George Ohr—Just a Little Bit Eccentric

QUESTION: On a recent trip to New Orleans, I found and bought a quirky piece of art pottery in an antique shop. The dealer said it was by George Ohr, but I’ve never heard of him. I like the bizarre look this piece has and would like to find more. Can you tell me more about this potter?

ANSWER: George Ohr was a local potter that actually hailed from Biloxi, Mississippi. He was a real character and his personality definitely comes through in his pots.

In the early 1850s, Ohr’s parents moved to Biloxi, Mississippi, where his father opened the town’s first blacksmith shop. George worked with him and learned the trade. But when he was 18, Ohr left to seek his fortune in New Orleans.  There he worked at a ship chandler's shop for free room and board plus soap for washing. After three years, he was still getting free soap and only $15 per month. So he went back home to Biloxi where he worked as an apprentice in a file cutter's shop and in a tinker's shop.

Disenchanted with his situation, he returned to New Orleans to learn all he could about potting. As soon as he mastered enough technical skills, Ohr left and spent two years traveling to 16 states to observe other potters and their potteries.

He returned to Biloxi in 1883 with $26.80 with which he equipped his own pottery. He spent most of the money on bricks for his kiln. He did all his own work—digging the clay from a nearby riverbank, loading it in a wheelbarrow, and hauling it back to his shop, which he called the "POT-OHR-E." He called his creations "mud babies" and made over 600 pieces in his first  year. He exhibited some of them at the North Cotton Centennial Exposition, but someone stole them.


On Sept. 15, 1886 Ohr married Josephine Gehring of New Orleans. They had 10 children, but the first two died very young. To support his family, he began selling novelty pottery and souvenir items, such as flowerpots, ceramic hats, children's banks and plaques of Southern buildings at local fairs. He once said that if it weren’t for the housewives of Biloxi who have a constant need of flowerpots, water coolers and flues, the Ohr family would go hungry. Ohr hated to part with his "mud baby" creations, so he put high prices on his best works to see what the market would bear.



It didn't take Ohr long to get the reputation of being just a little bit eccentric. People began calling him “the made potter from Biloxi.” This was in part due to his bizarre appearance. Ohr had long hair that he knotted on top of his head with a brass pin and a long beard that was usually tucked into his shirt to keep it from getting caught in the potter's wheel. He often made a public spectacle of himself—from boasting about his artistic talents to zooming down the street on his bicycle with his 18-inch-long mustache tucked behind his ears. Ohr admitted that he acted "crazy" to attract tourists to his shop.

Although Ohr won a medal at the St. Louis Exposition in 1904, he became disillusioned with the pottery business because he didn't think people appreciated his work. So he abruptly closed his pottery in 1906 and became a motorcycle salesman and then an automobile dealer. Ohr died in 1918, still convinced he was the greatest potter who ever lived. He left his pottery to his children with the request that it not be sold until 50 years after his death. He believed the originality of his work would be appreciated in time.

In 1968, exactly 50 years after Ohr's death, James W. Carpenter, a New Jersey antique dealer, discovered over 7,000 pieces of Ohr's pottery in the attic of the Ohr Boy's Auto Repair Shop. He purchased all of them from Ohr's children and offered it for sale in the New York area. People soon recognized these works of an obscure turn-of-the-century potter as the creation of a genius ahead of his time and not just the works of "the mad potter of Biloxi."

Each piece of pottery created by George Ohr is totally unique. Although he made the usual bowls, vases, mugs, pitchers and teapots, no two were alike in shape or decoration. Ohr had a mischievous nature and enjoyed making unusual forms as well, such as puzzle cups for which the puzzle was how to drink from it without spilling the contents. He made a coffeepot with a lid that couldn’t be removed. The trick was to fill it from the bottom.

Some of Ohr's work showed the Art Nouveau influence of the time. He applied snakes, crabs, seashells, dragons and even the head of a wildcat. Today, these pieces sell for high prices.

Ohr was an expert on the potter’s wheel. He created eggshell-thin vessels of fine quality but wasn’t satisfied with their static quality. He dug his fingers into the moist clay and twisted, dented, pinched, squeezed and generally "tortured" the white and red local clays into amazing one-of-a-kind forms. Ohr designed his elaborate handles with curves and scrolls in the style of wrought iron, influenced by his work with his father as a blacksmith.

Ohr’s glazes, in deep and lustrous in shades of brown, red, bright pink, purple, cobalt blue, yellow and green luster, were as varied as his pottery forms. His colors were Many objects had a gunmetal or pewter finish. He experimented with volcanic, sponged, drip, blister, iridescent, tortoiseshell and pigeon feather glazes. And on some of his pieces, he flawed or sometimes even burned his glazes.

As he got older, he left his works in the unglazed bisque stage. He believed God put no color on souls, so why should he put color on his pots.

It wasn’t until Carpenter put the pieces he discovered up for sale in the 1970s that Ohr’s work found a market, and it was his bisque pieces that got the highest prices. It seems that some of the buyers then glazed these pieces in order to earn more money from resale.

Today, collectors seek Ohr’s twisted, tortured forms and colorful vibrant glazes. It’s what he would have wanted when he was making them.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Article section of my 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 the Victorians in the Winter 2018 Edition, "All Things Victorian," online now.  

Fiesta Fun

QUESTION: My aunt had a large collection of Fiesta dinnerware which she left to me. I added a few pieces that I found at flea markets over the last few years, but now I want to sell it. Is this pottery worth much and where would be the best place to sell it?

ANSWER: Depending on what pieces you have, your collection of Fiesta dinnerware could be worth a small fortune. But before you get dollar signs in your eyes, there are a few things you should know about it.

The style and bright colors of Fiesta dinnerware look very 1950s. But actually it appeared during the Great Depression in the mid-1930s. Englishman, Frederick Hurten Rhead, designed the simple Art Deco shapes while chief engineer Victor Albert Bleininger fabricated the colorful signature glazes. Both worked for the Homer Laughlin China Company of Newell, West Virginia.

Originally, the company offered 37 different affordable pieces, ranging from candle holders and ashtrays to large serving dishes, each in five bright colors: red-orange, yellow, green, cobalt blue, and ivory. It added turquoise in 1939 for a total of six basic colors..

Homer Laughlin pioneered a whole new concept in dinnerware with Fiesta. When it first introduced the dinnerware at the annual Pottery and Glass Exhibit held in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in January 1936, its line was the first widely mass-marketed, solid-color dinnerware in the country. It was also the first dinnerware that consumers could purchase by the piece instead of in complete sets, as was the custom at the time. This allowed customers to mix and match, perhaps choosing a different color for each place setting, or have all their dinner plates one color, their cups and saucers another, and so on. This concept became instantly popular with the public, and soon Fiesta dinnerware became a runaway hit.

At its introduction, Fiesta dinnerware consisted of the usual place settings of dinner plates, salad plates, soup bowls, and cups and saucers, plus occasional pieces such as candle holders in two designs, a bud vase, and an ash tray. A set of seven nested mixing bowls ranged in size from five to twelve inches in diameter. The company also sold basic place settings for four, six and eight persons. But the idea from the start was to create a line of open-stock items from which the consumer could pick and choose based on their personal preference.

The Homer Laughlin Company quickly added several additional items to their line and eliminated several unusual items—a divided 12-inch plate, a turquoise covered onion soup bowl, and the covers for its set of mixing bowls. The Fiesta line eventually consisted of 64 different items, including flower vases in three sizes, water tumblers, carafes, teapots in two sizes, five-part relish trays, and large plates in 13- and 15-inch diameters.

But with the onset of World War II, the company was forced to reduce the number of items in the Fiesta line as public demand declined and companies cut back non-war related production. By the end of the war, Homer Laughlin had reduced the items in its Fiesta line by one third.

The design of the original dinnerware pieces remained unchanged from 1936 to 1969. However, the company did change its colored glazes to keep up with home decorating color trends. It introduced four new colors—rose, gray, dark green, and chartreuse, replacing the original blue, green, and ivory. Yellow and turquoise continued in production.

By the end of the 1950s, sales again dropped, so the company reduced its offering of items and changed the glaze colors once again. This time, it introduced a medium green, to distinguish it from other green glazes which the company had produced. This shade of green is in high demand by collectors, and certain pieces in this color command extremely high prices.

Homer Laughlin removed the original red-orange color, the most expensive glaze to produce, before 1944 because it contained uranium oxide which the government needed to construct the atom bombs. Therefore, red pieces also usually command a premium price in today’s collectible market.

By 1969, the company restyled the finials on covers, handles on cups, bowl contours and shapes to give them a more contemporary style.

Fiesta dinnerware became popular once again as baby boomers began establishing their own homes. Not long after Homer Laughlin discontinued the brightly colored dinnerware line in January 1973,  collectors began buying up what remained at garage sales and second-hand shops. Prices for it hit the roof and by the mid-1980s, prices of Fiesta items reached $100 for scarcer pieces.

Generally, serving pieces such as casserole dishes, carafes, teapots, and water pitchers almost always have higher values than normal place setting pieces. As mentioned earlier, certain colors are also priced higher, no matter what the piece.

It’s also important to look on the back of each piece for the familiar “Fiesta” backstamp,
followed by 'HLC USA', 'MADE IN USA' or 'H.L. CO. USA.' You may also discover some pieces with the word 'GENUINE' stamped near the Fiesta signature.

As far as selling your collection, you might do better selling off the pieces individually. If the pieces are from the 1930s and 1940s, you might want to consider sending them to a good auction house where you'll most likely get a better return on them.