Edwin Bennett Pottery Company, Baltimore, Md.

OBITUARY.

HENRY BRUNT, general manager of the Edwin Bennett Pottery Co., Baltimore, died Dec. 16 at his home in that city. He was one of the leading potters of America, and had spent nearly fifty years in the business. At a special convention of potters in New Orleans forty years ago he was awarded first prize for his work in this line. He combined a considerable knowledge of geology and chemistry with his handling of the clay, and had made an extensive study of American clays. In these studies he developed some of the important properties of kaolin, the result being a tremendous boom in the kaolin districts of Florida and other parts of the South. In the pottery world he was recognized as one of its leading authorities.

Mr. Brunt was born at Penkhulk, England, and served as apprentice at one of the big potteries at Stoke-on-Trent. After becoming foreman of the kilns he took a special course in chemistry at Cambridge University with the particular intention of applying the knowledge to pottery manufacture. He later became manager of the Florence Pottery, at Stoke-on-Trent; thence, in the early eighties, coming to America and locating in Trenton, N.J. Five years later he went to Baltimore as manager of the old Chesapeake Pottery Co. and here introduced the making of opaque porcelain.

Henry Brunt.

When the Edwin Bennett Pottery Co. was formed a few years later he became managing director. This was in 1890, and he remained its head until his death. His conceptions in these later years embraced colored glaze ware, clay-painted ware and decorated china.

The Chicago Fair management awarded the Bennett pottery display the first prize and made a departure by recognizing Mr. Brunt as the brains of the display and awarding him a personal diploma for the great advancements he had made in American pottery work.