On the afternoon of July 7, 1903, the former partners in the inoperative East Liverpool Potteries Company met in the home of Robert Hall to settle the affairs and distribute the physical assets of the Company. Mr. Hall accepted, as his share, ownership of the plant located on the south- east corner of East Fourth and Walnut Streets, which had previously been known as the West, Hardwick and George Pottery. Thirty-eight days later, on August 14, 1903, he founded The Hall China Company, East Liverpool, Ohio. Three oven kilns were fired, and thirty-three potters began to make bed pans and combinets, the first chinaware to bear the trade name, Hall China.

The Company, born among the depressing ashes of failure, arose, not phoenix like, but feeble and struggling for the very breath of life. It suffered from lack of capital and scrambled in stiff competition with more than a score of other small potteries. What plans Mr. Hall had for its future, what success he might have made of his unpromising acquisition, were never to be known. For, before he had an opportunity to get well under way, he died, in 1904, the year following the founding of the Company.

Development of Single-Fire Process

Robert Taggart Hall, son of the founder. assumed the management. Very early in his new job he began to investigate the possibilities of developing a glaze that would stand the heat required for bisque firing, thus making possible single-fire ware that would be proof against crazing. He had little to guide him. Ancient history hooks reputed that a single-fire china had been made during the Ming dynasty (A.D. 1368-164-1) in China, but the lore was lost, and beyond the encouraging fact that what had been done could be done again, Mr. Hall had no precedent to follow His practical experience. and that of his superintendent, Robert Meakin, made it clear, however, that a leadless glaze was necessary to the successful development of the single-fire process, for lead could not stand the temperature necessary for bisque firing.

From 1903 to 1911, Mr. Hall experimented tirelessly to develop the single-fire process and struggled to produce, at a profit, sufficient white ware, such as combinets, bed pans, mugs, and jugs, to keep the Company in operation. Dinnerware, added to the line in 1908, was made in small quantities until 1914, at which time its manufacture :vas discontinued until much later in the Company's history.

The fact that the Hall kilns kept burning during the initial years was due largely to the efforts of Francis I. Simmers, who became associated with Robert Taggart- Hall soon after the death of the founder. During those lean days, Mr. Simmers kept the orders coming in and !aid the groundwork for later developments.

So meager was the Company's income during this early period that payday for the plant employees was often just another day of worry and struggle for the management. Looking backward, it now seems that 1910 was the year of darkness before the dawn. On Memorial Day of that year, vandals entered the sliphouse, slashed the engine belts to ribbons, tore the pug mill apart, and riddled the silk lawns of the slip sifters, leaving behind them damage to the extent of $3,000, an almost catastrophic loss. The vandals, or the motives that impelled them, were never discovered.

This incident seemed to spur Robert Hail's determination to produce chinaware by the single-fire process, Intensified research followed, and early in 1911, Mr. Hall and Jackson Moore, superintendent, who had succeeded Mr. Meakin in 1910, were to see the long search crowned with success.

First Successful Leadless Glaze

The first successful leadless glare, in 1911, was mixed in a mortar with a pestle, and the quantity was just sufficient to dip half a mug. The mug was placed in the hottest part of the kiln, where the temperature was about 2200"F., and the result was "Fair," which means that it was good enough to encourage further efforts. More of the glaze was prepared and a few bed pans were fired, and again the results were encouraging rather than successful. Next, it was decided to load an entire kiln with the glaze-dipped unfired bisque. The result pointed the way to complete success, for the pieces in the hottest part of the kiln were al- most perfect, whereas those in the coolest part were unsatisfactory. It was obvious that a hotter fire was needed. so another load was fired at a maintained temperature of 2400 degrees F., and when the kiln door opened, a new era was ushered in for The Hall China Company.

The ware that came from that kiln in 1911 was strong, hard, nonporous, and crazeproof. When Francis I. Simmers examined it, he turned to his partner and said, "Bob, if you continue to make ware like that. I'll sell so much of it you'll have to double the plant." Bob Hall did make the ware, and Ruby Simmers sold it in ever-increasing quantities.

In a few months, production had grown from two dozen to sixteen dozen pieces a day. and, although this is small in the light of today's output, it loomed large in comparison with the starvation years which had preceded it. If the Company was still a small youngster, it had now definitely survived and outgrown the vicissitudes of its enfeebled and precarious infancy.

The team of Robert Taggart Hall to make the ware and Francis I. Simmers to sell it worked in complete harmony. From 1911 to 1920, when Mr. Hall succumbed from a heart attack, the two men held the position of president alternately, a year at a time. Since the death Mr. Hall, Mr. Simmers has served continuously as the Company's president.

1914 Brings Opportunities

The year 1914 brought opportunities of which the joint managers were quick to take advantage. Because of the war, European potteries, formerly the chief source of sup- ply for stoneware items such as steam-table insets, coffee- urn liners. and other vessels used in the preparation and serving of food, were unable to continue to make or ship their products to the United States.

A11 available production facilities at Hall were devoted to the manufacture of casseroles, teapots, coffeepots. coffee- urn liners, and similar items for the institutional trade. The war thus gave impetus to the trend toward Hall China cooking ware that had started in 1911 with the introduction of the single-fire product.

The more widespread use of Hall China during this period demonstrated to hundreds of institutional men the difference between the European ware and Hall single-fire china. The imported ware was soft, porous, absorbent; the finish rough. Hall China was smooth, nonabsorbent, and glistening when new; it was still smooth, nonabsorbent, and glistening after extended use.

When the war ended, and cheaper importations entered the country, users of Hall China had learned that it was less expensive in terms of cost per year and immensely cheaper in the subtler items of food presentation and customer satisfaction. Hall China was in the market to stay.

Growth Continues

In 1919, Hall's production facilities were increased through the purchase of the plant of the Goodwin Pottery Company at East Sixth and Broadway, and an entirely new line was introduced-- gold-decorated teapots for the retail trade. Coincidentally with the introduction of Hall China gold-decorated teapots, the Company engaged in a campaign, which has been sustained throughout the years, to educate the American housewife in the proper method of brewing tea and the proper pot in which to brew it. Hail soon became the world's largest manufacturer of decorated teapots, a position it has consistently maintained,

The Company's sales of institutional cooking ware and decorated teapots continued to grow, and as they grew, new executive personnel was engaged. Malcolm W. Thompson, who joined the Company in 1930, is now treasurer and general manager. William J. Hocking started in 1921 and is today the Company's purchasing agent. Joseph R. Thompson, who became a member in 1925, is now secretary and sales manager. Robert H. Simmers joined in 1924 and has been vice-president since 1940. The Company's engineering and design staff was also enlarged and has been regularly augmented during the course of the years, and the policy of continuing research pursued by this staff, headed by L. H. Brown, has been largely responsible for the successful development of a wide variety of underglaze colors, the series of design innovations that were issued by Hall before the present war, and the many advancements in manufacturing methods that have contributed to maintenance of high quality In finished ware.

In 1927, a third plant was opened and its facilities were used exclusively to produce a new line-soda-fountain jars. another new line was introduced during the following year-- decorated cooking china, distributed through retail-trade channels.

New Factory

Success brings its problems as well as its triumphs. Consequently, In 1919, the Hall management. realizing that the Company's growth was destined to exceed the capacity of its three potteries and that obsolescence of equipment made imperative the need for new and more efficient methods and facilities, decided to erect an entirely new factory and to abandon the three old plants upon its completion.

Attract of twenty-three acres in the East End became the site for the building which was first occupied in 1930. The new factory was 250 feet wide by 680 feet long, and there there approximately 170,000 square feet of floor space, all on one floor. The entire door space was open, and the production layout enabled continuous, progressive movement of work. Firing equipment in the new factory consisted of three tunnel kilns-- one open-fire multiburner, one muffle-fire, and one semimuffle-fire glost kiln. All were fired with natural gas. The open-fire unit was turned in when the building was first occupied. The glost kiln was turned in the following year, and the muffle-fire unit was placed in operation in 1933.

In 1933, The Hall China Company engaged in the manufacture of decorated cooking china, teapots, and coffee- makers. The year 1936 brought further expansion in the line, when, for the first time since 1911, dinnerware took shape on the jiggerman's wheel, flowed through glazing, firing, decorating, and inspection processes to the shipping floor, and thence to market.

The Company's activities in these fields have necessitated eight additions to the building and the installation of four other firing units. The additions, the first of which was made in 1934 and the last of which was completed in 1941, have provided a total of 385,000 square feet of floor space. The additional firing equipment consists of a circular electric kiln and a gas-fired multiburner turned in 1935, a circular gas-fired glost kiln turned in 1936, and a return-tray electric decorating kiln installed in 1937.

The war has brought new problems to The Hall China Company, as it has all other American manufacturers. Yet it seems that adversity has always been a steppingstone to greater success at Hall, and those who keep their fingers on the pulse of the ceramic industry will continue to observe with keen interest how Hall solves its war and post war problems.

Kiln picture courtesy of the inimitable Steve and Dave.