The First Glass House Mold; Homer Brooke Comments

THE FIRST GLASSHOUSE MOLD.

Under date of April 24, Homer Brooke, of New York, a master mold maker and inventor of the original device for flowing glass from tanks or pots into molds, set us a letter of which the following is copy:

"I note article in your issue of April 6th, with reference to the demise of Joseph Zihlman, which reads, "was inventor of the first successful glass mold." As a manufacturer of glass molds since the early sixties, and my father, William Brooke, long before me, making all kinds of molds and mechanical contrivances for the successful manufacture of glassware for manufacturers throughout the United States and the Western Continent, as well as European countries, and the Far East, the statement interested me.

"My father and myself were the patentees of several inventions for special constructions of glass molds to greatly facilitate the glass worker, and making more perfect articles. I am at a loss to know what kind of mold the item refers to. Perhaps your Mr. W. S. McKee of the S. S., a successful and skillful manufacturer of all kinds of molds for glass, could intelligently inform your readers as to this 'first successful glass mold.' His training and experience would be intelligent and interesting reading along the lines you suggest.

"Old Andy Thompson, decades ago the pioneer mold maker of Pittsburg, made many successful glass molds, and his successors, all along the line, and especially in our own time, have made glass molds and implements almost talk.

"But really your suggestions, if time could be given them, with sketches of the old-time first molds, and improvements since made, and what objections and hindrances the improvers have had to meet, would make very interesting reading.

"I wish I had the present time to do it so as to add my long experiences as a glass engineer and mold maker."