Quezal Art Glass and Decorating Company
The Quezal Art Glass and Decorating Company was incorporated a century ago, on March 27, 1902. It was founded by Martin Bach, Sr., Thomas Johnson, Nicholas Bach, Lena Scholtz, and Adolph Demuth. The factory was located on the corner of Fresh Pond Road and Metropolitan Avenue in Maspeth, Queens, New York. In October 1902, the trademark “Quezal” was successfully registered. By 1904, roughly fifty glassworkers were employed at the works.
Martin Bach, Sr. was the president, proprietor, and guiding force behind this successful company. Born in 1862 in Alsace-Lorraine to German parents, he emigrated to the United States in 1891. Before his emigration, Bach worked in Saint-Louis, France, at the Saint-Louis Glass Factory. After Bach arrived in this country, he was hired by Louis C. Tiffany as the latter’s first batch-mixer or chemist at the newly established Tiffany Glass and Decorating Company, in Corona, Queens. After a period of about eight years, Bach left Tiffany and established his own glassworks.
Bach was assisted by Thomas Johnson, an English immigrant, and Maurice Kelly, a native of Corona, both of whom were gaffers or master glassblowers. Johnson and Kelly helped pave the way for Quezal’s early accomplishments and later recognition. Thomas Johnson, like Bach, was a founding member and also previously employed by Louis C. Tiffany. Johnson’s association with Quezal, however, was relatively short lived. Around 1907, Johnson left for Somerville, Massachusetts, where he became involved in making Kew Blas glass, under William S. Blake at the Union Glass Company. Maurice Kelly’s tenure with Quezal was also brief. Kelly worked at Quezal from January 1902 until July 1904, but by November 1904, he was making Favrile glass at Tiffany Furnaces, where he would happily remain until 1918.
Quezal art glass is usually signed so it can be more easily distinguished from similar items, including those marked Tiffany, Steuben, Kew Blas, Imperial, Fostoria, Lustre Art, and Durand. A few of the different marks that are sometimes found on genuine Quezal items include “Quezal N.Y.,” “Quezal,” accompanied by a decorative scroll underline, and “Quezal” together with a prefix letter and numeral. Two variations of the mark, “Quezal,” by itself, are known: it appears either engraved into the surface of the glass or else a special pencil or stylus was used, which left a platinum or silver signature. Vases and other tableware items are generally signed on the underside in the area of the pontil mark. The signature on a Quezal shade is usually found along the interior of the fitter rim, which is the part of the shade that adheres to the lighting fixture.
Martin Bach, Sr. was often given to generous actions and gave away a good many pieces of his beautiful Quezal glass to neighbors, friends, and even settled his local debts with his wares. When he died of cancer on August 1, 1921, at the age of fifty-nine in the Greenpoint Hospital in Brooklyn, unfilled orders for Quezal art glass totaled some $350,000 – a considerable sum in 1921. Complicating matters, Quezal was experiencing financial difficulties under the management of Robert Robinson, president, and Martin Bach, Jr., vice-president.
Dr. John Ferguson, a close friend of the Bach family and their family physician, was brought in as an investor. Dr. Ferguson, together with three other wealthy friends, raised the capital necessary to keep the factory operational. The investors contributed an undisclosed sum of money and promised additional financing if Martin Bach Jr. could show a profit of $1,000 at the end of the year.
Notwithstanding the infusion of capital, in December 1923, the Quezal Art Glass and Decorating Company was sold to Edward Conlan, a personal friend of Dr. Ferguson, and in January 1924, the Quezal Art Glass and Decorating Company was reorganized as the Quezal Glass Manufacturing Company. Dr. Ferguson served as president and Martin Bach Jr. served as general manager.
Several important glass artisans were employed in the art glass shop, including Harry and Percy Britton, William Wiedebine, and Emil Larson, a gaffer hired in 1923. Sadly, by early 1924, the majority, if not all, of Quezal’s artisans from the art glass shop had left the factory, which closed soon thereafter. These individuals and Martin Bach, Jr., who was in possession of his father’s glassmaking formulas, moved on to other glass manufacturers, including the Imperial Glass Company in Bellaire, Ohio, and the Durand Art Glass division of the Vineland Flint Glass Works, in Vineland, New Jersey.
The Gorham Manufacturing Company in Providence, Rhode Island, and the Alvin Silver Manufacturing Company in Sag Harbor, Long Island, purchased Quezal art glass, which they in turn embellished in their shops with silver overlay decoration in the fashionable Art Nouveau style and later resold. Gorham’s silver overlay designs mostly include stylized floral motifs.
