Just a Bit of Whimsy

 

QUESTION: Recently, while browsing the booths at an antiques coop, I came across several kitschy ceramic planters. One had the form a sadiron, another had the form of a decorated rolling pin. Neither one had a mark. Do you have any idea which pottery produced these funky pieces?

ANSWER: It looks like you found some pieces of Cameo China ware. Cameo China, of Wellsville, Ohio, is one of the least known of the many novelty potteries that once operated along the Ohio River during the late 1940s and early 1950s. Because few of its products had marks, they’re difficult to recognize.

The Cameo China Company, an outgrowth of the Chic Pottery Company, operated in a portion of Wellsville's old United States Pottery Co., side by side with the better known Purinton Pottery, before the latter moved to Shippingsville, Pennsylvania in 1940, and Chic moved to Zanesvifle, Ohio. The United States Pottery Company, a manufacturer of semivitreous toilet and table wares from 1898 until 1932, fell victim to the Great Depression.

John Purinton purchased the pottery in 1936 and began producing colorful, hand-painted "peasantware" and fruit decorated kitchenware. He allowed Dana K. Harvey to use the southern portion of the factory for the Chic Pottery Company Harvey operated Chic Pottery in Wellsville and later in Zanesville, Ohio.

Both Hugh Garee, the mold maker for Chic Pottery, and Sam Corsello, who had  worked for the old United States Pottery, worked for both Chic and Purinton Pottery  during those early years. Corsello did just about everything at Chic's pottery, from pouring slip to firing gold, and Garee designed molds for both Chic and Purinton

Hugh Garee was born in Toronto, Ohio, in1875, the son of Albert and Eathenorah Burchfield Garee. His father, Albert, was a "pottery hand" in New Cumberland, West Viriginia, in 1880. Garre moved to Ontario, Canada, in 1897, and in 1900 worked  in Mimico, Ontario, as a brancher, making "branched" sewer tile at the Ontario Sewer Pipe Co.  He continued to work at various potteries in eastern Ohio and western Pennsylvania.

Garre worked for a number of potteries, including Salem China, Bedford China, Sebring China, Selo Pottery, Homer Laughlin, and Shenango China as a mold maker and/or designer. In 1929, he moved to Minerva, Ohio, where he worked for Owen China. 

In 1946, Hugh Garee and Sam Corsello continued to operate the Cameo China Company while Corsello worked for Acme Craft Ware. Garee, his son Mac, and J.Lee Pickering incorporated the business on October 9, 1948. Cameo operations included a small, 40-foot-long tunnel kiln but were sufficient to keep 21 women employed. 

Mac Garee sold Cameo China pieces at the Garee Scott Clothing Store in Minerva, Ohio, while at the same time advertising Cameo wares in American Home and similar decorating magazines. Particularly popular were Cameo's rolling pin and flatiron planters, usually decorated with a rose decal, and various salt and pepper shakers.

Among Cameo’s known designs are a pair of salt and pepper shakers representing a coal stove and coal bucket, male and female torsos in old-fashioned undergarments, two sizes of a standing alligator, a pair of clasped hands, and a pair of bare feet with brightly colored toenails and a definite orthopedic problem involving the big toe—the best known pieces. The smiling alligator, the most appealing, appeared several years before the Disney movie version of "Peter Pan:" As for the painfully if humorously disjointed feet, Japanese and American copies are far more common than the Cameo originals. Cameo China had the foresight to copyright them, although most potteries paid little attention to copyright laws.

Japanese imports quickly spelled the end of Cameo China's prosperity, however. Hugh Garee's sight completely failed in 1951, and son Mac Garee, who had worked with his father since the age of 13, continued to manage the pottery for a time, working day and night to fill orders. The Garees wisely sold their part of Cameo China to Sam Corsello, who continued to operate it for a few more years with his son Russell. 

Garee used a kick wheel for many years. He created his own tools by hand from kitchen utensils and other readily available utensils.

 produced a leaping fish as a hair receiver for Chic, and later made a very similar shape for Cameo. While only slight differences in form distinguish the two, they can easily be identified by differences in decoration—Cameo used airbrushing more often--- but especially by glaze and density. Chic pottery’s pieces weren’t as well fired, causing fine crazing, and was off-white or ivory color. Cameo’s ware was denser, whiter and less subject to crazing.

Cameo China's lady head vase is one of the few pieces clearly identified with an impressed "C.C.Co. U.S.A." mark. (Both Chic and Cameo often used a small, block-letter "U.S.A." in-mold mark along the inside edge of the base.) The lady head vase is distinguished by sponged gold hair, a gold trimmed flower at the neck and a red, cold-painted flower in the hair. A "Cameo China"mark in gold script mark was also used on some pieces.

Cameo's 6-inch-high "Mammy and chef cream and sugar set" been recognized; it was patented Sept. 1, 1949. Finally, a "Golf bag and two clubs" was patented June 11, 1951, undoubtedly one of the last pieces that Hugh Game designed before he lost his sight. Although unmarked, the golf bag planter with two clubs has rather prominent "USA 51" impressed near the bottom. 

 Hugh Garee's distinctive and considerable ability from the pottery novelties produced by Cameo China alone. A much better idea of his skill is gained by examining the wide variety of shapes he designed for Chic Pottery.

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The Truth About Sadirons

QUESTION: Recently, I purchased an old iron at a local flea market. On the top of the heavy iron base is molded the word “sadiron.” Was this the brand name or a name people called this type of iron?

ANSWER: A flatiron pointed at both ends and having a removable handle is commonly referred to as a sad iron. First used in 1738, it became a regular household item by the mid-18th century and continued in use until the last decade of the 19th.

From research, historians know that the Chinese started pressing cloth using hot metal before anyone else. At the same time, Viking women used simple round linen smoothers made of dark glass along with smoothing boards to iron cloth. Others used hand-size stones which they rubbed over woven cloth to smooth it, polish it, or press it into pleats. And while some may have dampened linen first, it’s unlikely that these women heated their “smoothers.” Later glass smoothers, called slickers, slickstones, or slickenstones, had handles. It wasn’t until the late Middle Ages that blacksmiths began forging smoothing irons, heated by a fire or on a stove, for home use.

People began to call these flat smoothing irons “sad” irons, based on the Old English word “sad” meaning heavy, dense, or solid. Although most of these irons were small, they were very heavy, thus women looked forward to ironing day with some distain, knowing the drudgery it entailed.

On Mondays, women washed both clothes and bedding. They reserved Tuesdays for ironing, a chore that took all day and tired them as much as washing.

At home, ironing traditional fabrics without the benefit of electricity was a hot, arduous job. Women had to keep their sadirons immaculately clean, sand-papered, and polished. They also had to keep them away from fireplaces to avoid getting soot on them and had to regularly grease them lightly to avoid having them rust. Beeswax, applied to the underside of an iron, prevented it from sticking to starched cloth.

Women needed to own at least two irons—one for ironing and one for re-heating—to make the sadiron system work well. Large Victorian households with servants often had a special ironing-stove on which to heat the irons, fitted with slots for several irons and a place to set a water jug on top.

With no way to control temperature, women had to constantly test to see if their iron was hot enough by spitting on its heated underside. They learned the right temperature by experience—hot enough to smooth the cloth but not so hot as to scorch it. So they wouldn’t burn their hands, they had to grip the handles of their irons with a thick rag.

On April 4,1871, an enterprising women named Mary Potts of Ottumwa, Iowa (Yes, that’s right, the place where the fictional character, Radar O-Rielly, hailed from on the hit T.V. series, “M.A.S.H.”), received a U.S. patent for a lighter sadiron with a detachable wooden handle, which remained cool while ironing. Women could purchase several iron bases which could all be heating on the stove while she ironed. Women loved the idea.

She received another patent for an iron with a hollow body which could be filled with a material that didn’t conduct heat, such as plaster of Paris, clay or cement. In her patent, Mrs. Potts claimed that these materials held the heat longer so that women could iron more garments without reheating their as often.

Mrs. Potts exhibited her new sadiron in the 1876 Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia. She prominently featured her picture in advertising for her new iron.