Where Are The Big Ravenswoods?

[Steph]

Here's a passage from an article written about the operations at Ravenswood in about 1944. Published in 1945 in the Science and Mechanics magazine, but written when Charles Turnbull was still alive. (He died in 1944.)

Sure seems to be a "we were there" account with specific info about the production of big marbles, 3/4" and up. Any reason to doubt it?

The marble glass is tapped from the furnace or tank over the marble machine through an adjustable orifice, which controls the diameter of the finished product. The stream of glass is cut by part of the marble machine called a shear which shuttles from one side to the other of the glass flowing through the orifice so that the piece cut off drops to one side or the other onto the parallel, spirally-grooved rollers of the marble machine. Seven sizes are made: 1/2", 9.16", 5/8" 11/16" 3/4", 1" and 1 1/4". Two orifices are used; a 3/4" for marbles up to 11/16" in diameter, and a 1 and 1/4 inch orifice for all larger sizes.

I have a copy of the article, but you can read it at this page: Ravenswood Glass Novelty Works. It discusses the way Ravenswood made glass from batch and a little bit about the chemistry. Also mentions how the war was making it challenging to find the materials needed to make the glass. Pretty cool article actually.

So anyway, seems pretty technical and detailed. And it discusses big 'ol Ravenswoods specifically. So where are they?

[glangley]

Well, they could all be Jabo's, which isn't a bad thing at all, but I had questioned the yellowish based one in these pics as well as the clearish one with the brown. Check em out, they are all big, well bigger than 3/4in.

[Steph]

Here's a 7/8"-er a friend of mine has with his Ravenswoods. I used to want to argue with him just on the basis of size. But now I can't.

It's blue and brown.

[duffy]

it would be my guess that lots more smaller marbles are made if ya got orders for em...1 bag of 40 +1shooter....so it would be common sense that there were more smaller ones made...plus the material would make more smaller marbles and if materials were at a premium you would want more product so maybe that could xplain the where are they question...

[david Chamberlain]

My suspicions are that some latitude was used in the article when the author said "seven sizes are made." It probably should have said "seven sizes can be made." Between the few people I've seen with advanced collections of Ravenswood marbles there is just a small smattering of larger examples. I have a 13/16" a I recall that was authenticated by Mike Johnson and I have a 3/4" serious brown one; other than that....zilch! Oh, a few approaching 11/16"+ but that's it. Maybe Al can provide some info. on the number of types of Ravenswood bags in which there was "One Large One." I'll have to take another look at that Ravenswood Catalog. By the way, I have some extra mint examples of that if anyone is interested. David

[Alan]

Since vintage marbles were made almost exclusively to play marbles with - any marble larger than 3/4" would:

1. Be too large for a child's hand to shoot with

2. Not conform to marble playing regulation - which IIRC limit marble diameter to 3/4".

We all know some vintage types that were made larger than 3/4" - but we should remember that they were made to be played with - not collected as we do today.

[lstmmrbls]

After some of the ridiculous stuff I have read in old articles I would say, Heck yes, there is plenty of reason to question the article.

[Steph]

A 1 and 1/4" orifice seems a pretty obscure thing to simply make up.

I haven't read any reviews on it yet but I expect a magazine with a name like Science and Mechanics to be more credible than, say, some of the newspaper filler articles of the time.

So even if that particular "orifice" wasn't used a LOT, it sure sounds (to me) as if it existed and that Charles Turnbull deemed it worth discussing.

[m!b$]

That blue/brown shooter in post #2 does look Ravenswood to me. That is what I would have guessed it as being. Maybe most of the shooters are in collections, and maybe there never were very many to begin with. There aren't all that many of the smaller Ravenswoods, compared to other makers, seems like, anyway. And of the few that I have (ten total), four are noticeably out of round. So, maybe they decided not to make many shooters for that reason also.

[duffy]

he said the orifice could adjust up to 1-1/4 inch.....i dont see a mystery here or anything that needs to be picked to death......maybe a diagram of the tank or what size rebar was handy to punch out the tank...but really...they prob made lots more out of the 3/4 orifice.....i wouldnt think ravenswood marketed out of rounds ...there was alot of diggin there on the river when they was discovered...lots of their marbles ended up there...it was widely believed they didnt even make shooters there for awhile...fwiw...that machine there in the article has been touched by me in recent history....it lived along time in tenn......its now restored and a purty blue...

[lstmmrbls]

Actually it does seem like a fairly accurate article. There is one major piece of equipment not mentioned though. That would be the machine used for rounding the larger sized marbles. The orifices mentioned would be part of the furnace, not the rounding rollers. So now we ask, was there a large size auger setup at the plant when it was gone through?

[Alan]

Does anyone know if Ravenswood made industrial marbles?

[n2marbles]

Here's a cool bag of ravenswoods. They are all a little over a inch. Nice muticolored patch looking marbles? Steve

[david Chamberlain]

n2marbles,

That's the ubiquitous Ravenswood Paul Bunyan bag and it has been pretty much determined that Akro made them. Ye ol' 'eyelash' determinant. I wish Al would weigh in re. any large ones in bags besides this particular bag.

Re. the thought that there weren't many smaller ones assuming we're talking about 5/8". Well.....not! In 1987 two tons of them surfaced in a warehouse in WV. This is doccumented in Castle & Peterson. I went through many of the 50 lb. boxes that were shipped to California in 1989. There was a s---load of them! And my suspicions are that those two tons worth were just the tip of the iceberg production-wise. David

[Al Oregon]

Here's a post that Ron Shepherd did on LOM back in 2007 or so:

---------------------

Here goes, believe what you want. About the second year i was researching Ravenswood i ran into my first Paul Bunyans. I was directed to a woman in Ravenswood for Ravenswood marbles and info. She was a close relative of Edwin Safreed who built most of the equipment and operated everything at Ravenswood. She showed me my first Paul Bunyans and assured me that Edwin brought them straight from the factory that evening when he finished work. She said they were still to warm to hold in her hand. Faye Safreed daughter of Edwin also has told me over and over that her Dad made the Paul Bunyans at Ravenswood. She remembers watching him make them. Another former Ravenswood Novelty employee also told me that they were made at Ravenswood. Another former employee could not remember if they were made there.

I agree they look Master or Akro, and i know and have the bags with the paper label stating made by Akko and sold by Ravenswood. I have wondered if this was done to make the bags and marbles more saleable. The Akro name and marbles got more collectors attention and sold for much more than Ravenswood years ago. Years after the plant closed remaining stock and items were auctioned. Many in cases, maybe the Paul Bunyans was purchased then and the paper label added to resale them?

From what i know, none were ever found one the river bank while digging, but everything dumped here was dumped even later years after the auction. The actual company while in business never dumped at the river bank.

I have not had anyone confirm these being dug at Akro, or found in any Akro original package?

Akro and Ravenswood were always in competition. Akro people are the likely ones who destroyed the Ravenswood equipment over patient rights. Maybe Ravenswood had some Akro equipment or someone with former Akro knowledge.

I could go on, i have been after this item for more than ten years. My feeling is that there is a possibility that they were made at Ravenswood. The people who have told me so, have nothing at all to gain by not being truthful. I like to have more than one, usually three confirmations of any marble history. Even Paul Cox said they were made at Ravenswood and he was there and company owner.

It has always been assumed that since they looked Akro or Master and not like Ravenswoods, that they could not have been made by Ravenswood. Maybe both Akro and Ravenswood made them? One copying the other, who made them first?

You decide!! For now, i think they were made at Ravenswood Novelty. Until i or someone proves 100% that they were not.

Time to get off work, and bedtime. Hope it makes sense, and i could add more, but time and space.

Good luck!

[Al Oregon]

The mesh bag shown above and a similar polybag are the only ones with a Ravenswood label where I have seen larger marbles. However, the Genuine Old Fashion bag is also one attributed to Ravenswood - only has Ravenswood marbles (Ron has ocnfirmed the marbles, too) and here are two bags I have that have the larger marbles in them (same style so....?).

[bigjohn691500]

i always wondered about that these have been in my Raven bin for a while, but actually didnt know for sure,,, bj

[lstmmrbls]

Those sure look like Alley marbles to me. The Paul Bunyans are not swirls.

[david Chamberlain]

Paul Bunyans are definitely a patch style marble. Brushed patch in many cases throughout the 5-6 basic styles and then the singularly hybrid style that have surfaced in bags and at the same time as the Ravenswood find in WV in 1987. I got all my Paul Bunyans at that time as I did the Ravenswood marbles. I always wanted to consider them Ravenswood but the matter kept getting clouded. This was between 1989 and 2000+. Then in recent years I'd accepted that they were Akro. In all honesty, this is a case of someone who should have known.....me. I swear since 2009 there have been repeated back 'n' forths here where the 'eyelash' appearance on some of the Paul Bunyans was given credence again as linking them to Akro. I'm hoping that Ron's 2007 Statement is the last word on them because I can't imagine anything sounding more definitive and then it's coming from Ron. Not to inflate his head but if there's something about these marbles(or most any marbles) that Ron doesn't know than there's no one that knows it! David

[david Chamberlain]

Talked with Ron yesterday evening mainly re. the latest Joker Run, general Chat Board interactions but also the Paul Bunyans. The PB's had vexed him for years. Even with the verbal ancestral information provided in his 2007 statement regarding them we mutually agreed that there's often a diminishment of memory over certain things that were not necessarily consequential at the time. It wasn't stated quite that way but that's the jist of it. There's a degree of attention brought to marbles these days that was never so dense and exacting in the past. David

[venwood]

Could someone put up pics of the ones that they think are Paul Bunyon's. Thanks

[david Chamberlain]

I just sent a set to Jenny gratis so maybe she could photograph them and pop them up. They really are rather an undistinguished marble; they've just had a lot of press and confusion. David

[Steph]

we mutually agreed that there's often a diminishment of memory over certain things

Do you mean the diminishment of the memory of the people who were making the marbles?

That's what I think is so cool about having a 1940's article interviewing the boss. That's pretty fresh.

Adding the Paul Bunyans to the mix is a twist. So here are the two main questions I have in reference to that article. (trying to summarize and still keep the topic open while someone comes up with pix of Paul Bunyans for Stacy :-)

1. is it believable that Ravenswood made big marbles using that 2nd orifice?

2. if yes, then would those large marbles be the Paul Bunyans, or would they have been swirls?

[david Chamberlain]

I would really like to lean towards the Paul Bunyans being made by Ravenswood as Ron states in his 2007 piece. If you note he does sort of wind-up throwing his hands in the air much like he concluded yesterday evening when we talked.

Regarding memory lapses this covers everyone. Mike Johnson in the many years he researched his book AMERICAN MACHINE-MADE MARBLES(2006) regularly ran into contradictory past rememberances from factory workers, family of factory workers, etc.

Anyway at this stage I'm with Ron in giving them the Ivory Soap purity % possibility of being made at Ravenswood.

By the way, I do have sets of them for sale. On my last trip to California I shored up my dwindling supply of the blue one with green patch; that one is actually somewhat dramatic. Mostly they're ho hum....sorry! David

[venwood]

Hello David how many in a set and how much do you want for them? Can you post some pics. You can email or post it here. Tryed to PM you but it wouldn't let me. Thanks Stacy