Minutes
May 13, 2017
A lovely May day in Omaha was the scene for our Great Plains Heisey Club meeting at the beautiful home of Marcie and Eric Bergquist. We started with a delicious meal after which President Mock called our meeting to order and thanked our hosts. There were 28 members and 4 guests present.
We thanked Mary and Gregg Cameron and Bev and Bob Heise for their work at the HCA museum library in April. Many of our GPHC members also volunteered at the HCA Spring Auction. Gregg Cameron gave a report on HCA Board activities and we thanked Gregg for his recent website work. Minutes of our previous meeting were approved and the Treasurer's report was given. We hope to make a nice donation at the HCA convention in June.
Our club will represent HCA at the National Depression Glass Convention in Wellington, KS in July so we will make that the venue for our next meeting. Ande and Greg Henne will serve as our hosts. Part of the meeting will include discussing our Heisey finds en route or at the NDGA show.
Trudy aka “Martha” presented a “moment” emphasizing the importance of carefully wrapping and carrying our Heisey purchases to prevent accidents. She told of making a great buy and then having the contents crash on the pavement when the plastic sack slipped from her grip as she exited the store. She demonstrated the sickening sound made when glass meets a solid surface. A sad story but a good reminder.
Tom Files presented a program on table size creams and sugars or the “big guys” as he called them. He started with all the various forms of creams or sugars produced by Heisey and then discussed many of the table size ones on display – patterns from the beginning of production to ones still around when they were phased out in the the early 1930s. His handout also included a useful field reference by pattern.
Some members had made great purchases at the HCA Spring Auction and other sources so we had a table full of Heisey to show and tell. Some of the items: Empress oval footed comport with elaborate cutting, Empress ice bucket with Tally Ho etching, Yeoman puff box with insert, Plantation cordial, Marshall decanter with Orchid etching, Old Williamsburg footed comport, Half Circle cream & sugar/Moongleam, Navy soda/Cobalt base with two etchings—Short Sailboat & Motor Boat variant, Old Sandwich catsup with stopper, Carcassonne footed ice tea with Houston Post etching, Cut Block/Custard individual cream souvenir of Butte, MT, Punty Band pickle dish, Fancy Loop cracker jar, Koors jug, and Queen Ann salad dressing bowl with Minuet etching.
We held our usual 50/50 auction which got very spirited and was fun for the all the lucky bidders. Thanks to Jean Will we also had jelly sales to help our treasury.
The raffle winner was one of our guests and he decided to keep all the Heisey in the box. (Now there's a new Heisey collector in Omaha). There were some beautiful Heisey items in the raffle box thanks to Glenn Gall who donated all the great glass.
President Mock adjourned our meeting for an array of sweet desserts brought by a number of our club members. A yummy ending for a fun GPHC meeting. Marcie and Eric were terrific hosts, many thanks for their hospitality.