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John Adams (1823-1887) a pioneer American glass manufacturer, and the founder of Adams Glass was born in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania in 1823. He began working in glass manufacture at the age of 14. [1]
He developed the technique of using lime in place of lead to make glass. This significantly lowered the cost of glass production. He made good use of this advantage, turning his factory, located in Pittsburgh, into a large and successful operation. [2]
He was a major producer of kerosene lamps. Along with his sons Adolphus and William, he produced numerous artistic table glassware designs. They also made such unusual items as glass plow-shares, washboards, and coffins.
John Adams also served on the Pittsburgh City Council, was a director of the Iron & Glass Dollar Savings Bank, street railway companies and Flint Glass Association. He was an ardent Methodist, and lifelong Sunday school teacher.
Five years after John Adams’ death in 1886, his sons sold out their holdings in Adams & Company (also known as Adams Glass). The Adams & Company factory became “US Glass, Factory A”.
His daughter, Jennie Adams, became a well known missionary to China. She founded an orphanage, and supported it by her second occupation which was discovering and trading in Chinese antiquities.
There is an oral tradition among his descendants that John Adams was a related to the presidential Adams family. However, no evidence has been found to substantiate this claim.
John Adams and family remain united in death. Their tombstones are arranged in a circle, around a large Adams Family obelisk, located in the Pittsburgh, Southside Cemetery.
Louis Comfort Tiffany was an American artist and designer who worked in the decorative arts and is best known for his work in stained glass. He is the American artist most associated with the Art Nouveau and Aesthetic movements. He was affiliated with a prestigious collaborative of designers known as the Associated Artists, which included Lockwood de Forest, Candace Wheeler, and Samuel Colman. Tiffany designed stained glass windows and lamps, glass mosaics, blown glass, ceramics, jewellery, enamels, and metalwork. He was the first design director at his family company, Tiffany & Co., founded by his father Charles Lewis Tiffany.
The history of Pittsburgh began with centuries of Native American civilization in the modern Pittsburgh region, known as "Dionde:gâ'" in the Seneca language. Eventually, European explorers encountered the strategic confluence where the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers meet to form the Ohio, which leads to the Mississippi River. The area became a battleground when France and Great Britain fought for control in the 1750s. When the British were victorious, the French ceded control of territories east of the Mississippi.
Chickering & Sons was an American piano manufacturer located in Boston, Massachusetts. The company was founded in 1823 by Jonas Chickering and James Stewart, but the partnership dissolved four years later. By 1830 Jonas Chickering became partners with John Mackay, manufacturing pianos as "Chickering & Company", and later "Chickering & Mackays" until the senior Mackay's death in 1841, and reorganized as "Chickering & Sons" in 1853. Chickering pianos continued to be made until 1983.
Wedgwood is an English fine china, porcelain and luxury accessories manufacturer that was founded on 1 May 1759 by the potter and entrepreneur Josiah Wedgwood and was first incorporated in 1895 as Josiah Wedgwood and Sons Ltd. It was rapidly successful and was soon one of the largest manufacturers of Staffordshire pottery, "a firm that has done more to spread the knowledge and enhance the reputation of British ceramic art than any other manufacturer", exporting across Europe as far as Russia, and to the Americas. It was especially successful at producing fine earthenware and stoneware that were accepted as equivalent in quality to porcelain but were considerably cheaper.
Henry Osborne Havemeyer was an American industrialist, entrepreneur and sugar refiner who founded and became president of the American Sugar Refining Company in 1891.
Augustus Henry Heisey was an American industrialist, soldier and glassmaker.
Captain John Baptiste Ford was an American industrialist and founder of the Pittsburgh Plate Glass Company, now known as PPG Industries, based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States.
The Westmoreland Glass Company was a company that produced glass in Grapeville, Pennsylvania.
The Fostoria Glass Company was a manufacturer of pressed, blown and hand-molded glassware and tableware. It began operations in Fostoria, Ohio, on December 15, 1887, on land donated by the townspeople. The new company was formed by men from West Virginia who were experienced in the glassmaking business. They started their company in northwest Ohio to take advantage of newly discovered natural gas that was an ideal fuel for glassmaking. Numerous other businesses were also started in the area, and collectively they depleted the natural gas supply. Fuel shortages caused the company to move to Moundsville, West Virginia in 1891.
The Sneath Glass Company was an American manufacturer of glass and glassware. After a brief 1890s startup in Tiffin, Ohio, the Company moved to Hartford City, Indiana, to take advantage of the Indiana Gas Boom. The small city was enjoying the benefits of the boom, and could provide natural gas as an energy source for manufacturers. Sneath Glass was one of many glass manufacturers that moved to the region, and became Hartford City's second largest employer.
Henry Crimmel was an American glassmaker who became well known in Ohio and Indiana. A German that came with his family to America at the age of eight years, the American Civil War veteran started at the lowest level in glass making, and learned every aspect of the business. A skilled glassblower known for his glassmaking expertise and the recipient of two patents, he also worked in management in at least three glass factories – and was one of the co-founders of the Novelty Glass Company and the reorganized version of Sneath Glass Company. He retired with over 50 years in the industry.
The United States Glass Company was a trust formed by the combination of numerous glass companies. The factories were located from western Pennsylvania to Indiana.
Glass art refers to individual works of art that are substantially or wholly made of glass. It ranges in size from monumental works and installation pieces to wall hangings and windows, to works of art made in studios and factories, including glass jewelry and tableware.
Duncan & Miller Glass Company was a well-known glass manufacturing company in Washington, Pennsylvania. Items that were produced by the company are known as "Duncan glass" or "Duncan Miller glass." The company was founded in 1865 by George Duncan with his two sons and son-in-law in the South Side neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. By 1890, the company joined other glass companies to form the United States Glass Company, a powerful glass trust. In 1892, the factory was destroyed in a fire, and the company was relieved of its trust relationship with the US Glass Company. After the fire, the second generation of the Duncan family moved operations to Washington, Pennsylvania. In 1900, John Ernest Miller, the company's long-time designer, became a full shareholder along with members of the Duncan family. By 1955, economic pressures from machine-produced glass forced the company to sell off its assets to the US Glass Company, who continued to produce Duncan-style glass until 1980.
The Great Fire of Pittsburgh occurred on April 10, 1845, destroying a third of the city and causing between $6 million and $12 million in damage. While having little effect on the culture of the city except to spur further growth, it would provide a temporal reference point for the remainder of the century and beyond.
Hartford City Glass Company was among the top three window glass manufacturers in the United States between 1890 and 1899, and continued to be one of the nation's largest after its acquisition. It was also the country's largest manufacturer of chipped glass, with capacity double that of its nearest competitor. The company's works was the first of eight glass plants that existed in Hartford City, Indiana during the Indiana Gas Boom. It became the city's largest manufacturer and employer, peaking with 600 employees.
Seneca Glass Company used to be the largest manufacturer of tumblers in the United States. The company was also known for its high-quality lead stemware, which was hand-made for nearly a century. Customers included Eleanor Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson, the president of Liberia, the Ritz Carlton Hotel, Tiffany's, and Neiman-Marcus.
J. H. Hobbs, Brockunier and Company was one of the largest and best known manufacturers of glass in the United States in the 19th century. Its products were distributed world-wide. The company is responsible for one of the greatest innovations in American glassmaking—an improved formula for lime glass that enabled American glass makers to produce high-quality glass at a lower cost. The firm also developed many of the talented glassmakers that started glass factories in Ohio and Indiana.
The Northwood glass company was a manufacturer of art glass in various locations in the United States.
The Wistarburg Glass Works was the first successful glass factory and joint-venture enterprise in the Thirteen Colonies. Caspar Wistar founded the glass works company in 1739. He began by recruiting experienced glass artisans from Europe, and built homes for the workers along with a mansion for the factory's foreman. Wistar also had a company store built near the factory.
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