Kate Field

“ Cheap fuel was necessary to successful glass making. How could New England coal compete with natural gas? So Ohio came to the front. A few years ago Ohio's natural gas became exhausted. Without a day's disturbance petroleum [Pg 23] succeeded gas, and better glass was made than ever, because oil produces a more even temperature. Verily "there is a soul of goodness in things evil." From Massachusetts to Ohio, from coal to gas, from gas to petroleum, what would be the next act in the drama of American glass? What, indeed, but an act the scene of which was laid in the grounds of the World's Fair! ”

“ They want to know how things are made, and, like children, are not content until they have laid their hands on whatever confronts them. "Please do not touch" has no terrors for them. In addition to this inborn love of action, there is a fascination [Pg 26] about glass blowing and the fashioning of shapeless matter piping hot from the pot that appeals to men and women of all sorts and conditions. With eyes and mouths wide open, thousands stood daily around the circular factory watching a hundred skilled artisans at work. ”

“ As a matter of fact a specialist is needed to cut and sew glass, which differs from other cloths in breaking and wickedly sticking into the hands, so a skillful and artistic young woman employee from Toledo was sent to New York to do what the ordinary seamstress could not. ”

“ The Drama of Glass was an inspiration born in the brain of Kate Field, as she watched the busy workmen, who with trained eyes and skillful hands, wrought out the products of one of America's great industries that found a temporary home in the World's Fair at Chicago. ”

“ Yielding to royal desire, Venice freed these artisans, and thus glass making was established in Great Britain. Beyond the point of reason all prohibitory laws fail sooner or later. Go to the bottom of slang, and as a rule you will find it based on rugged truth. When in the breezy vernacular of this republic a human being is [Pg 15] credited with "sand" or is accused of being entirely destitute of it, he rises to high esteem or falls beneath contempt. Possessing "sand" he can command success; without it he is a poor creature. ”

“ Like the oak, it begins with a small seed that hardly knows its own mind, and is often more surprised than the rest of the world at the result of earnest effort. See what apothecaries did for Italy. Mediæval art and the Medicis go hand in hand. The drama of glass in the United States may have as significant a mission, for it is singularly true that James Jackson Jarves, son of Deming Jarves, the pioneer glass manufacturer of New England, was almost the first American to give his life to the study of old masters and to [Pg 22] devote his fortune to collecting their works. ”

“ Marietta, after the manner of women, loved a man, [Pg 13] one Giorgio, an artisan in her father's employ. History does not tell, but I have no doubt that Giorgio wheedled the secret out of his sweetheart. ”