Well stated, Bobby Rockwell. This is a lesson in American history. In the mid 19th century immigration by the Scotch-Irish (Scots-Irish) to the Eastern US and westward changed the values of Americans from those of England and the Continent to those you express. If you were poor or from poor stock anything without usefulness was not acquired and this carried through to the first part of the 20th century when people got a little richer in the big cities. Growing up in the Midwest in 1950’s this was always the excuse for not giving us everything we wanted but if the object had a use perhaps it could be justified, so sometimes mother got a pretty glass object. Perhaps this was why pretty colored dinnerware was so popular at Marshall Fields. Robert Weinberg

Bobby Rockwell’s Story

Hi Alan,

If I could relate a story Carder told my father it may shed some light as why certain objects have certain names. As in the terms covered vase , covered compote, etc., these terms are found in the line drawings so we know that they were used at the factory and they are not collector’s terms for the 20th and 21st centuries. With that in mind let me retell my story. Carder had told my father that one of his biggest problems in merchandising his products to the American consumer was in naming the object. In England the customers would look at product as a work of art and therefor not worry about a function. A vase was a vase and a bowl was a bowl pure and simple. Not so with an American. In America an object had to have a function. There was no room for frivolous objects, therefor everything had to have a purpose. While growing up here I have seen many covered vases used to put hard candies in(it kept the flies off the candy). I can remember being shown a set of miniature compotes that were sold to the family as champagnes, miniature vases that served as toothpick holders and on and on. It made sense to people then; something that has lost to us now as our tastes have become more developed and moved away from our frontier attitudes. The buyer of 1910 to the 50’s is much different than the buyer today.

Best,

Bobby Rockwell