Duncan & Miller Glass Museum

Glass manufacturing in Western Pennsylvania began in 1797 with the establishment of the O’Hara & Craig Glassworks located on the south bank of the Monongahela River just below the point. By the latter half of the Nineteenth Century, there were dozens of glass houses in the region producing the majority of all glass manufactured in the United States. The reasons for this spectacular growth were location, availability of raw materials including fuel, transportation, and a growing market. Pittsburgh’s location at the confluence of the Monongahela and Allegheny forming the Ohio provided access to a vast river network reaching to the Gulf of Mexico and up the Mississippi/Missouri watershed to the entire middle of the continent. As the first “Gateway to the West” Pittsburgh provided the Nation’s westward expansion with many needed glass items, ranging from window glass, bottles, barware, tableware, canning jars, furniture knobs, druggist ware, and fine cut glass. By the time Geo. Duncan and Son’s was established, the glass industry was expanding rapidly.

George Duncan was born in a small town in Fayette County, PA in 1812. In 1836, he moved to Pittsburgh and was a hammer man at the Sligo Iron Works. As early as 1856, George was briefly a principle of the Pittsburgh City Glass Works of Cunningham and Co. In 1865 Duncan becomes a partner in the D. C. Ripley & Co., Tremont Glass Works at 10th and Carson Streets in the Pittsburgh area of Birmingham (later called the Southside). Upon the death of D. C. Ripley Sr., George Duncan purchased all shares of the company and became its sole owner on January 29, 1874. Mr. D. C. Ripley Jr. formed another company located at Bingham St. between 8th & 9th Streets in Birmingham.

April 1, 1874, George Duncan and his wife Agnes formed the company as George Duncan & Sons by selling to their son James E and their daughter Susan N. Duncan Heisey 25% interest each in the glass factory and associated land for $1 and natural love and affection. At that time the Southside of Pittsburgh was the industrial hub of the city. The factory was located just two blocks from the Monongahela River, which provided an easy and cheap access, by barge, for the sand, silica and potash needed to make glass. Coal to fuel the furnaces was readily available from Coal Hill (now Mt. Washington) just blocks away. Natural gas soon became readily available and provided a much cheaper and cleaner.

John Ernest Miller was born in 1840 in Germany, his family settled in America in 1845. He worked in glass factories in Pittsburgh and Steubenville, Ohio from the age of 10. He enlisted in the Union army during the Civil War from 1861 to 1864. Following his war service, he worked for the Steubenville Flint Glass Works, independent mold maker Washington Beck, and King, Son & Co. He joined George Duncan & Sons in 1874 as a mould shop superintendent and designer. Miller’s most famous design is Three Face inspired by the profile of his wife Elizabeth Bair Miller. He worked at Duncan for 52 years, never missing a day of work. He retired at the age of 87.

In 1891 the United States Glass Company formed a trust by the merger of several glass companies. Duncan joined this union but the association ended in 1892 when the plant was destroyed by fire. Both James Duncan and Augustus Heisey decided to leave U.S. Glass and pursue separate interests. Heisey established his own glass house in Newark, Ohio in 1897.

James E. Duncan Sr., who became head of the firm in 1877 when George Duncan died, brother Harry B. Duncan and John Ernest Miller selected a site for a new factory on Jefferson Avenue in Washington, Pennsylvania. Gas was plentiful and cheap for the furnaces and the Pennsylvania and B&O railroads ran through Washington to transport raw materials and glassware. Also The National Road (Route 40) connected Washington in both East & West directions.

On January 3, 1893, the new Washington plant opened (on the present day site of Pathways of SW PA, the Alpine Club & Burger King). The 16 Pot Deep Eye furnaces were fired up and glass produced on February 9th. The first newly designed pattern was #2000 Flowered Scroll.

The period from 1893 to the closing of the plant in 1955 is generally known as the Duncan-Miller period, although the company was initially known as Geo. Duncan’s Sons & Co. until November 15, 1900, when the firm was incorporated as Duncan & Miller Glass Company with Duncan family members and John Ernest Miller as stockholders. For the first three decades of the new company’s existence only clear glass was produced. Many of the Pattern Glass and Colonial Revival patterns of this era were decorated by engravings, etchings, colored stains and enamel, gold and silver either at the company or at independent decorating companies that bought Duncan blanks. Miller continued as the primary designer until his retirement in the mid-1920’s.

During the 1920’s Duncan began to produce colored glass and introduce patterns inspired by modern design, art deco in the 20’s and 30’s and mid-century modern in the 40’s and 50’s. These design trends were inspired by a series of industrial designers hired by Duncan including Robert A. May, James Rosati, Michael Lax, and Ben Seibel. Duncan also participated in Russel Wright’s American Way program which was side-tracked by World War II. The most popular and enduring dinnerware patterns, Teardrop, Canterbury, Early American Sandwich, and Hobnail were produced for decades.

The method of making handmade glass at the Duncan & Miller Glass Company was not much different than that of the numerous small plants scattered in the tri-state area of Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia. Only the artistry of design, the skills of the workers, the batch formulas and the lovely colors have distinguished their glass from others of the time. Most pieces required that ten persons handle each piece. Some, like the famous Pall Mall swan, which is considered one of the finest pieces ever produced by any firm, required fourteen.

All the work came to an abrupt end on June 13, 1955. Mechanization and foreign imports made the production of fine hand made glass uneconomical and so the decision was made to close the plant. The remaining inventory was advertised for sale and people came hundreds of miles to buy the last pieces of Duncan & Miller hand-made glass at greatly reduced prices.

Most of the moulds, machinery and equipment were sold to the U.S. Glass Company, Tiffin, Ohio to be used by their Duncan Division led by former Duncan & Miller President James Duncan III and employing many former Duncan workers. The United States Glass Company itself was dissolved in 1962 but glass manufacture continued at Tiffin under various owners until 1980 largely using Duncan moulds. In total, the Duncan & Miller legacy of glass manufacture encompasses 115 years.

The history of the Duncan/ Duncan & Miller Company, except for its remarkable duration, is typical of the glass industry in Western Pennsylvania. It is not unusual to trace an individual’s journey from child laborer to principal owner of a company. It is to keep alive the history of these glass companies and their impact on the economic development of the region, that organizations such as the National Duncan Glass Society have been formed.

National Duncan Glass Society. DUNCAN & MILLER GLASS “THE LOVELIEST GLASSWARE IN AMERICA”, Duncan & Miller History. Accessed February 23rd 2021. https://duncan-miller.org/history/.