| 64
Cast Iron Cookware News is published
bi-monthly by Steve Stephens. All rights
reserved. No part of this work may be
reproduced without written permission from
the publisher. Subscriptions are $15 and
begin with the January issue and end Dec.
31st. Regardless of when you subscribe
you will receive any back issues for the
year. Send subscriptions and all material
to: Steve Stephens, 28 Angela Ave.,
San Anselmo, CA 94960 (415) 453-7790
I saw a 00 skillet that had a Griswold stove advertising inside the skillet. The outside looked like a 00 ashtray but had no match holder. Could this have been for real? Also, I have two different Victor waffle irons. One is a No9, patterns 996 and 997. The wood handles are locked together with a square-like dial pin. (I'm not sure what he means by this -ed.) The other is a No8 and both irons have pattern 395 with the base being 396. The coil handles twist over the irons and don't have the rod with an eye that passes through the center of the coil handle as most do. The irons have two little angle feet at the base of the handle to center the irons with each other or lock them together. My No6 waffle iron has the same feature. Do you have any information on them?
Glen Gary, KY
The 00 advertising skillet you saw may have been genuine. As far as I have been able to determine, all Griswold ashtrays made in Erie have the match holder. I did see one without but it looked like the match holder may have been carefully removed--I couldn't tell for sure. The 00 ashtrays without the match holder were probably all made in the Wagner foundry after both companies came under the same ownership. Many of the Griswold patterns were transferred to the Wagner plant sometime after the Griswold foundry closed in 1957. Remember that most of what Griswold cast had a fine quality to it. Always look at a suspect piece to see if it looks like the same Griswold quality and has the same type of grain, writing and pattern numbers, etc. An advertising piece may have been modified from what the normal, piece looked like. Regarding your Victor waffle irons, they were made in the early years (c. 1900?) and probably c. 1930. The early (your No9) and the late (your No8) styles were very different from each other. I do not know if Victor waffle iron production was continuous or not from the early years to the late. Sometime in the late 20's or early 30's Griswold changed the
|
construction of their waffle irons. The new design needed fewer patterns because both halves of the iron were now identical and could be cast from the same patterns. The coil handle with the eye bolt thru the center was continued. Later a new, heavier coil handle was used which was attached without the eye bolt by having external "threads" cast on the irons which the coils could be screwed onto. This change made a three piece handle into a one piece handle and eliminated the need to tap threads in each iron for the eye bolt to screw into. The angle feet you mention were another change along with a change in the shape of the handle where it rested on the frame, allowing for the elimination of the small tit on one side of the irons and the corresponding notches on the top edge of the frame. All these changes are evolutionary and made the waffle irons cheaper and easier to manufacture while maintaining Griswold's high standards of quality.
*****
Ed Myers, AZ, notes that H.S.B.& Co. is Hibbard, Spencer, Bartlett & Co., a midwest hardware wholesaler operating in the early part of this century. (I do not know if they are still in business or when they started. -ed.) A man whose last name was Conover was their sales manager, Conover spelled backwards is Rev-O-Noc. Many of you may have seen Griswold waffle irons with Rev-O-Noc and H.S.B.& Co. on one iron of the waffle iron, Apparently these were made by Griswold for H.S.B. to sell through their catalog. Ed also mentioned that he has a Griswold sad iron heater (dome iron rack--see Harned p.61 bottan) marked "ERIE". It has three 7/16" u-shaped holes in each side of the base. -ed.
*****
GRISWOLD HOTEL and RESTAURANT EQUIPMENT
Catalog E-39. The following three pages are reprinted from the above catalog. A "Price List Effective July 10th 1939" came with the catalog along with a later price list (August 1st 1940) which does not pertain to catalog E-39. Both price lists show the same items and prices for the following three catalog pages. Some, but probably not all of the items shown, were also made in black iron. Some plated pieces which have had the plating stripped have shown up. These generally have the polished surfaces that only the plated pieces had. Note that the catalog shows three sizes of oval skillets. (I want to buy or trade for a No16½ OVal Skillet -ed)
|
