oldmarblenut

It looks like Dale D. Ziemianski, a well known modern artist who has done some children's book illustrations. here is his website www.d-alien.com

The rougher end is typically the cut off side, the "top" pontil is re-heated and twisted off leaving it a bit smoother and a tighter twist, I see the slight reverse to the twist but it is still predominantly left twisted, most often ( 99.9 % ), a right or left is the same on opposite end, I have seen a few over the years that do have a complete reverse twist but I do not own any at this time. In Hansel's photo, the top marble shows the shape of the diamond shear in the center, when squeezing the glass down it sometimes transfers the shape of the cutting tool, most often if the rotation of the marble stops while cutting, also not all German marble shears used a diamond shaped shear, the set I have has flat blade and leaves a smoother cut as the blade comes to rest at the edge of the cup. Are these smaller marbles Hansel?? under 3/4"??

Thanks Ron, glad you helped me figure them out! I'll post pix of my small handful of them when I get a moment.

Thanks for the info, I didn't know there was a book on Alley. There are other things I didn't know, you should check your inbox.....

Does anyone have a list of known Alley animal figurines? I was looking my group today and found I have 2 different squirrels, I found a frog today at the flea show that is slightly pink glass, I've never seen one and I am curious.

I can accept that

LOL, I do my best to explain myself clearly and completely within areas I know. My panties don't get bunched, they get twisted to the left when somebody decides to sidestep a question with another question. No spidermen for you...back in line! LOL

I agree with Al, I said mid 70's due to the type of MK's also on the back there is an offer for "20 ways to play jacks & rules, send 20 cents & self addressed stamped envelope"

They no longer have marbles in the product line, I wonder when MK stopped supplying them with marbles?

Yes Steph, all transparent base, even the white ones. The blue with white ribbons are light transparent blue base and some of the white ones have a thin clear line you can see into the clear core.

Furthermore... It is a big deal when you make a statement that doesn't make sense to a glass worker full of historical glass facts and 40+ years experience collecting marbles then ignore the questions asked about your statements and then come up with some side tracking information in an attempt to side track the question that you have no answer for. I will refer to somebody else's comment about you being rude and unprofessional. Stop confusing the newbies and stick to what you know.

German marble trade beads were drilled after they were cold. they were not made on a mandrel like the Chinese trade beads were. as for the + Chinese marbles I have no clue, I do not like crappy glass products so I can admit I know very little about it and would not have wanted to know useless information that would contradict the proper glass techniques. Yes I have seen the odd 2 types and I have my own theories on them that you would probably disagree on.

LOL, pull spots are from marbles placed into the annealing oven or leer that touched each other and stuck together just like the spots or eyes on Benningtons or from the carry in boy working multiple production lines collecting a group and not being careful, my gosh, if you tossed multiple hot glass balls into a bowl and rocked them around you would have one lumpy mess, also with most marbles having pull spots you will find tool marks ( two small dents )either side of the pull spot where they were separated with pinschers while still hot By the later times the handmades actually became better not worse as you mention, they became more round with less flaws and made of finer glass, brighter colors and less bubbles in the clear etc.. As I mentioned earlier, I have seen marble shears from peewee to very large. why would anyone shape a marble using marble shears then toss them into a bowl for better rounding? Maybe the rocking bowl technique was an experiment that they found out would not work, it would have to be one hot bowl to keep the little glass balls from fracturing from cold shock, or maybe even better, the rocking bowl technique was not for glass balls?? maybe clay or stoneware?? I have been collecting marbles since I was 9 years old, I am now almost 52, I was first exposed to hand made glass before I was 9, I live in an area where glass is our local history, I spent many many hours in the American Museum of glass reading about how things were done here in America and abroad, the ancient greek mosaic marbles could have possibly been rounded that way due to the lack of proper tools for rounding but I've never heard of the rocking bowl technique used in the German glass marble shops.

The only "one off" marbles I know exist are the paperweight type and sulphides, there are 2 types of paperweight styles, one has blotches of simple frit and the other is made of milefiori cane in a paperweight style but rounded as a marble, all 3 types have single pontils. One type that could be considered a "one off" is the end of cane where the cane has been folded over onto itself or swirled into a confusing design, they are end of cane so calling them "one off" is actually incorrect, they came from a cane, just they were the last one that most often lacked all the design features so were folded or swirled to make a marble, probably the last marble made during the gaffers shift.

Actually the larger ones are easier to make, also the size of the marble is determined by the size of the cane. any stretching off a larger glob would destroy the design foul the colors and drastically affect the final product. I have seen marble shears sized from peewee to over 2" I have never heard of hot glass German cane cut marbles being rounded in a foot pedaled bowl, this sounds like a process that would also contradict production principles, can you elaborate? They all come from a cane, I am confused by your previous answer, "one is cut from a cane and one is not" How did they make the ones rounded in the foot pedaled bowl???

Here is an interesting bag of marbles I found today the local flea market, they are from the Wells Mfg. co. New Vienna Ohio and contain 40 Marble Kings from the mid 70's. Does anyone know anything about this bag?

It's the last blizzard I want to see this year No doubt an amazing marble!

My friend was at this run, I am waiting on my box, he says it's a late X'mas present LOL

They are both cane cut marbles, and of course you could make a smaller cane out of it, maybe one worth 4-5 7/8" marbles from a 2-1/2" marble, what makes you think it was not of a cane?? When I made marbles at 2" I still made a cane just like the Germans did and most canes produce more than 4-5 marbles, I averaged about 6-8 on big cane and 8-10 on smaller cane, go ahead and weigh 3 to 4 marbles that are around 1", I'm sure it would be very close to the weight of a 2" marble. Unless you consider a large marble somewhere around the size of a softball and weighing around 5 lbs. LOL Large onions and large swirls all come from cane construction, it is my opinion ( and not only mine ) that clouds also came from cane, just they were the first off cane and maybe a second one cut depending on the amount of stretching to the color spots, single pontil clouds and 2 pontil clouds exist. I have always argued they were not made one at a time, it would defeat the purpose of production, something vital to the profits in any glass shop or factory. Do you have any idea the time it would take to make 4 single pontil clouds that were just 3/4" to 1" ?? the factory would go broke fast! it takes about 10-15 minutes minimum to make one that way, so at 4 marbles per hour the factory would be paying the glass working team at a rate of 500 to 10000% of their profits! Clouds can be found from peewee to well over 2", I guess you think the peewee clouds were made one at a time also?? I am sure that somebody here has a cloud and some onions that match in color and design. I had a few "sets" back in the day, a cloud and multiple onions with increasingly stretched colors in same design.

Jeroen... it looks close, the size was a solid 2-1/8" this auction says 2-1/6", and the yellow as I remember was pale like the one posted, not as bright, also the red and green specks were smaller and thinner like the one posted, I sold it to a collector in Indiana for $5750, my asking price was $6000 It had only slight as made tooling marks and was glossy clean 9.9, I had photo's on my old PC that was destroyed by fire, I think Clyde may have seen it back then.

What is the difference between a cane cut onionskin and a large onionskin?? tricky answer... .selbram regral rof eno regral a tsuj , enac a morf emoc htob yeht ... ! GNIHTON

That was a very nice marble, salt glazed grey body with cobalt splotches, probably American stoneware, nice price too! I agree with Clyde, nothing like a bennie.

That looks like a pale yellow base to me, I sold one like that years ago in a 2-1/8" size, it was on pale yellow, must have been same cane?? it was mint with as mades only, sold for a very hefty price. Notice how the body and one end has no twist? just the cut off end is twisted.

They look left twist to me Steph, can you show the doves right side up?

I doubt a blonde moment would fit in, when you make hundreds of pieces per day you don't have a blonde moment, consistency is the key to production work, it would foul up the whole team and un-twist the cane, it's quicker to throw it away and start fresh than it is to fiddle with it and make it work, common rules in the factories today, I'll stay with the goof around when they had the time. I've worked at both Fenton and Blenko glass while in Wva. on special contract runs, I did the ruby, burmese and cobalt ornaments for Fenton in 2007-2008, our 4 man team made around 750-800 per turn, about 35-40 seconds each one, they were the cobalt Canaan Valley Christmas ornaments and the ruby Mary Gregory ornaments and the Burmese hand painted ones, I had a gatherer, a hooker and a carry in boy, 2 of them were Fenton employees I taught how to make ornaments, this was when I worked for Hinkle glass in Buckhannon. if you search ebay you will find many of the ones I made then still being used in later years with different decorations as we made thousands of them. it still bothers me that Hinkle got the credit but I was working for him and did those particular runs. He only helped out on the Burmese, I was lead gaffer. I can't figure out how to paste the link LOL. :computer-17: