Fisher Diamond

The long-lived Mt. Washington Glass Company was in operation for most of the 19th century, and it continued well into the 20th century as the Pairpoint Corporation. The “Fisher Diamond” pattern is attributed to Mt. Washington because it is shown in one of the company’s earliest catalogs, which was printed between 1877 and 1885. Cut glass was becoming more popular at that time, and Mt. Washington was one of relatively few companies that both made the blanks and executed the cutting. The firm had a sizable cutting shop, which turned out large quantities of decorated glass. Mt. Washington is well known among collectors today for its innovative Art Glasses. However, cut glass was a major part of its production in the last quarter of the 19th century and the first decades of the 20th century. The company’s cut patterns were also inventive, although not as distinctive as its Art Glasses. The “Fisher Diamond” pattern is relatively simple in comparison with the very elaborate patterns that were popular in the 1890s and thereafter. Mt. Washington did not sign its cut glass, so the Museum was fortunate to find a piece in a pattern that can be documented by its presence in the closely dated catalog mentioned above. For more information on cut glass made by the Mt. Washington Glass Company, see Kenneth M. Wilson and Jane Shadel Spillman, Mt. Washington and Pairpoint Glass, v. 2, Corning: The Corning Museum of Glass, 2011, pp. 244–277.