Blenko Glass Company
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| Private | |
| Industry | Glassware |
| Founded | 1921 |
| Founder | William J. Blenko |
| Headquarters | Milton, West Virginia, United States |
| Website | www |
Blenko Glass Company, located in Milton, West Virginia, is known for its artistic hand-blown glass.
William J. Blenko was born in London, England in 1853. He worked at a glass factory in his youth. In 1893, he emigrated to Kokomo, Indiana, in the US, where he established the first American factory to produce sheet glass for stained glass windows. In 1903, he was forced to close his factory and return to England, due to an economic downturn.
His second business venture was in 1909, in Point Marion, Pennsylvania. This endeavor quickly failed, as did a third, in Clarksburg, West Virginia. At that time, Blenko found work at other established Ohio and West Virginia glass companies and purportedly received a job offer from Louis Comfort Tiffany.
In 1921, Blenko started another sheet glass company, this time setting up in Milton, West Virginia spurred on by the low natural gas prices in the area, a major concern for glass manufacturers of the time, which drew many prospective glassblowers to the area. His new company was originally named Eureka Glass Company, later changing the name to Blenko. Until the arrival of his son, William H. Blenko, in 1923, he had no employees, making and selling all of his glass himself.
Soon after the onset of the Great Depression, which decimated the stained glass market, Blenko began to produce stemware and tableware, after finding two expert glassblowers to work for the company in 1930. However, this did not mean the end of Blenko’s stained glass industry. Blenko Glass Company still produces hand-blown sheet glass for use in stained glass windows, as well as architectural glass.
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Wikipedia