The Sparkle of American Brilliant Cut Glass

 

QUESTION: I have a large cut-glass bowl that belonged to my grandmother. As I’m fast approaching 70, I was hoping to find a home for it. My adult children have no interest in it. Do people collect cut glass? 

ANSWER: People definitely collect pieces of cut glass, especially American Brilliant cut glass. 

American Brilliant cut glass was a symbol of elegance in Victorian America from around 1850 to the beginning of World War I. Middle class to wealthy people liked to give pieces as wedding and anniversary presents. Immigrants helped supply glass houses in the United States with skilled cutters allowing them to develop a product rivaling European cut glass. Prior to that time, most cut glass pieces came from England, France, and Ireland.

Historians trace the first cut glass to ancient Egypt in 1,500 BCE, where artisans decorated vessels of varying sizes by cuts made by what they believed to have been metal drills. Artifacts dating to the 6th century BCE indicate that the Romans, Assyrians and Babylonians all had mastered the art of cut glass decoration. Slowly glass cutting moved to Constantinople, then on to Venice, and by the end of the 16th century, to Prague. Apparently the art didn’t spread to the Britain until the early part of the 18th century.

The New World didn’t see any cut glass until at least 160 years later. Henry William Stiegel, an immigrant from Cologne, Germany, founded the American Flint Glass Manufactory in Mannheim, Pennsylvania, and it was there in about 1771 that he produced the first cut glass in America.

For the next 60 years, the "Early Period" of American cut glass, pieces were indistinguishable from English, Irish and continental patterns because  most of the cutters originally came to America from Europe. About 1830 American ingenuity and originality began to influence the industry, and a national style began to emerge. This came about the time The United States  was preparing to celebrate her 100th birthday. and what historians term the "Brilliant Period" began. From about 1876 until the advent of World War 1, American cut glass craftsmen excelled all others worldwide, and produced examples of the cut glass art that may never again be equaled.

When American glass manufacturers displayed their cut glass at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia in 1876, their clear, bright, leaded glass was an immediate sensation. From then on, American cut glass became extremely popular. Most middle-class and wealthy households owned at least a few pieces to grace their elegant holiday tables.

Representatives from eight American glass manufacturers showed off their leaded-crystal goblets, tumblers, decanters, and serving plates at the Exposition. Each of these pieces had been deeply cut by hand on a succession of metal, stone, and wooden wheels. The Brilliant Period lasted from the Centennial celebration until the first decade of the 1900s, when changing tastes and less-expensive pressed glass, which replicated the look of cut glass, pushed the original to the sidelines. In fact, by 1910 manufacturers of the floral, fruit, and geometric patterns in cut glass pressed their pieces first, then cut them, making their pieces less costly to produce.

During the Brilliant Period, over 1,000 cutting shops met the demand. Companies such Dorflinger, Hawkes, Libbey, J. Hoare and Co., T. G. Hawkes, Tuthill, Egginton, and Mt. Washington were highly regarded for the quality of their work, as well as their artistry. 

Some of the most sought-after patterns cut during the American period of cut glass are Wedgemere, Aztec, and Ellsmere by Libbey; Aberdeen by Jewel; Queens, Chrysanthemum, and Nautilus by Hawkes; Assyrian by Sinclaire; Poppy by Tuthill; Wheat by Hoare; and Russian and Comet by several companies. Shapes can also be considered rare, such as tea and coffee pots, table lamps, oil lamps, triple-ring lapidary neck decanters, cake plates, punch bowls, and whiskey bottles.

All glass that’s to be decorated by cutting requires the addition of up to 40 percent lead oxide, a chemical that makes ordinary glass soft enough to cut against moving wheels without shattering. Leaded glass is called "crystal.”

Cutting glass was time consuming. After a worker brought a blank from storage, a designer marked it with outlines of the decoration. The "rougher" began the cutting by holding the blank against a rapidly moving, beveled, metal wheel, kept constantly moistened and cooled by a fine stream of wet sand dripping from an overhanging funnel. He followed the designer's marks, making incisions by pushing the glass down against the wheel. A worker would use various sized wheels to make the many different sized cuts required to complete the design.

Next, the piece went to the "smoother", who went back over all the rough cuts with stone wheels called "craighleiths." The smoother also initially cut some of the small lines on the motifs, as indicated by the design. Finally, the "polisher" finished the piece by polishing each cut with wooden wheels made from willow, cherry or other softwoods. Polishers used rottenstone or pumice with the polishing wheels to give a lustrous appearance to the cut, leaving no imperfections on the gleaming surfaces.

Early in the Brilliant Period, one cutter did all the cutting on a single piece. Since changing wheels to accommodate various sizes and depths of cuts could occupy 60 percent of a cutter's time, manufacturers quickly adapted assembly line methods. By giving each cutter a different sized wheel and by passing a piece from station to station, productivity increased immensely.

Artisans in over 1,000 shops cut hundreds of patterns. Some makers polished glass using wooden wheels while others used acid. Hobstars and fans, strawberry diamonds and flutes, beading and chair caning, are but a few of the motifs that make up American designs. Not all cut glass was of the same quality. While some was excellent, other pieces were just fine, and many were downright inferior. 

Workers cut facets into finished glass pieces by pressing them against a large rotating iron or stone wheel. The nicest pieces of cut glass had a high lead oxide content giving them extra sparkle showing off the exceptional shine of the cutting in this clear glass.

However, as ;the American Brilliant Period progressed, glassmakers turned from hand blowing blanks to blown glass made with molds, and eventually incorporated design elements in the blown mold as well. However, craftsmanship suffered and the overall quality declined.

Manufacturers also changed how they polished pieces, going from hand finishing to a strong acid bath to eliminate sharp edges. This method worked but lacked the same high-quality finish when compared to the earlier handcrafted glass. And to save money and increase profits, decorations became less elaborate, with less swirled cuts and precise points cut into the glass. 

Manufacturers developed and patented stunning new patterns quite unlike earlier European designs. They gave patterns intriguing names, and leading glass houses began advertising campaigns urging collection of whole sets of goblets, tumblers, wine glasses and finger bowls in the new designs. Cutting shops proliferated to meet the demand for fine pieces of cut glass being sought by wealthy American households.

By 1908 less than 100 cut class workshops remained. A number of leading companies continued to maintain their high standards throughout the waning years, attracting the finest designers and most skilled craftsmen, who from 1908 to 1915 produced some of the most elegant patterns of cut glass ever created. 

The outbreak of World War I dealt the final blow. Lead oxide, an essential ingredient in glass made for cutting was needed for the war effort, and by the time the war ended, the few factories that had managed to survive used their resources to produce less costly glass.

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Who's for a Game of Cards?

 

QUESTION: Recently, while browsing though an antique shop, I came across two tables. Both had fold-over tops. One seemed like it was from the 18th century, the other from the Empire period of the 19th. The dealer unfolded the top of the older table to reveal a green felt cloth inlaid into it. He said that this was a card table. When he unfolded the top of the second table, it had no felt inlay and was plainly finished. He told me the second table was a tea table. I always thought they were both card tables. Can you tell me the difference and when card tables started to be used?

ANSWER: There’s a difference between the two tables, although subtle. Back in the 18th century, furniture was expensive as each piece was handcrafted to suit the customer. People woud have used their card tables as tea tables by just putting a tablescloth over it. But by the 1840s, furniture had begun to be at least partially machine-made, and manufacturers kept the cost down by making card tables plainer. 

Playing cards were probably invented during the Chinese Tang Dynasty around the 9th century as a result of the usage of woodblock printing. Playing cards became a diversion both in public houses and private homes. Early playing cards had neither suits nor numbers. Instead, they had instructions or forfeits for whoever drew them. Usually, playing cards revolved around drinking alcohol, especially in the public houses.

The earliest game involving cards occurred on July 17,1294 when the Ming Department of Punishments caught two gamblers, Yan Sengzhu and Zheng Pig-Dog, playing with paper cards. The Department confiscated the wood blocks used for printing the cards together with nine of the actual cards. By the 11th century, playing cards had spread throughout Asia and eventually made their way to Egypt. Playing cards probably came to Europe from the East, arriving first in either Italy or Spain.

By the early 18th century, specially made tables for playing cards began to appear all over England. The first card tables first appeared in the American Colonies around 1710. Card tables became symbols of wealth and the consequent expansion of leisure time and soon became a social necessity in every fashionable home. Without modern entertainment devices, about the only forms of evening entertainment was playing music, dancing, and of course, playing cards. 

Cabinetmakers constructed most of these imported English card tables of mahogany or walnut. Each had a hinged two-leaf top that, when open and supported on a swing leg, revealed an inner surface lined with leather, felt, or the coarse woolen cloth called baize. Since household lighting was usually inadequate for evening play, most of the tables had four turrets projecting from the corners to accommodate candlesticks. In addition, there were often “guinea pools” or “fishponds”—shallow dishlike depressions to hold money, dice, or counters—and, in Chippendale styles, a single drawer in which to keep the cards. The tables stood on graceful cabriole legs, meant to resemble a woman’s shapely calves, but their backs, unseen against the wall, remained unfinished.

Since so many of these tables were highly decorative and also bore their makers’ marks, they provide valuable evidence of the varieties of carving, inlay, veneer, and other detail used by the cabinetmakers, as well as of regional characteristics. Tables with bowed fronts were popular in Boston and Salem, and five- and six-legged examples appeared in New York.

Some people used card tables for purposes other than for playing cards. Unfortunately, tablecloths only covered over the fishponds, often causing accidents and breakage.

In Puritan New England and Quaker Philadelphia, as well as in the South, people bet huge sums on cockfights and horse races, on bull and bearbaiting. Doctors and lawyers would wager their fees at the card table, and the “devil’s prayer book”—a deck of playing cards—could be found everywhere.

From the beginning of the United States, gambling overpowered every effort to restrain it. By the late 18th century every fashionable home had a card table. Still, most households reserved the card table for recreational use.

In the upper-class 18th-century American home, ladies played cards at afternoon tea parties where guests might win or lose hundreds of dollars. In the evening, families would summon servants to bring the card table into the center of the drawing room after dinner, as card playing was a primary form of evening entertainment. Players became embroiled in spirited games of whist, a simpler foreunner of bridge, pokerlike brag, quadrille, or any of the several other games while spectators observed the action. 

When not in use, card tables in most households remained folded away to become consoles or side tables. Servants set card tables against the wall when not in use, sometimes with the upper half raised as a kind of ornamental backsplash.

After about 1840, card tables began to lose the felt inlaid on their surface. People still played cards but now these tables came into popular use as tea tables. With a smooth top, minus the fishponds and candlestick rests—indoor lighting had been much improved—it was now possible to place a tablecloth over the table without the fear of anything toppling due to the former depressions. In many cases, these table featured graceful rounded corners and were still being made of mahogany or walnut.

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A Chest by Any Other Name

 

QUESTION: I have inherited a chest that originally belonged to my great-grandmother which had been passed down to her daughter, my grandmother, then to my mother, her daughter. My mother used the chest, made of cedar, to store blankets and linens in her bedroom. I inherited it when she died two years ago. People have told me that it was a hope chest. What was a hope chest and what was it used for?

ANSWER:  “A rose by any other name....” so go the words of William Shakespeare. The same can be said of the “hope” chest. Originally referred to as a dowry chest, cedar chest, or trousseau chest, it changed names with the times. The dowry chest was meant to contain assets–money and jewelry—that the family of the bride gave to the groom in exchange for their daughter’s hand in marriage. But hope chest implies something else—the hope for a good life for her in marriage.

Young unmarried women used a hope chest to collect and store items, such as clothing and household linen, in preparation for married life. Americans called this a "hope chest" or "cedar chest" while the British referred to it as a "bottom drawer." 

Using her own needlework skills to construct a trousseau was for a young girl the equivalent of planning and saving for marriage by her future husband. The collection of a trousseau was a common coming-of-age rite until the 1950s, a step on the road to marriage between courting a man and engagement. Such a chest was an acceptable gift for a girl approaching a marriageable age.

What did a young girl put in her hope chest? Typically, she stored traditional dowry items, such as special dresses, table linens, towels, bed linens, quilts, silverware, and sometimes  kitchen items. As a bride would normally leave home when she married, cabinetmakers often made hope chests to be portable by including sturdy handles on either side. 

Traditionally, a mother would pass her hope chest down to her daughter. She would start preparing a hope chest from the time her daughter was a young age and slowly build the collection as the years went by. The chests contained many things thought of as “essentials,” such as china, silverware, linens, clothing, and jewelry, that a young woman would need to start a new life in marriage.

It was also standard practice to include family heirlooms and mementos. Things like albums or photographs, letters or treasured objects passed down through the generations that may not have much monetary or practical value but which would comfort the young woman in her new home.

The chest itself was often made of cedar. At that time, cedar was easily available and a popular choice for storage thanks to its naturally fresh, long-lasting fragrance, as well as natural resistance to mold and insects. Cedar also had a naturally warm color and a softer, cozier texture.

But hope chests didn’t just appear out of nowhere. Around 3,000 years ago, the ancient Egyptians created boxes and wooden chests with dovetail joints. The wealthier a girl was, the more ornately-decorated and -painted was her hope chest.

Between the 5th and 15th centuries, wooden chests saw a period of prosperity. In Europe, most were made of hardwoods like oak, poplar, walnut, pine woods and some soft woods. It was during this time that decorating a chest wasn’t just reserved for kings; it became common practice to add friezes and panels to the outer lid of a chest. Handles also began to appear, but not for decoration. During times of wars, battles and invasions, a household had to be ready to pack up their things and flee at a moment’s notice.

The 17th century witnessed a change in the hope chest—the addition of drawers. For the first time in history, cabinetmakers incorporated storage drawers into chest design. At first, it was simply the addition of two small drawers underneath the chest. By the end of the century, chest makers chose mahogany and employed inlay materials like pearl and bone. They also began to finish the chests with a coat of lacquer.

By the 19th century, the hope chest had evolved into a tradition in most families, especially among immigrants to America. This was typical among Scandinavian and German immigrants. The Amish have had a long traditions of plainly constructed chests with extensive painted decoration.

Today, the tradition of keeping a hope chest has faded away. One of the primary reasons is that such a chest tends to glorify the outdated idea of a “dowry.”  Also, it isn’t the most practical  since the items traditionally kept in a hope chest, like fancy linens and dresses, aren’t exactly the things a modern bride “needs” for a successful marriage. However, antique hope chests can be found in both antique shops and shows. And the more decoration one has, the higher the price.

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It's Your Turn

 

QUESTION: I’ve always loved playing board games. When I was a kid, my family would have game nights. Each member of my family take turns choosing the games we played. While we played more modern games, I’ve always been fascinated by antique board games. How did board games get their start? What were some of the more popular games in the 19th and early 20th centuries? If I were to collect old board games, which ones would be the best to collect?

ANSWER: Collecting board games can be fun. The shear number of games produced during nearly 100 years of game production offers a wide variety of games to collect. Many people who collect games collect the ones they played as children. It’s a great place to start.

People have been playing games since ancient Egypt. The Romans loved to bet and rolling dice was popular. By the Middle Ages, playing cards was all the rage. Games became more sophisticated by the 17th century, as backgammon caught on. The Industrial Revolution and the introduction of electricity enabled the middle class to have more free time and by the late 19th century, parlor games, especially board games. The reliable light source encouraged people to seek evening amusements.

One of the most popular of these amusements was the game of checkers. While the more elite were more inclined to play chess, everyone else played checkers, often while sitting out on the porch on a summer’s eve or around the pot-bellied stove in the local country store in winter. While commercial manufacturers produced checkerboards, those that collectors love most are the handmade versions of light and dark wood inlaid in a contrasting pattern. 

Much the same can be said of backgammon and Parcheesi boards, some of which were made of glass with the board design painted in reverse on the back. Many of the game boards were beautiful works of art, with bold designs and bright colors, featuring fanciful characters or outrageous cartoons, often based on nursery rhymes, fairy tales or stories plucked from the headlines.

The counters, playing pieces, that people used to play these games range from the plain wooden circles of checkers and backgammon to elaborately carved pieces of exotic woods, jade and other semiprecious stones, and ivory for chess.

Board games offer the greatest variety for collectors. Most board games involve a race to the finish between two or more players who move their pieces along a printed track at a rate determined by the throw of a pair of dice, the turn of a numbered spinner, or the selection of cards.

In the 16th century, the Italians played Goose, the earliest known board game. But it wasn’t until the 19th century that board games existed in greater numbers. From about 1870 to 1960, when watching television gained popularity, manufacturers produced thousands of board games for the market. Some didn’t quite make it out of the gate while others gained phenomenal success.

The Mansion of Happiness, a game with a religious theme, first appeared in 1843 and was still popular over 40 years later in the 1880s. Winning, based on the Puritan view that success could be achieved through Christian deeds and goodness, required players to advance by landing on spaces denoting virtues like piety and humility and move backward when landing on spaces like cruelty and ingratitude. 

In 1860, The Checkered Game of Life rewarded players for mundane activities such as attending college, marrying, and getting rich. Daily life rather than eternal life became the focus of board games. The game was the first to focus on secular virtues rather than religious virtues, and sold 40,000 copies its first year.

By the 1880s, many games had a rags-to-riches theme. In Game of the District Messenger Boy, players are rewarded for landing on spots with attributes like accuracy and neatness and deducted for loitering.

Most games originated in New York City, as it was the center of the board game industry. The Game of Playing Department Store from 1898 showed what a novel concept it was for Americans to do all their shopping under one roof. Round the World With Nellie Bly from 1890, illustrated the Victorian fascination with travel and exploration, while Rival Policeman from 1896 used as its base the real-life story of a time when New York had two competing police departments.

Board games tell a lot about the culture in the United States at different times in its history from the mid 19th century to the mid 20th century. 

Probably the all-time most popular game to this day is Monopoly. Originally conceived in the late 1890s under a different name as a game of the poor versus the rich, it was mostly a game with rules and game boards that players customized themselves. Sometimes they used a piece of oil cloth for the board and whatever little objects they could find for the game pieces. But it wasn’t until 1935 that Charles Darrow, a broke and out-of-work man in southeastern Pennsylvania, took the game idea, using various concepts created by players over time, and packaged it into a product that he sold through Wanamaker’s Department Store in Philadelphia. While many accounts claim Darrow as the inventor, he wasn’t. But he eventually sold the game to Parker Brothers, the largest producer of board games in America at the time, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Collectors have a lot of reasons for collecting board games, but one of the main ones is the artistic and often complicated graphics which adorn the boards and box covers. Game manufacturers lithographed the graphics onto the boards in black and white, then carefully had low-paid young women hand tint them. But by the 1880s, chromolithography made it possible to produce multicolored boards. Some were faithful images of Victorian dress and customs while others were more abstract. In either case, the game’s box cover was what sold it. And even today, if a game’s box is lost or damaged, most collectors won’t purchase it. Ironically, the absence of game pieces, cards, dice, and spinners isn’t that important, though will detract from the game’s value.

Even though manufacturers produced thousands of games, not all that many survive in good condition and even fewer in pristine condition because nearly makers used cardboard and paper to produce them. Board game and moisture are a bad combination. 

From 1880 to 1950, three companies dominated the market for board games. One of the earliest was W & S.B. Ives Company of Salem, Massachusetts. Ives developed the game with the longest name—Pope and Pagan, or the Missionary Campaign, or the Siege of the Stronghold of Satan by the Christian Army. Like many other late 19th-century board games, Pope and Pagan had a religious theme. Board games of the time were meant to be educational and not just for amusement. Some taught geography or simple bookkeeping or social values, such as honesty and a respect for hard work.

Two other major board game producers were McLoughlin Brothers of New York City and Parker Brothers of Salem, Massachusetts. 

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 30,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "folk art" in the 2023 Winter Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.

Birds of a Feather

QUESTION: My mother loved birds. She had a number of birdfeeders in our yard when I was growing up, and I used to sit and watch all the different kinds of birds flock to them. I guess her love of birds transferred to me because I started looking up the birds I saw to learn more about them. Besides encouraging a growing bird population in our yard, she also collected little knick-knacks of birds that she found at yard sales and flea markets. Now I have them. Most of them look pretty cheap, but there are several that look like they’re made of fine porcelain. I know very little about antique porcelain and was wondering if you could point me to some of the better companies pieces to collect.

ANSWER: Birds have been a favorite of many people for thousands of years. They kept them as pets and even worshiped them. Even today, there some Asian cultures that believe certain birds bring good luck.

Birds have been kept as pets for at least 4.000 years. Doves and parrots appear in Egyptian hieroglyphics. Indians have considered the mynah bird sacred for over 2,000 years. During feast days, oxen would carry these birds in processions through the streets. The ancient Greek aristocracy kept the mynah and parakeets as pets. And in wealthy Roman households, one slave had the responsibility of caring for the family bird, which was often a type of parrot. Apparently, watching the parrot talk and perform was an early form of home entertainment.



In 1782 the bald eagle was adopted as the national emblem of the United States. It was chosen because it is such a powerful, noble looking bird. And so it continued throughout history.

Birds have long appealed to Chinese and Japanese potters. A favorite mythological bird which appeared frequently on Chinese ceramics was the elegant ho ho bird or phoenix which was the symbol of happiness. It had the head of a pheasant, tail of a peacock and the legs of a stork or crane and symbolized beauty, rank and longevity.

White cranes in flight are often the subjects painted on Chinese Export items, Japanese Satsuma, Kutani and Banko ware. To the Chinese and Japanese, the crane means good luck and longevity. In Japan peacocks stand for elegance and good fortune and are often found together in design with the peony flower.



In Chinese mythology ducks and drakes denote conjugal bliss and made popular wedding gifts. Early Chinese potters made large soup tureens shaped as swans, ducks and other birds.

The largest category of bird collecting is figures and portraits in porcelain and pottery. And the English stand out in this category.

In l8th century England, the Chelsea and Bow Porcelain Factories copied the Chinese tureens and made them shaped as pheasants, pigeons, and a hen with her chicks. Early duck and partridge tureens are extremely rare and can sell for over $10,000 today. Chelsea teapots modeled as birds were also popular. One exquisite model, representing a guinea hen trapped in a rosebush, had a speckled white glaze and wonderful detail.

At the end of the 19'h century the four Martin Brothers, studio potters in Fulham, England, made some extraordinary pottery birds. They specialized in salt glaze stoneware and made humorously modeled birds with quizzical expressions. Their work was greatly influenced by the 19`" century Gothic Revival. Some of their most desirable pieces are figural tobacco jars with detachable heads. Martin Brothers pieces are clearly marked on the base with the incised signature: "R. W. Martin."

The Royal Worcestor Company also made magnificent bird figures in various colors and glazes. Regarded as one of the most notable sculptors of the era, Dorothy Doughty began her series of models of the Birds of America in the 1930s. From then until 1960, she created 30 different bird sculptures. Doughty, at her studio in Cornwall, worked from living birds. On an American field trip in 1953, she spent three weeks getting close enough to the elusive oven bird to study it. The birds, with their mounts of flowers and branches, were extremely elaborate and difficult to execute, requiring from 20 to 50 molds each. She sculpted them in correct size and color, and even modeled the foliage in which they sat true to nature. Every model, each made in limited edition, bears the artist's signature and marks of the factory. One of Doughty's rarest bird models, the Indigo Bunting on a Plum Tree, was made to be a cheap Christmas present, and its lack of flowers and foliage resulted in a market failure. Only six or seven were made, and today they are valued at $900-$1,200.

Royal Crown Derby produced many fine porcelain bird figures. Arnold Mikelson was a talented modeler who worked from 1939 to 1945. He designed over 60 different lifelike birds that are still popular, such as woodpeckers, pheasants, owls, goldfinch and fairy wrens. Royal Crown Derby artist Donald Birbeck studied bird and animal life in America in the 1930s. He designed many luncheon and dinner services with game subjects during his long stay at Derby.

Collectors get particularly excited about birds made by the Crown Staffordshire Company. J.T. Jones, decorating manager with the company until his death in 1957,  designed some of the finest. Jones carefully researched these bone china birds from nature.

He portrayed the lifelike songbirds in natural settings—perched on a tree branch or base surrounded with the lovely applied flowers for which the Crown Staffordshire Company is known. Today, the tradition continues with a range of wild fowl figures authenticated by Sir Peter Scott and modeled by John Bromley.

Birds in various colors and glazes have always formed an important part of the Royal Doulton collection. In 1902 the company produced its magnificent range of birds, including fledglings, ducklings, and penguins, in flambé glaze, which recreated the blood-red effects achieved by Chinese potters of the Sung Dynasty.




By 1920 Doulton's list of birds included pigeons, pelicans, eagles, kingfishers, ducks, penguins, and chicks. Designers created some in realistic detail and gave others human or comic characteristics, such as Charles Noke's Toucan in Tails.

In 1952, the company added a few large bird figures to its Prestige Series. In the 1970s Robert Jefferson produced some outstanding limited edition sculptures of birds for the U. S. market. An example is a pair of 8-inch white-winged Cross Bills perched on a branch with pine cones. Doulton's line of miniature character birds, including comic owls, puffins, penguins and toucans, are especially popular with collectors.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Article section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the other 18,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about western antiques in the special 2019 Spring Edition, "Down to the Sea in Ships," online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques & More Collection on Facebook.