I have not counted the number of names on iron cookware that I have come across but it's probably over 200 different names. The early pieces were mostly unmarked but waffle irons, tea kettles and some other pieces often were marked with brand names or makers' names. There were just many more and smaller foundries in the early days and, later, the number of foundries became less while the production of each grew larger until, today, we have ONE maker of cast iron cookware in the US plus, possibly, several very small ones (Finex for example).