The Drama of Glass Part 2

Do you remember the roaring furnace a hundred feet high, the melting pots made of the clays of the Old and the New Worlds, mixed by the bare feet in order that they have the requisite consistency? The products of this factory were born of fire. The plastic molten ma.s.s that came from the melting furnace, with its heat of 2200 degrees Fahrenheit, was thirty hours before a mixture called by gla.s.s makers a "batch," whose chief ingredient was sand from the hills of Ma.s.sachusetts.

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Did you watch the workmen--the "gatherer" and the "blower," with their long, hollow iron pipes? How the "blower," with his trained fingers, gave an easy, constantly swaying motion to the pipe, into which he blew and expanded the hot gla.s.s at its end? The tempering oven, through which all gla.s.s productions must pa.s.s before they will resist changes in temperature or even stand transportation? Did you follow the process of cutting gla.s.s; see the wheels like grindstones, driven by steam power?

Wheels of stone that come from England and Scotland, and carry with them the old-country names of Yorks.h.i.+re Flag, New Castle and Craigleith, stones that are very hard and close-grained, capable of retaining a very sharp edge? Wheels of iron, which are used to cut the design in the rough; wheels of wood, cork, felt, and revolving brush wheels, used in finis.h.i.+ng and polis.h.i.+ng? Did you know that the trained eye of the cutter and his experience were the only guides he had to secure the requisite depth to his cutting; that he must exercise great care and judgment, else the vibration of the gla.s.s renders it extremely liable to break, and that an intricate design requires many days of constant manipulation?

Did you watch with interest the making of gla.s.s cloth, see how the thread of gla.s.s was drawn out and wound on the big wheels that revolved hundreds of times a minute? How the gla.s.s thread was woven with the silk thread, producing a pliable gla.s.s cloth of soft sheen and l.u.s.tre, that could be folded, pleated and handled in all ways like cloth?

Do you recall the Crystal Art Room? Did you realize that under that ceiling, bedecked with ten thousand dollars' worth of spun gla.s.s cloth, was collected the finest display of cut gla.s.s the world had ever seen?

Do you remember an old gla.s.s punch bowl, used in 1840 by Henry Clay, and that near this relic of ancient gla.s.sware was another punch bowl upon which five hundred dollars' worth of labor had been bestowed?

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Did you mark the difference, the deep and brilliant cuttings, how effective they were, how they brought out the beauty and richness of the design? Then, when you examined the hundreds of other articles, the sherbet and punch gla.s.ses in Roman shapes, the quaint decanters in Venetian forms, the celery trays, flower vases, and the ice-cream sets and cut-gla.s.s dishes for every use, you saw the clearness of the gla.s.s itself, and that this deep and brilliant cutting of perfect design, that brought out the beauties of the great punch bowl, was a marked characteristic of the Libbey Cut Gla.s.s. Did you not, as an American, feel proud of the progress that your countrymen had made in this old art of gla.s.s making?

Since the World's Fair at Chicago, two expositions of the industries of this country, the San Francisco Midwinter Fair and the Atlanta Exposition, have added to the honors and reputation of the cut gla.s.s of the Libbey Company. Certain trade-marks and names on silver and china are always looked upon with pleasure and with a feeling that the possessor has the genuine article.

The same thing applies to cut gla.s.sware, so as a protection to the public against those who would profit by the reputation of others, the Libbey Gla.s.s Company cut their trade-mark--the name Libbey with a sword under it--upon every piece of gla.s.s they manufacture.

Half a century in the life of America has added much to the art upon whose brilliant crest, as Miss Field has said, may be found the splendid quarterings of Egypt, Rome, Venice, Germany and Great Britain, and today the United States stands unrivaled in the manufacture of cut gla.s.s.

The honor conferred upon the Libbey Gla.s.s Company by the committee, in granting to them the exclusive concession to manufacture and sell American gla.s.sware within the grounds of the Exposition during the World's Fair, was a great one.

The honors conferred by the San Francisco and Atlanta Expositions are but added proofs that the selection was a proper one. The Libbey Gla.s.s Company thus stands today to represent the best the United States produces in cut gla.s.s, and the best the United States produces is the world's best.

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Bartlett & Company

The Orr Press

New York