GLASS IN A FLASH: Short Overview of Glass in Sandwich : page2
The molds for pressing glass were metal, hand-carved by mold-makers. The early pressing process often created surface imperfections due to the different cooling rates of the glass and molds. Small circles or dots were added to the early pressed designs, called stipples. The dots help to refract the light through the glass and to draw the human eye away from those surface imperfections. Collectors often call this type of glassware LACY glass.
The Boston & Sandwich Glass Company was very prosperous and focused on producing quality pieces of glass. The company continued to grow and expand, creating an entire community around the factory, both fueling and depending on the factory's business. The community incorporated all of the factory buildings, the workers' houses, the mercantile buildings, and other support buildings, such as the train roundhouse.
In the 1840s and 1850s, the company perfected the pressing processes further to eliminate surface imperfections. They mass-produced a stunning spectrum of colored tableware, including lamps, spoonholders, perfume bottles, candlesticks, and celery vases.
Set c.1858
Deming Jarves was the main principal of the company until 1858, when he resigned over a dispute with its Board of Directors. The master craftsmen of the company presented Deming Jarves with a set of blown, cut and engraved glassware as a farewell gift engraved with the initial "J". A portion of this collection resides at the Museum.
After his departure from the Boston & Sandwich Glass Company, Jarves soon began another glass company just down the street from the old called the Cape Cod Glass Works. Jarves went into business with his son John. This glass company produced tablewares and lamps, as well as toys, dolphin candlesticks, and other novelty items. Unfortunately, John died a young man, and his father was left to run the Cape Cod Glass Works until his death in 1869.
c.1865
After the Civil War, the glass industry changed in Sandwich and New England. The coal country of Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia had a cheap and ready supply of fuel for the Midwestern glass furnaces (Sandwich had converted from wood to coal furnaces in 1836). These companies were able to produce cheaper pressed tableware in soda-lime glass, thereby squeezing out the New England pressed glass competition.
Parade
By 1870, the Boston & Sandwich Glass Company had changed its production line to more delicate, finely blown, engraved and decorated glassware to appeal to an upscale clientele and compete against the Midwestern factories. At its height, the factory employed hundreds of men, women and children in the various processes of glass making and decoration. The community around the factory continued to thrive, as seen in a photo of the 1876 Centennial celebration, where the glassblowers threw tricolor glass bracelets to the crowds.
c.1870's
The change in production included a variety of blown, pressed, cut, engraved and decorated wares, some of which were featured in the company’s catalog of the 1870s. Nicholas Lutz, originally from France, came to the company in the 1870s and brought new styles to production including threaded ware and paperweights.
Murrhina
In the early 1880s, there was another short-lived glass company known as the Vasa Murrhina Glass Company that took up residence in the former Cape Cod Glass Works that Deming Jarves had opened. Unfortunately, the mica in the glass formula proved to make the glass unstable and unsaleable.
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