This is Part D of a six-part guide on opalescent vases made by the Jefferson Glass Company.  The patterns shown here include Jefferson's Single Lily Spool and Twisted Rope.  This guide was made possible by the many E-Bayers who have contributed photographs to this project.  Please leave feedback by clicking the button at the bottom of the page.

ID Guide to
Jefferson Opalescent Vases, Part D:
Jack-in-the Pulpit Vases

by curculiosglass

 

A Jefferson Single Lily Spool vase,
with an illustration from a November, 1901
advertisement in China, Glass & Pottery Review 

right photo courtesy of starrfir1

INTRODUCTION

          As noted in Part A of this guide, the Jefferson Glass Company of Steubenville, Ohio, specialized in the making of opalescent glass from 1901-1906.  Nine of Jefferson's conventionally-shaped vases are shown in Part A and Part B of this guide.  Part C features footed and novelty vases; Part E striped vases; and Part F bulbous vases.  This section, Part D, focuses on Jefferson's Jack-in-the-pulpit vases:  Single Lily Spool and Twisted Rope.

          Single Lily Spool and Twisted Rope vases share an interesting common feature:  both used pressed-glass methods to create a pattern that imitates a blown-glass technique known as "threading," popular on Victorian glass in the last decades of the 1800's.  The Corning Museum of Glass defines "threading" as "the process of winding a thin trail of glass around an object to create the appearance of parallel lines".  The 1901 Twisted Rope vase shownin this guide was cast from a mold designed to create the impression that a glass trail had been hand-wound around the piece.

 Threading on a blown-glass Tiffany vase (top),
with Jefferson's molded design imitating threading,
on a Jefferson Spool vase (bottom)

photos by curculiosglass

          In 1876, W.J. Hodgetts of Stourbridge, England, patented a machine that wound closely-spaced glass threads at even intervals around a vase.  In 1901, Jefferson created a mold that impressed into glass a pattern imitative of the effect produced by Hodgetts' threading machine. The result was a spool-like design that Jefferson used on two of its vases:  the Spool vase (shown in Part C of this guide) and Single Lily Spool shown here.

   Photographic Gallery of Vases
             

A November, 1901 Jefferson ad
placed in China, Glass & Pottery Review

Single Lily Spool vase.   In May, 1901, the trade journal China, Glass & Pottery Review announced that Jefferson's "water lily vase, in three colors, with wrought-iron foot, is an immense 'ten-center'.  Buyers should get in touch with this young firm, for they can save money on the line they have been importing."  This review must have been good news to the fledgling company Jefferson, which had opened only a year before:  Jefferson's proclaimed goal was to spare American buyers import prices by producing "fine glass" like that being manufactured in Europe.  Six months later, when Jefferson ran the above-shown advertisement in China, Glass & Pottery Review, the company included a picture of the Single Lily Spool vase to represent Jefferson's wares.  The ad's fine print lists Jefferson's wide range of products including "Novelties in Opalescent Colors" and "Opalescent and Decorated Vases".   The two illustrations in the ad depict floriform variations of Jefferson's Single Lily Spool vases: 

A Single Lily Spool with Jack-in the Pulpit mouth (left and center)
with vase variation featuring a flattened mouth (right) 

photos by starrfir1 (left and center) and curculiosglass (right)

"Floriform" or flower-shaped vases were in fashion throughout the Art Nouveau era (1880-1914), when they became highly popular in Tiffany glassware.  Jack-in-the-pulpit vases imitate the shape of the woodland flower by the same name and come in many styles, with oval, circular or peaked mouths, some dramatically splayed and others with more subtley flared rims.   The Jefferson Single Lily Spool vase shown above left and center features a round Jack-in-the-Pulpit mouth with the back rim raised and pulled into a peak.  The second variation on the vase, shown above right, has a mouth flattened into 6 petal-like lobes.

As noted in the introduction above, Lily Spool vases feature a molded pattern that resembles thread round around a spool; the pattern begins near the foot of the 6" vase and stops just short of the rim: 

Thread pattern on Single Lily Spool vase
photo by curculiosglass

       
          Jefferson's Single Lily Spool vases are referenced in the Standard Encyclopedia of Opalescent Glass, 5th ed., at p. 140.  The SEOG reports that the vases were made in blue, green and white, which is confirmed by the 1901 trade journal ad's announcement quoted above that Jefferson issued the pattern in "three colors".  Jefferson's Lily Spool vases vases terminate in a notched base made to fit into a metal holder.  Metal holders for vases vary:  in the photos higher up on this page, the holder shown under the Lily Spool variant with the flattened mouth is identical to the holder featured in the original 1901 Jefferson advertisement.  The pretty winged holder under the Jack-in-the-Pulpit vase seems to reflect the influence of later Art Deco design of the 1920's.  According to the SEOG, the winged holder has been found in conjunction with a variety of vases from different companies. 

         In 1905, four years after issuing the Single Lily Spool vase, Jefferson produced a second, larger vase with a spool pattern known now as Jefferson Spool.  This 1905 vase appears in Part C of this guide. 

A rare blue opalescent Twisted Rope vase,
with an illustration from a Jefferson Glass Co. advertisement
placed in the August, 1901 China, Glass & Pottery Review

photo (left) by David A. Peterson, all rights reserved

Twisted Rope.  We include this elegant and rare vase here, because we believe that it is a Jefferson invention, although until now the vase's origins have been unknown.  The 7 5/8" Twisted Rope vase shown above features a slender body that tapers toward a flattened ball stem with a foot measuring 3" in diameter.  A raised glass thread winds counter-clockwise from the bottom to the rim, which has a distinctive round mouth with the back of the rim pulled up into peak. The surface of the glass between the threads is stippled, and opalescence is concentrated at the top of the vase and the vase mouth. Twisted Rope vases were first brought to the attention of collectors by David A. Peterson, author of Vaseline Glass:  from Canary to Contemporary.  

          According to Peterson, prior to March, 2008, only six documented examples of the vase were known to exist:  two in vaseline opalescent, two in blue opalescent and two in clear-to-white opalescent. One also had been reported in cranberry (non-opalescent) glass.  The green example shown below was discovered by E-Bayer unclechamps and sold on E-Bay on March 9, 2008 for $335.  This is the first green Twisted Rope vase to be documented: 

A recent E-Bay discovery:  the sole documented
example of a green Twisted Rope vase

photos courtesy of unclechamps

          Our research has led us to conclude that that Jefferson Glass is the maker of Twisted Rope vases.  The vase's Jack-in-the-pulpit mouth with one pulled up peak is very similar to that of Jefferson's 1901 Single Lily Spool vase shown higher up in this guide.  In addition, Twisted Rope vases closely resemble the vase depicted in an August, 1901 Jefferson advertisement from China, Glass & Pottery Review; a detail from this ad is shown at the top of this section, and the ad is shown in its entirety below.  Although the ad illustration omits the "twisted rope" threading, the vase depicted has the same unusual mouth pulled up into a peak found on Twisted Rope vases, the same flattened ball stem and a a nearly identical general design. Since the vase illustration is a fairly small-sized element of the ad, it may well be that the illustrator opted to simplify the illustration and omit details such as the threading in depicting the vase:

Jefferson Glass advertisement
from the August, 1901 China, Glass & Pottery Review

Peterson has long speculated that Twisted Rope vases are are a Jefferson product.  He has noted that Jefferson made both cranberry and opalescent glass in the same 1902-1905 period -- which might explain why the vases have been sighted in both opalescent and cranberry glass.  In addition, Peterson has noted that  the two known blue Twisted Rope vases are the distinctive blue of Jefferson's opalescent glass, and that the two known vaseline examples are a shade of yellow typical of Jefferson's canary opalescent glass.

          Twisted Rope vases are featured in The Standard Encyclopedia of Opalescent Glass, 5th ed., at p. 164.  We welcome information from E-Bayers who might offer any other evidence linking these vases to Jefferson, and we would be interested in learning about any additional sightings of Twisted Rope vases.

    

A blue opalescent Jefferson Stripe vase
photo by curculiosglass

Other Jefferson Jack-in-the-Pulpit Vases.   Jefferson's bulbous (bulb-shaped) vases occasionally appear in Jack-in-the-Pulpit variations.  The Jefferson Stripe vase shown above is the same vase shown in the advertisement illustration two pictures up -- the striped vase on the ad's right-hand side simply lacks the Jack-in-the-Pulpit mouth.  Jefferson's Stripe vases are featured in this guide's Part E.

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Jefferson Vase Guide Table of Contents

A. Conventional vases          B. Whimsey vases          C. Novelty vases          F.  Striped Vases         E. Bulbous Vases        

_________ o _________

          Many thanks to E-Bayers   starrfir1, mrvaselineglass  and  unclechamps  for  generously contributing photographs to this guide.  Special thanks to author  David A. Peterson  for information.  Rights to all photos belong to the photographers, and pictures should not be used without their permission.  Text is (c) 2008 curculiosglass, all rights reserved.  To locate any E-Bay seller mentioned here,  just click on "Site Map" at the bottom of your E-Bay screen, and then click on "Feedback Forum" at the right top corner of the large menu that pops up.  Type or copy the seller's name into the Feedback Forum's search blank.

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