 | |
| Company type | Private company |
|---|---|
| Industry | Glassware |
| Founded | 1907 in Dunkirk, Indiana |
| Founder | Frank Merry |
| Defunct | 2002 |
| Headquarters | |
Key people | Frank W. Merry, Charles L. Gaunt |
| Products | pressed and blown glassware including lamp fonts, lamps and tableware |
Number of employees | 1,300+ (1979) |
Indiana Glass Company was an American company that manufactured pressed, blown and hand-molded glassware and tableware for almost 100 years. Predecessors to the company began operations in Dunkirk, Indiana, in 1896 and 1904, when East Central Indiana experienced the Indiana gas boom. The company started in 1907, when a group of investors led by Frank W. Merry formed a company to buy the Dunkirk glass plant that belonged to the bankrupt National Glass Company. National Glass was a trust for glass tableware that originally owned 19 glass factories including the plant in Dunkirk. National Glass went bankrupt in 1907, and its assets were sold in late 1908.
Indiana Glass Company mostly made tableware, lamps, and vases although it had additional products. Collectors consider the company a manufacturer of Depression glass, Goofus glass, and Carnival glass. One well known customer was the A&W drive-in chain that featured mugs of A&W Root Beer, and Indiana Glass was the original manufacturer of root beer mugs for that company. Another major customer was Kmart.
During 1957, Lancaster Lens Company acquired a controlling interest in Indiana Glass. Lancaster Lens Company was renamed Lancaster Glass Company, but Indiana Glass continued to be a separate entity. By the 1960s, a reorganization had Indiana Glass Company as a subsidiary of Lancaster Colony Corporation. Indiana Glass had a resurgence in sales during the 1970s, and began marketing some of its tableware for the home through Lancaster Colony's Tiara Exclusives. Indiana Glass continued operating in Dunkirk until November 2002, when the plant was closed. Although a glass plant owned by Lancaster Colony continued operating in Oklahoma under the name Indiana Glass Company, that plant was part of a sale to another glass company in late 2007.