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by Glen and Steve Thistlewood
Particular thanks for information and expertise to:
Howard Seufer, Norman Montgomery, Dr. James Measell and Brian Pitman
With introduction by Brian Pitman
Are you ready for some controversy? I mean some REAL controversy.
Well, here it comes. Let's meander into the heart of something
that has been debated many times this year in carnival glass, even
pushing the ACGA membership meeting to record length to discuss it.
Simply put, there are some out there who think that "someone" is
currently turning Fenton bowls into Fenton plates. How? There are
theories, many theories, and many stories as well.
I heard about this in depth at the ICGA convention (I remember some
stuff Diane Fry had mentioned on her website before), but intensity
of this conversation surpassed anything I had experienced on it
before. The people who brought it up to me really believe this is
happening (they are very serious about it), and they had some points
and arguments that are pretty convincing. I took some pics of some
pieces that were supposedly altered in this way, and I sent them to
our Super Detective Team, the Thistlewoods.
What resulted was a month of full-on investigation, discussion, and
a few dozen trips around the globe to get to the bottom of this. And
now, they have the answers to many of the questions and points
brought up.
Is it possible? Can a Carnival Glass bowl that was made back in
the early 1900s be flattened into a plate today?
Let’s start by considering how a Classic Carnival Glass plate
was usually made. The glass batch was around 2000 degrees F: the
molten glass was then placed into a mould (shaped for a bowl)
and the plunger inserted. The mould was opened and the bowl
removed from the mould, then gripped by its marie (collar base)
in a “snap”, reheated in a glory hole, then spun flat (by the
finisher). The centrifugal force simply caused the bowl to
assume the profile of a plate.
So why was it that plates were made from bowls back then, and
not vice versa? We’d like to quote from one of our books: “The
explanation for this was provided by Frank M. Fenton: “the
reason is the need for a cutting joint to accommodate a
variation in the volume of glass deposited in the mould. Fenton
made some plates in recent years, but pressed them up-side-down
in order to get a cutting surface (in the round shape, similar
to a shallow marie) on the underside surface of the plate. In
the older pieces this cutting surface was at the top edge of the
bowl.” Dr. James Measell, Fenton historian, further observed
that “it is possible to observe a slight curving at the outside
edge of some plates” on the radial mould seams. This would have
been caused by the distortion caused by spinning the plate out
from the bowl shape.”
So, Fenton plates were originally made from bowls in the
factory, at the point of production, while the glass was hot and
still “plastic”. Is it possible, then, for the process to be
applied today to old Carnival Glass bowls? Can an old bowl be
heated up and turned into a plate?
If you want to try and re-fry a bowl into a plate, you’ve got
to heat it up to around 1100 degrees F to make it pliable. You
then would need additional heat to change the cupped up bowl
shape outward and downward (evenly) to alter its profile to that
of a plate. The chances of the bowl cracking are undoubtedly
high. How many bowls would you want to experiment upon? And what
would happen to any crimping (ruffles and flutes) on the bowl?
Some plates (mainly Fenton ones) have been observed with
various characteristics that some have suggested may be caused
by recent reheating / modification. We asked Howard Seufer for
his opinion on these characteristics - and he kindly also asked
Fenton’s Hot Metal foreman, Norman Montgomery and also Dr. James
Measell.
Let’s look at these characteristics and see what they
actually are:
Roughness on the base (marie) thought to be caused by
reheating
Click image below to see a
larger version in a new window.
This is a characteristic often seen on old Carnival Glass - a
number of Classic items exhibit exactly this characteristic, it
is simply a feature of pressed glass. Howard explained that
“these are actually "oil marks" and are probably the result of
wax or oil that was applied to the bottom (mould) plate and the
volatiles in the application left pitted marks in the glass.
(The oil and wax are used to lubricate the hinges of moulds and
to cool the mould surfaces to prevent the glass from sticking to
the iron.) There is a similar effect caused by a cold mould
surface, which leaves an "orange peel" pattern in the glass.
Strange swirly marks
Click image below to see a
larger version in a new window.
These are called Lap Marks, and they are another feature of
old pressed glass that can be seen on a lot of old Carnival.
Again Howard explained: “The "lap marks" were probably a result
of slightly cooler glass being gathered (say 1800 degrees F. or
lower) or the gather being held on the punty too long before
being dropped in the mould. The outer layers cool and fold over
each other and don't fully fill the mould pattern.”
Slumping - producing egg shaped depressions
Click an image below to see a
larger version in a new window.
Once again, this feature occurs on old Carnival Glass. The
photos show our amethyst Concord plate - and you can see what
appear to be a gentle uneven-ness on the surface of the glass.
There is a soft concave effect around the plate, coinciding with
the panels (between the ribs) on the exterior. It’s just how the
plate was made back in the early 1900s. We’ve had this plate for
twenty years, and we bought it from a friend who had owned it
for many years prior to that. It has an impeccable provenance
(and it’s a scrumptious plate too).
You can see the same effect on the green Concord in the
illustration too. Howard Seufer reports that exactly the same
effect can be seen on some of the old plates in the Fenton
Museum at Williamstown - right where they were made almost 100
years ago.
Back in the early days of Carnival Glass production, the
phrase “Quality Control” was not in practical usage. There were
no Quality Control Inspectors and many items left the factories
less than perfect. The glass was low-priced and produced in
quantity, and it was aimed at a market that wasn’t going to
complain if there were a few funny little marks on it here and
there.
If a bowl were to be re-heated today, in an attempt to turn
it into a plate, none of the above pressed glass features would
be indicators of such an attempt. So what would you expect to
see? Well, first and foremost, probably a lot of broken glass,
as let’s face it, reheating an almost-century-old bowl would not
be quite as easy as cooking a stir fry.
Norman Montgomery, the hot metal foreman at Fenton, offered
these additional views:
"The dope would probably change - craze or crackle - as it would
stretch from the bowl to the plate shape. When reheated to the
temperatures for slumping, the iron dope would probably
discolor.”
And we’ll leave the last word to Dr. Jim Measell, who agrees
with these views, and noted that the potential dollar losses
would be large when experimenting (with bowls that would have to
be rare enough to even try to turn them into plates) and he
feels that it is highly unlikely that a bowl-to-plate operation
is being done successfully.
Copyright 2006, G&S Thistlewood. All Rights
Reserved.
All photos are
Copyright Glen and Stephen Thistlewood and Brian Pitman
and may not
be copied or used in any form without permission. |
