been given to the guests

already laden;’plated up’

as we would

say today. This
left plenty of

space on the table
for glasses and, as

toasting and drunk-

enness had by then

gone out of fashion,
different appropriate

wines could be served

with each course, in the

correct’ shaped glass,

and sipped throughout
the meal.
Jet has very kindly

provided translations for

the captions in the two I

sketches.

1
2,

The central caption 1
–

reads: ‘The layout of the

meal in Falmouth at the c
)

(home) of Consul Dow-

es’. To the right are two

drawings of items which

appealed to Brandes.

The upper says:These

slippers were placed at
the door (of the house)

of the Consul, with

beautiful needlepoint’.

And below:Tron

clogs which
the women
used to walk on; across

the foot there is a belt’.

To the left the cap-

tions read:’Little buffet

with bread in a basket,
oil and vinegar, jug for
beer, glasses and wine’…

`these we had to ask the
male servant

for; and beneath

clever servant, all

done quietly and

quickly’.
The names of

the guests are on the

napkins, with Brandes

centre bottom, Consul

Dowes two to his left,

and’old English misses,

mother of the Consul’

two places to his right.
Note that the table has a

joint of meat, fish, salad,
sauces and salt, a bread

roll to the left on the

(clean) table cloth and

spoon, fork and knife to

the right.
If any guest needed a

drink they would have
to ask the servant who

would hand them a
full glass, (quietly and

quickly) wait while they
emptied it, and return it

to the buffet.
The lower drawing, ti-

tled’The Dessert; shows

the table com-
pletely cleared,
possibly a new tablecloth

used, (often the table

cloth was just removed

to reveal the shining
mahogany wood beneath

during the dessert).

The table is laid with

butter, cream, preserved
cherries, (in sugar?), jelly

of berries, oranges and

sweet almond pastry.
Water glasses are on the

table and also a small

wine glass for each

,
c

person. Two decanters

are shown, one for wine, c
2
1

the other for rum, and

decanter is’a

wine bot-

tle with

a silver

label and

chain’.

The

servant
would often

have left

the room

by now,

enabling the

guests to

gossip indis-
creetly among

themselves while helping

themselves to dessert

(the artist has forgotten
to provide spoons). The

glasses are small because
the wine was not for
sipping but for toasting,

which required empty-

ing the glass in one go;
not to empty it was an

insult. Guests became

very adept at suggesting
toasts: `To your Wife’:

‘Success to your fishing

fleet’; ‘May your harvest

be good’;’May your

daughter have many chil-

dren — the options were
endless and many hosts

would be offended if
their guests left the table

sober. We know all this

from the literature of the
period, but seeing it in
pen-and-ink and

drawn in such
detail by a

foreigner

is a bo-

nus — only

a foreigner

would bother

to sketch out

something so
obvious to an

Englishman.

Notes

1.
Nederland

dineert. Vier eeuwen

tefelcultuur. 2015 Ed Jet

Pijzel-Dommisse.

2. Maalttijdt inrigting in
Falmouth by de Consul

Dowes. Jan Brandes

(1743-1808). Rijks-
musuem, Amsterdam

NG-1985-7-2-52

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

REVIEWS

Book reviews

Eighteen Century

English Glass and its

antecedents:

A documentary History

of Glassmaking from

Post Medieval England

until the beginning

of the Industrial
Revolution.

Michael Noble

Published by the

author, 2016

Publishhed price £65.
Discounted price for

members £58 +

p&p. ISBN 978-1-

5262-0357-1 Hard

back, A4, 436 pp

R
A

ichael Noble used

I V I to make glass,

indeed he was factory
manager of the largest

glasshouse in the UK,
and he is a scientist by
training, so he does

understand the subject!

(See page zo.)
For many years

Michael’s historical

interest had been

porcelain but his focus
changed to include glass.

Since his retirement in
zoos Michael has been

touring England with
note book and camera

visiting where possible

all the glass making sites

extant and all sources of
local history. Fortunately
for him glassmakers were

often litigious or prone
to bankruptcy so many

legal records also survive.

The book is divided

into three parts:-

•
London Glasshouses,

before and after the

Restoration.

•
Provincial glasshouses.

•
Glass production.

His cut off date is

around, or a little later

than the start of the 19th

century. After this time
factory records are more

accessible and pattern
books survive so this

period has been well
covered by other authors
with the rise of Victorian

glasshouses.

A total of 570

glasshouses are

considered in some

detail, and others

mentioned in passing.
zzo pages are devoted

to provincial glasshouses,
divided into South,

Central and North of
England. In the South

there are 44 in the

Weald, s8 in Bristol

and iz other sites. The
Central area lists 57

glasshouses plus 17 in the

Stourbridge area. The

North has
22
plus 9 in

Newcastle.
Around Too pages are

devoted to the 35 London

glasshouses, with maps,

notes on what was

produced in them, the

raw materials used,
the different types of

furnace, and production
methods.
There is a curious

timelessness in reading

this book. To take
one example, Michael,

writing about Bristol

glasshouses, in particular

about the Temple Gate
glasshouse of Ricketts &

Co (of bottle fame) and

the Avon Street, Great

Gardens glasshouse of

Isaac Jacobs (of gilding

fame) quotes the local

guide of 1819:-
Those
of our readers

who are curiously
inclined, would be highly

gratified with a visit to

Messrs. Ricketts and Co’s

Temple Gate, and Mr.

Jacobs, Great Gardens,
where strangers are

permitted to view the

same. On entering the
glasshouse, the stranger

will be surprised with
the apparent confusion

and intermixture of the
men and the boys, all

crossing and re crossing

each other, but each
moving in his proper

sphere, with the glass,

which they call metal, at

the end of their irons, in

its fluid state: some are

collecting the metal to be

blown: others blowing it

into various shapes: after

which it is finished by
the best workmen. When

the piece of glass is

finished and has assumed

consistence enough
to maintain its form,

it is conveyed at a red
heat into the annealing

furnace or lear, which has

nearly the same heat as

itself, through which it

is drawn down by slow

degrees till it becomes

gradually exposed to
the temperature of the

atmosphere.

‘Health and safely’ no

longer permits such free
movement in the UK but

those of us who visited

the Czech Republic will
recognize this scene

exactly. This quotation is
typical of the quotations

that pepper this book.
A enormous amount

of contemporary

information is slipped

in to each glasshouse

section, depending on
the information available,
costings, stock levels,

excavated examples

of glass, archeological
drawing of excavations

of glasshouse site,
together with Michael’s
photographs, old prints,

plans and maps. The

effect of changes in

taxation, the War tax

and excise duty are also
covered.

The last section, Glass

Production, has been

written by someone who
has actually done it, and

covers glasshouse and

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

DYNAS

RUI LDE
ibe Hidden
Samuel Car
Founder

and
REVIEWS

furnace design as well as
manufacture.

This book has

thousands of end notes,
a testament to the

amount of work that
has gone into it, but no

index, which at times is a

pity, but understandable

as there is so much
indexable material in

this book that an index

might have taken up

5o further pages in this
book, and thousands of

man hours.

This is not a book

which will help

collectors identify their

glasses, that is not its

aim, but it will help

them understand how
they were made, and also

where that might have
been.

It has been said that

you are never more than

zo feet away from a rat
in England, which may,

or may not, be true but
this book shows that in
England you are never

more that 5o miles away

from the site of a former

glasshouse, although
usually a bottle or

window glass site, both

being absolutely essential

to the life and comfort

of any English man from

the middle ages onwards.

Don
‘
t be put off by

the length of this book.

It may be the first book

to comprehensively

cover glass making of
this period in England
but it is written in such

a readable style that it
will appeal to a wide

audience, historians,

academics, professionals,
collectors and students,

as well as those with just

a passing curiosity to

learn more about how
and where early glass was
made and the triumphs

and tribulations of the

glassmakers.
John P Smith
The Dynasty Builder:

The Hidden Diaries of

Samual Cox Williams,

Founder of Stevens and

Williams

David Williams-

Thomas
Brown Dog Books

2016, Lao (Amazon)
ISBN 97
8-1-
7
8
545
–

I07-2

Paperback, 510 pp

I
have just been

reading

I
The Dynasty Builder,
just

published, written by Da-
vid Williams-Thomas, the

last managing director of

Royal Brierley Crystal Ltd

(the final name of Stevens

and Williams). The moti-
vation to write this book

was to publish for the first

time dairies written by the

founder of Stevens and

Williams between 1869

and 1883, and at the same
time give a history of the

company in the context

of the Stourbridge area.

The diaries are published

verbatim.
Samuel Cox Williams
was no Pepys or Alan

Bennett. There are few

personal thoughts and

much of the diary is made
up of lists of monies in and

out, meetings attended,

gifts received and given,
and trips out, both with

his family and company

jollies, what management
consultants would now call

‘
bonding exercises!

The diaries give a great

insight into co-operation

between the different
manufacturers, what we

would now call
‘
price fixing;

and the regular battles
between the unions and

employers. Glass mak-

ing was a highly paid and
highly skilled craft. It

took at least seven years

to become a glass-blower,

starting as an apprentice,

and many more years
to become a good one.

Cutting was learned more
quickly but was still highly

skilled. The unions kept

a very tight grip on the
industry, to advantage their
members, and were rich
enough to enable them to

finance prolonged strikes.

Black Country cussed-

ness on both sides did

not help either. Because

Stevens and Williams had

good industrial relations,

particularly with one very

large family of glassmak-

ers, strikes affected Stevens

and Williams less than
many. If an industry wide

strike was called this

family continued to work

as they were already being

treated better than what

the strikers were aiming

for.

The unions were deter-

mined to keep machinery

out of the factories, as this

would be to the detriment

of their members, and the
owners were not too keen
either, so pressed glass was

introduced in non glass-

making-union areas such

as Manchester, which had
no background in table

glass manufacture.

The diaries give costings

for the running of the

factory, and lists of what

was made, and how much,
their dealing with the

Northwood family and
notes of glass made for,

and bought from, other
factories. It is unwise to

assume that a product sold

by a manufacturer was

necessarily made by that
company, companies often

bought in what they could

not make for reasons of

capacity or skill. The word

‘
manufacturer
‘
has misled

many a decorative arts
scholar, it did not mean

‘
maker:

The understanding

of the 325 pages of diary

are greatly helped by the

175 pages of commentary
and gloss provided by the

author, who has worked

for the company all his life
until its closure and is fully

aware of his family history

and traditions.
John P Smith

Glass Circle News Issue 142 Vol. 39 No. 3

SUNDAY

26 FEB

CAMBRIDGEGLASSFAIR.COM

Diary

Circle meetings

Held at the Art Workers

Guild. 6 Queen

Square,
WCIN 3AT
7.15.

Sandwiches from 6.30

p.m. Guests are welcome
(there is a charge of

£10 for members, Eiz
for members of related

societies and £15 for

guests).

Tuesday 13 December

Suzanne Higgott:
Edward William

Cooke (1811-1880),
English Marine Artist,

Diarist and Collector:

The Formation
and Dispersion of

his Venetian Glass

Collection

Thursday 16 March

Jill Turnbull

From Goblets to

Gaslights, the rise and

decline of the Scottish

glass industry

Monday 13 April

Mike Noble

The invention of Flint

Glass and other Patents

Thursday 18 May

Anna Moran

Irish glass

dtvivic,t

SMITH

I
fevi
frJ

WITII COMPLIMENTS

2 WEST A 9 THORPENESS, LEISTON9 SUFFOLK 1P16 4NF TEL: 0172 452 398
42 VESPA 0AD9 LONDON W12 gal 4l TE +20 S735 0318

CELL PHONE: +7725 4:i9 727 E
–

MAIL: JOHN SMI@GLO ALNET:CO.UK

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Glass Circle News_No.142, Dec 2016

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