Vitro and Akro ?

[Mojo]

3 again for you all to see 

And maybe ID 👌😎👍

[Steph]

Seriously ... you might be sitting on a treasure trove of beautiful Akro-like non-American marbles which are totally foreign to us.  

You may be our newest source for research into marbles which are abundant in the Netherlands but which we don't know about yet over here.  


 

[Mojo]

59 minutes ago, Steph said:

Seriously ... you might be sitting on a treasure trove of beautiful Akro-like non-American marbles which are totally foreign to us.  

You may be our newest source for research into marbles which are abundant in the Netherlands but which we don't know about yet over here.  


 

Ill keep posting then 👌😎👍

[Ric]

7 hours ago, Steph said:

Seriously ... you might be sitting on a treasure trove of beautiful Akro-like non-American marbles which are totally foreign to us.  

You may be our newest source for research into marbles which are abundant in the Netherlands but which we don't know about yet over here.  


 

This is exactly what I am thinking, Steph, and why I am hesitant to stretch too far to ID some as American-made.

[Mojo]

4 hours ago, Ric said:

This is exactly what I am thinking, Steph, and why I am hesitant to stretch too far to ID some as American-made.

Maybe this is the answer why i have the ones i got and look like vitro and akro ......last part of this story says between 1930 and 1950 shippid "fake" american marbles too europe   

The years around the change from the 19th to the 20th century were, also for the German marble production, real crisis years. WW1 was threatening and there was also the rumor that in America people were already very advanced in building a machine to make glass marbles. America was the largest buyer of almost all types of German marbles, so this could be a noose. To make matters worse, many Europeans took the gamble to build a new future in that great America. Many glass workers from the Thuringia region also left for America. The latter were welcomed there with open arms, they could use their knowledge and experience very well in the design and manufacture of glass and therefore also marbles. Soon, both in America and Germany, machines were designed to make glass marbles, but most attempts were unsuccessful.

Until Marten Christensen, an American of Danish descent, came with his machine. This was the breakthrough. He was patented in 1904 and immediately founded the M.F. Christensen and Son Company. With this machine one could make marbles, half machine. There was still a lot of manual work and craftsmanship involved. These semi-machined marbles are called "transitionals" by collectors and, just like the handmade glass marbles, have a kind of pontil. The marble factories sprang up like mushrooms in America. And soon their own needs were met with marbles. Little was exported to other countries.

Here countries in Asia, e.g. Japan, later convenient use of. Soon, machine marbles were also made there, which looked a lot like the American transitionals. These marbles often went to Europe and therefore also to the Netherlands. The elderly among us will know these marbles well, they were often exported to the Netherlands between 1930-1950. Because of this competition from Japan and later other countries, such as Taiwan, many American companies disappeared as quickly as they came. Fortunately, there are still a few active, such as e.g. the Champion Agate Company.

[Ric]

This is very interesting Joep. Can you tell me where the story is from?

[Mojo]

14 minutes ago, Ric said:

This is very interesting Joep. Can you tell me where the story is from?

I googled in dutch

European Factory's Marbles and this popped up 

https://www.knikkerwereld.nl/glasmachinaal.php

 

This is the second half of the story on that website ⬇️⬇️

After Christensen's invention, the development in America was viewed with sorrow in Thuringia. Until now, they had not been able to design a good machine and were therefore in danger of losing the battle.

Again it was a descendant of the Greiner family, this time Otto Greiner, a cousin of Elias and Septimus, who came up with the solution. He had one of the better machines from America rebuilt in Lauscha. This, of course, put him on a heavy fine. Because of this fine and the crisis, his company was on the brink of collapse. Nevertheless, he was allowed to make marbles with this machine, which was started in 1912-1913. Soon several machines arrived in and around Lauscha, such as that of the "Schneiderhütte".

By 1920, the crisis was somewhat overcome again and Otto Greiner's move turned out to be not so bad. Germany was again a leading country in marble production. Glass marbles were made mechanically in Lauscha until the end of the 1970s. In the course of the 20th century, marble machines were also built in other places. At the beginning of 1950, the Hopf und Hopf company, in Coburg-Esbach, started producing both clay and glass marbles. They continued doing this until about 1985.

Marbles were also made in Illmenau, at the Illmenauer Glassworks. They started this at the end of the 50s and stopped production in 1990.

This immediately ended an enormous era: the large-scale production of marbles in Germany. Fortunately, all these types of marbles can also be found in the Netherlands.

The Seppenhütte of the Greiner family was demolished in 1977 and the Farbglasshütte was built on the same site in 1979. It is accessible to tourists and it is demonstrated how the most beautiful objects of glass, including the "Lauscha marbles", were made there over the centuries. Marbles are still made manually, almost in the same way as Elias Greiner invented it, only in a modern version.

If you come to Lauscha nowadays, you immediately see that this village has a great history in the field of glass art. Most shops, even the bakery and butcher, have antiques and modern glassware for sale.

Of course, marbles are still made in Germany, but the major producers now come from Asia and Mexico (Vacor de Mexico).

[Mojo]

Maybe....i have some german akro / vitro look a likes 

🤔 

[Mojo]

This one was indentified as one 

I have more of these 

[Ric]

Thank you, Joep. I had seen that site before.

Here is a side-by-side Google translation of the page (Dutch to English) for folks who may be interested. If I am not mistaken, Cees  (@cvdv), the Author, is also in Holland and he posts here occasionally.