Pattern Name:CABLE

Pattern Motif:Geometric

Glass Type:Flint

Description:50 Favorites - 2. Cyrus W. Field formed the Atlantic Telegraph Company in 1856 with the intention of laying a 2,000-mile long telegraph cable from the United States to England. A prodigious technological feat for its time, the first unsuccessful attempts in 1857 and early 1858 were followed by triumph in August 1858. The international press was naturally ecstatic but, unfortunately, the cable's insulation failed within a few months and it took Field another eight years to develop and lay a fully functional line. This wonderful story, recounted by Bessie M. Lindsey in Lore of Our Land Pictured in Glass, has been associated with the CABLE pattern since the 1920s (see Antiques, May 1928). Whether the pattern was conceived to commemorate this grate achievement remains a subject of heated debate. That the popularity of the pattern has been enhanced by the story uncontested. Stylistically, the pattern does seem appropriate for the period of the 1850s and 1860s. The brilliant lead-glass pattern, though simple and atrractive, was characterized by Ruth Webb Lee as less "artistic" than many others (Early American Pressed Glass.) (50 Favorites catalogue)