Duck Marbles from the Seike family

[Joe2]

5 hours ago, shiroaiko said:

@Joe2, @davesnothere, thanks for showing me your marbles!🫧✨

I prepared the yellow patches, matching sets for figure 8s, transitionals, and early cat's eyes. Please have a look!

 Opaque white tends to spread and bleed on the surface.

Figure8s and submerged ribbons. 

We can see many dark green bits here in these marbles. 

Opaque white with white bits is used for the pair. 

Earlier type of cat's eyes? Other colors are dark amber and blue. 

Tatsukichi Isogami filed two cat's eye patents (utility model rights) between March and May of 1938, so based on the records, he’s considered the “father of cat’s eyes” in Japan.

IMO, Seike may have been making cat’s eyes even earlier. His ribbon marbles often got unstable ribbons. When he started making submerged ribbon marbles, he might have realized the great potential of vane-like structures inside the glass. 

Unlike Isogami, Seike's patch/ribbon type vanes are white. The part that carries color, or where he changes color, is the base glass. 

 

 

The yellow marbles are local finds. They don't glow. No fracture. Left two are not spherical. I think the intensity of yellow reflects thickness of yellow. The yellow is very soft. @Joe2, do you find them similar to yours? 

Smaller marbles are 13 mm. Bigger ones are 17 mm. 

Other Seike patches with yellow. 17 and 15 mm.

I almost forget about this. The yellow is really soft and spreads on alabaster. The ribbon looks affected by the underlying purple. This lot is from the UK. 

I hope these photos help convey the kind of yellow Seike made and used for alabaster patches.

Thank you! That Mushroom is a vary nice example, vary nice 🤎🤍🤎🤍🤎

[Joe2]

8 hours ago, shiroaiko said:

@Joe2, @davesnothere, thanks for showing me your marbles!🫧✨

I prepared the yellow patches, matching sets for figure 8s, transitionals, and early cat's eyes. Please have a look!

 Opaque white tends to spread and bleed on the surface.

Figure8s and submerged ribbons. 

We can see many dark green bits here in these marbles. 

Opaque white with white bits is used for the pair. 

Earlier type of cat's eyes? Other colors are dark amber and blue. 

Tatsukichi Isogami filed two cat's eye patents (utility model rights) between March and May of 1938, so based on the records, he’s considered the “father of cat’s eyes” in Japan.

IMO, Seike may have been making cat’s eyes even earlier. His ribbon marbles often got unstable ribbons. When he started making submerged ribbon marbles, he might have realized the great potential of vane-like structures inside the glass. 

Unlike Isogami, Seike's patch/ribbon type vanes are white. The part that carries color, or where he changes color, is the base glass. 

 

 

The yellow marbles are local finds. They don't glow. No fracture. Left two are not spherical. I think the intensity of yellow reflects thickness of yellow. The yellow is very soft. @Joe2, do you find them similar to yours? 

Smaller marbles are 13 mm. Bigger ones are 17 mm. 

Other Seike patches with yellow. 17 and 15 mm.

I almost forget about this. The yellow is really soft and spreads on alabaster. The ribbon looks affected by the underlying purple. This lot is from the UK. 

I hope these photos help convey the kind of yellow Seike made and used for alabaster patches.

Thank you! That Mushroom is a vary nice example, vary nice 🤎🤍🤎🤍🤎

[Joe2]

[davesnothere]

@Joe2 I think those are Taiwan made

[akroorka]

13 hours ago, davesnothere said:

I never felt that this marble was german made I've made the argument that the cadmium in the orange/yellow was not a german trait.

The prewar seikes definitely share this trait. Not seeing uranium at all.

I included my cats with the same red orange for comparison. 

 

This one may need a separate post Dave.
There could be some great discussion there.
Marble--On!!

[shiroaiko]

8 hours ago, akroorka said:

This one may need a separate post Dave.
There could be some great discussion there.
Marble--On!!

I agree! 

[shiroaiko]

@davesnothere Do you still have chilly weather in Canada? I took a walk this afternoon to see cherry blossoms in the castle park. They were about half bloom, but the forecast says showers and colder weather will persist for the next few days. 

I agree that the marbles you selected are beautiful and you can forget about the weather.

I had a feel IDing these is very difficult. To get the right answers, I need to see the whole lot/s they belonged to. 

 

About the marble you posted earlier, I finally found the picture I wanted to compare. The Instagram post was made by artbillescollection last month. 

The color and style of the center marble probably matches El Aguila. I think this marble is really nice...they use bright colors including the white alabaster base. Very cheerful.🫧✨

I also get a similar feeling from one of the marbles in your latest photo. I think you’ll spot the one I mean right away.😃

 

[davesnothere]

@shiroaiko its not the nicest spring, we've had grey and snow all week.

Thanks for the info I suspected such on the marbles. 

I would post the lot but I've mixed them into my bulk containers.

I'm struggling with it .

My interests are early marbles , makes it harder to sort 😊

[shiroaiko]

@davesnothere, I think a lot of people end up mixing lots, especially after sorting out certain types of marbles. I also get the urge to classify everything and put one type in each box, which would make my shelf more organized. I love English wisplers and I couldn't resist doing it for them. Once I remove marbles from lots, I forget everything. So I regret and don't do this for other marbles.

Early marbles are nice. 😊 I also like them very much.  

[shiroaiko]

19 hours ago, Joe2 said:

@Joe2, I also got a Taiwanese feel from your marbles, but I thought Taiwanese marbles usually have a blank spot around the cutline. I was curious if there are any examples where the ribbons meet right at the center.

Although they are far from the perfect match, I managed to find several examples. 

and I found the ones with narrow purple lines are nice. 😃

Not all of them, but the colors have a powder look. 

 

[shiroaiko]

Red ribbons in white base. The white is either opaque or alabaster. 

 

Big fat ribbons. 

 

Thinner ribbons. Left two got special ribbons. Color on color. 

 

Even thinner. Two ribbons join in the far right example. 

 

Alabaster is harder than opaque. Red tends to bleed here. 

 

Different recipe? Red doesn't bleed. 

 

[shiroaiko]

Another type of prewar marble Naoyuki Seike made was the wirepull. On November 13, 1936, he filed a utility model for a marble-making device that produced machine-made swirls. It was officially published on September 14, 1937, under Utility Model No. 13819 (Shōwa 12). The document can be viewed here: (https://www.j-platpat.inpit.go.jp/c1801/PU/JP-S12-013819/22/ja). 

The boxes here are Seike's wirepull boxes. The photograph is given to me by Roberto Borromeo, the current owner. 

The paper label on the box reads 16 Bolitas Japonesas, the source was Argentina. The Bolitas Japonesas box was prepared for the South American market.

Swirls are very busy. I saw another Bolitas Japonesas box, and swirls are less busy. 

Fairylite is a brand of Graham bros. Ltd. a London based company (1887-1970). I learned this first at AAM, a post by slagqueen on Sep 27, 2019. According to her, the company imported marbles from Hong Kong/Far East.

"Foreign" is a labeling used during the time of rising Japanese antipathy around WW2. After the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War (known in the West in part through incidents like the Manchurian conflict and the Nanjing Massacre), anti-Japanese sentiment grew in the UK and other countries. This led to boycotts of Japanese goods. During this period, Japanese products were often sold under generic labels such as "Foreign" to obscure their origin.

This negative sentiment toward Japanese products continued even after World War II. In 1954, the UK enforced stricter regulations requiring country-of-origin labeling on all imports. Until then, Japanese marbles had benefited from Most-Favored-Nation status by being routed through Hong Kong. 

Not all of them but some greens got dark green bits. 

All the photos are from Roberto. 🙏

At a glassmakers’ conference held on November 12, 1937, Seike said that the United Kingdom was his largest customer. This was reported in the December 1937 issue of Kagaku to Kōgyō (Science and Industry) magazine. Based on this, it’s likely that prewar wirepulls found in the UK were most likely made by Seike. 

These are from my collection. The green got dark green bits. It is interesting the white swirls got one big bubble each. 

 

 

 

 

Edited 1 hour ago by shiroaiko
One photo in the end was deleted.

[akroorka]

7 hours ago, shiroaiko said:

Naoyuki Seike made was the wirepull.

Thanks for joining "TheMarbleConnection" shiroaiko.

You are lighting the marble collectors world up with your collection and insights.

I just love this stuff---

Marble--On!!

[Ric]

@shiroaiko I agree with, Art. I too am happy you are here! And now you are showing some of my favorite marbles - swirls with lots of transparent glass. They are very nice!

[shiroaiko]

@akroorka @Ric, thank you so much! I’m really happy to be here and to connect with people who love marbles. Transparent swirls are my favorites too. For Japanese people, traditional toys were either made from clay, wood or paper. But when glass came into the picture (domestic production of glass marbles started from 1892 when Tamakichi Tokunaga started manufacturing marble stopper bottles), we were captivated by its transparency. There’s something magical about being able to see through a material—it's a kind of wonder. We love transparency and translucence so much.