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Introduction
Welcome to the June Cloud Glass newsletter. As well as our regular items, in this issue we have a small piece about the No 34 series of glassware. Also a word of warning about Uranium Glass.
In the UK this month we have been celebrating the Queen's Golden Jubilee, and the whole country had an extra bank holiday. In May 1937 at the Davidson Factory when King George VI was crowned the workforce were given the day off with Pay. Each glassmaker received fourteen shillings (70 pence). This was very unusual at the time, as paid holidays were rare in British Industry, and even Christmas Day was a holiday without pay in those days at Davidsons. Davidson only introduced regular paid holidays in 1938.
Cloud Glass Web site
The Cloud Glass web site has now moved to a new web provider and hopefully will have a higher degree of availability. My experience of certain Internet companies has not been good, and I would advise anyone wishing to have their own website to proceed with caution.
If you experience any problems please email to info@cloudglass.com.
Antique Fairs
Nothing much to report on the fairs front. The only major fair we have attended since the last newsletter was Swinderby. This fair is held on the Friday to Sunday before the giant Newark fair and is usually a good source of bargains even on the second day. There was very little Cloud Glass on offer and nothing out of the ordinary. There was a very nice 696D Flower set in Blue Cloud Glass. The trailing was truly stunning, probably the best I have ever seen. Sadly the asking price of £95 was over the top.
The 34 series of glassware was introduced in 1934 and consists of flower vases and two piece flower sets. For the most part it was a short lived range, only the 34D and 34SD flower sets were made after WWII. Production of the 34F and 34SF ended in 1937, and the other styles between 1939 and 1942. The 34 LF does not appear to have been made beyond 1934.
The first production runs for this range were as follows:
34SVG, 34 VG, 34F and 34LF - 7th March 1934
34VF, 34SVF, 34SF and 34SLF - 2nd May 1934
Originally Davidson had planned to use a different numbering system for this range. This was:
| 34 Range No | Original Number | 34 Range No | Original Number |
| 34 SVG | 35 | 34 F | 37 |
| 34 SVF | 35 S | 34 SF | 37 S |
| 34 VG | 36 | 34 LF | 38 |
| 34 VF | 35 S | 34 SLF | 38 S |
Only the 34 D and 34 SD, which came into production later in 1934, did not start life with a different style number.
The two rarest styles in this range are the 34 LF and the 34/10. The 34 LF was a large version of the 34 SLF, but very few examples appeared to have been made. The 34/10, was made to accept the No 10 Grid fitting. It was made in both Amber and Green Cloud Glass in 1934, yet does not appear in any known Davidson catalogues. No examples are known to exist in any Cloud Glass collection. Consequently we do not known what it would have looked like.
Geo Davidson - An Engineer as well?
Whilst researching patents I came across the following patent which was submitted on 25 June 1884 by 'George Davidson, the Teams, Gateshead Glass Manufacturer and Robert Turnball Chester-Le-Street Durham' The title of the patent was 'Improvements in combined hand and steam Steering gear'. They also submitted a further patent on the same theme in October 1884. As neither patent was accepted, no copies exist in the Patent archives. It is, however, interesting to speculate on the relationship between Davidson and Robert Turnball was and what venture they were involved in.
Uranium Glass
Ok this is nothing to do with Cloud Glass, but an interesting observation on Davidson's Uranium glass. It appears to be twice as radioactive as some other makes! In a totally unscientific experiment we used a Geiger Counter to measure the emissions in two pieces of Uranium glass from different manufacturers. The first was a 'Jacobean' style water jug on unknown origin. This had a reading of about 450 counts/minute compared to the background reading of 85 counts/minute. A Davidson 279 Column vase had a staggering reading of 1,000 counts/minute!! Twice as high as the water jug!!!
Health and safety regulations in UK schools require radioactive sources that are weaker than the Uranium glass to be kept in lead containers. My advice is to be careful of Uranium glass. If you have any then it should be kept in an enclosed display cabinet, as the materials of the cabinet will absorb most of the radiation.
I dare not enquire what the Health and Safety regulations would be for the disposal of broken Uranium Glass!!
Reports from the Pottery Gazette
This month our extract is not from the Pottery Gazette, but from and advert for the 'North East Coast Exhibition of Industry, Science and Art'. This exhibition, which ran from May to October 1929 was held in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, was a show case for North Eastern Industries. Both Davidson and Jobling were exhibitors. Davidson had stand 335/6, Avenue N in the Palace of Industries. The write-up for Davidson was as follows:
'This exhibit comprises a complete range of the well-known products of Geo Davidson & Co., consisting of table and decorative glassware made by moulding or pressing. They include the world-famous Flower Blocks, the "Premier" Flower Holders, the beautiful cloud colours "Amber Cloud", "Purple Cloud" and "Blue Cloud" and a large range of domestic and fancy glass. There are also shown numerous samples of the special glassware made for the Engineering and other Trades.'
This exhibition came very soon after the end of the British Industries Fair for that year, so must have involved Davidson staff in a lot of extra work. The write-up of their exhibits is interesting for two reasons. Firstly it tells us that Amber Cloud must have been introduced well before the exhibition started, suggesting a date of no later than the beginning of the year. Secondly the Premier Flower support was given a mention. This suggests that the support was popular and a good selling item, or else Davidson had recently introduced it and wanted to promote the support and the vases that went with it.
Jobling were exhibiting their Pyrex and Weardale ranges of glassware as well as tumblers and lenses.
Sadly The Palace of Industry no longer exists.
Cloud Glass on Ebay
There are still a large number of Cloud Glass pieces going through Ebay each week. Prices are not high, particularly for Walther Cloud Glass. Sepia in particular has been achieving prices which are only a fraction of what they realised 12 months ago. This is partly due to more Sepia being available and also because we now know that it is not rare Davidson Cloud Glass.
This last month has seen a very rare piece of Cloud Glass the No 275 Lily vase. Two have gone through Ebay in quick succession (just like buses). The first in Purple Cloud and the second in Blue Cloud. Both reached a selling price of over £300. Hopefully this will encourage some more to appear on Ebay.
The Ebay statistics in this newsletter are the average prices for Cloud Glass for the whole of May and June (up to 24th June). As usual please bear the following in mind when examining the table:
- Identification has been based on the picture and description given on Ebay. My interpretation may not be 100% correct.
- No account has been taken of the condition or completeness of the glass. It is in fact rare for a flower set to be offered complete with dome and plinth. In the case of vases and candlesticks some auctions are for a single piece and others are for a pair.
- I have only included Cloud Glass which was available to the UK.
- I have not included auctions which received no bids or failed to reach the reserve price
| Description | Amber | Blue | Green | Orange | Pink | Purple Amethyst | Red (ORA) | Sepia | Topaz Briar | Topaz Violet |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10/1910 Flower Set | £21.59 | £68.08 | ||||||||
| 12 Heart shaped | £13.72 | |||||||||
| 1907 TD 5" Flower Set | £9.85 | £27.25 | ||||||||
| 1910 BD Flower Set | £11.65 | £30.75 | £70.73 | £206.99 | ||||||
| 1910 MD Flower Set | £29.99 | |||||||||
| 1910 SD Flower Set | £22.34 | £47.99 | £70.71 | £21.00 | £15.69 | |||||
| 204 - 7.5" Flower Set | £4.00 | |||||||||
| 204 D 12" Flower Set | £36.80 | |||||||||
| 204 D 7.5" Flower Set | £10.88 | |||||||||
| 204 D 9" Flower Set | £4.99 | |||||||||
| 21 Flower Set | £34.99 | £22.90 | £37.30 | |||||||
| 24 M Hexagonal 8.5" Flower Set | £85.75 | |||||||||
| 248 D Flower Set | £45.10 | |||||||||
| 248 F - 5" | £58.00 | |||||||||
| 25 Octangonal Flower Set | £22.13 | |||||||||
| 275 | £349.41 | £330.10 | ||||||||
| 279 - 10" Vase | £73.01 | |||||||||
| 279 - 6" Vase | £15.77 | £15.32 | £41.00 | |||||||
| 279 - 8" Vase | £31.12 | |||||||||
| 280 Hexagonal Plates | £4.00 | |||||||||
| 282 8" Round Plate | £10.50 | £13.47 | ||||||||
| 283 - 3" Powder Jar | £10.30 | |||||||||
| 283 - 5" Powder Jar | £20.00 | £25.11 | ||||||||
| 283 - 7.5" Candlesticks | £9.05 | £155.00 | £60.59 | |||||||
| 283 - 8" Bowl | £19.71 | |||||||||
| 283S - 2.5" Candlesticks | £8.00 | £10.25 | £17.28 | |||||||
| 294 Vase | £110.74 | |||||||||
| 326 3" Powder jar | £3.00 | £25.25 | ||||||||
| 34 SD 9.5" Flower Set | £21.00 | |||||||||
| 34 VF Vase | £56.89 | |||||||||
| 5 Trinket Tray | £16.59 | |||||||||
| 50 Vase | £21.32 | £28.00 | ||||||||
| 51 Vase | £18.87 | |||||||||
| 696 D 13" | £30.00 | £135.47 | ||||||||
| 699 C 13" Flower Set | £31.00 | |||||||||
| 699 D 14.5" | £173.95 | |||||||||
| 700 D 12" Flower Set | £48.53 | |||||||||
| 712 10" Vase | £67.92 | |||||||||
| 712 8" Vase | £173.23 | |||||||||
| 727 Bowl | £16.69 | £23.99 | ||||||||
| 732 F 9.5" Flower Set | £6.00 | |||||||||
| 8283 Trinket Set | £55.53 | £45.24 | ||||||||
| 9421 Plate 11.5" | £19.69 | |||||||||
| Chrome Ashtray | £27.51 | |||||||||
| Diana 31451 Vase | £102.36 | |||||||||
| Edith 31432 - 18cm Comport | £35.74 | |||||||||
| Hermann oval bowl with star bottom 42171 | £48.52 | |||||||||
| Kopenhagen 18cm footed vase 44118 | £223.38 | |||||||||
| No 1 Cigarette Box | £55.27 | |||||||||
| No 1 Vase | £16.86 | £50.13 | £20.50 | |||||||
| No 2 5.5" Plinth | £6.25 | £14.59 | £28.58 | |||||||
| No 27 Boat shaped bowl 14" * 6" | £50.96 | £38.84 | ||||||||
| No 3H Dome 2.5" | £4.16 | |||||||||
| No 3H Dome 4" | £4.99 | |||||||||
| No 3H Dome 4.5" | £8.06 | |||||||||
| No 3H Dome 5" | £9.24 | |||||||||
| No 4 3.25 Plinth | £10.01 | £10.51 | ||||||||
| Orla 31415 26cm Bowl | £14.07 | |||||||||
| Orla 31416 31cm Bowl | £31.43 | |||||||||
| S/696 D 10" | £8.80 | £16.50 | £34.88 | |||||||
| S/696 F 9" Flower Set | £104.00 | £48.36 | £151.91 | |||||||
| Sowerby Ashtray | £8.91 | |||||||||
| ULM 31426 (no figure) | £54.02 | |||||||||
| Walther Unknown | £92.88 |
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