RUBY STAINED PATTERN GLASS

Our thanks to Ruth Goldsworthy for inviting us to
Her home to see her wonderful collection

One aid to the identification of anything is a common understanding of the meaning of terms used in descriptions. There is great confusion in what to call glass that is fundamentally clear, but has a surface red color added to decorative detail. The terms which need clarification, are "Ruby Glass," "Ruby Flashed Glass" and "Ruby Stained Glass."

Ruby Glass is properly used to describe glass that is made of a comparatively expensive gold solution formula and is red in color all the way through, i.e., a solid color.

Ruby Flashed is the proper term for a less expensive method of making a piece of glass appears to have been made of a solid color. A small quantity of ruby colored glass is blown slightly, cooled a bit, then dipped into a batch of clear molten glass. The desired item is then made. This gives the finished article a thin colored coat. A mere film of color in relation to the amount of clear glass used.

Ruby Stained is the name for the least expensive way of obtaining red color on a piece of glass. The item is fashioned in the usual way from clear molten glass, usually pressed in one of several thousand patterns. The staining material, usually ruby red in color was painted onto the annealed glass with a brush wherever it was desired for decorative effect. It was then fired on for permanency. This enabled one factory to produce the glass items and to sell them to various decorating companies where different portions of the same pattern could be stained. Ruby Stained glass was a late Victorian introduction and frequently was used to decorate souvenir pieces, etched with place names, people's names and dates. It is enlightening to note that most of this production came from the fabulous Pittsburgh area during the 1880's and 1890's.

Note: The above information is from Richard Carter Barret's book, Popular American Ruby Stained Pattern Glass.

This is my understanding of how Ruby Overlay was manufactured. A small quantity of clear glass is blown slightly, cooled a bit and then dipped into a bath of ruby molten glass and the desired item is then made. When removed from the mold, the artisans then cut the design through the ruby layer into the clear layer of glass. It is then ruby cut glass.

How did I get started collecting Ruby Flashed glass? I knew that my husband, Fred, had always liked red glass, but I never knew why. In 1965, we went to Twin Falls, Idaho to put Fred's bachelor uncle in a home for the elderly and cleaned out the small house he had lived in for 40 years. We were there for 15 days doing slave labor, but on the 14th day, I saw 2 boxes on a shelf in the coal shed. Fred got them down and I unpacked them - and behold!! - There were 5 pieces of ruby stained glass: Three toothpick holders, a miniature pitcher and a clover-shaped pin tray. What happy memories they brought back. They had belonged to Fred's Grandmother Goldsworthy. She had died before he was 5 years old. He started the collection by adding to his grandmother's pieces.

Fred died suddenly in 1974 and after awhile, I continued to collect it until 1989. I feared I wouldn't have space for more, and I wasn't able to go to antique shows. I've bought a few pieces since then, but very few.

Prepared for the AAUW Antiques Study Group February 26, 1999