The weller pottery’s hudson ware | the numbered scenics

Now on view, American Art Pottery Gallery, 1st Floor

View the work in the exhibition on our online collection database here.

Weller Pottery Company Hudson Ware

The Numbered Scenics

This unique exhibition features twenty-one examples from Weller Pottery Company's rare and enigmatic Hudson (Numbered Scenic) line. This is the first time in one-hundred years that these pieces have been exhibited together. The Zanesville Museum of Art would like to thank art pottery collectors and lenders Frank Norman, Fred Siebenshuh, Ken Ballantine, and Clark Creighton for making this exhibition possible.

Weller Pottery’s Hudson Line

This popular line of American art pottery, crafted in Zanesville, Ohio was developed by Weller around 1920. These vases, characterized by their lush satin glaze, featuring creamy, pale, pastel slip-decorated underglazes, were hand-painted by Weller’s leading decorators or artists.

The Hudson (Numbered Scenics) are a subset of their parent line. Author and collector Frank Norman believes these were created in 1928 and 1929. While they share common characteristics with Hudson ware, the Scenics are rare.

The Rare Hudson (Numbered Scenic) Line

These pieces differ from other works in the Hudson ware line. Of those on view, all but one have lush, detailed landscape scenes painted and signed by female pottery decorators including Sarah Reid McLaughlin (1885–1939), Mae Timberlake (1870–?), Dorothy England (1895–1982), and Hester W. Pillsbury (1862–1951) to name a few. Each of these works is likely hand thrown rather than cast, by potter Stoin M. Stoin (1895–1988). And every work referred to as a Numbered Scenic bears a hand-incised number on the underside of the vase.

Why were Hudson (Numbered Scenics) Made?

It is unclear what the hand-incised numbers of the vases’ underside signify. It is also unclear why Weller Pottery created the Numbered Scenics. Where they created for a showroom display? For a special exhibition? Or where they commissioned as special gifts to Weller employees or executives? In the late 1980s, Frank Norman identified that two Hudson (Numbered Scenic) vases were sold at auction owned by descendants of Weller employees.

Image Above: Weller Pottery Company, Hudson (Numbered Scenics) Line Vase #3 Featuring a Winter Scene with House in Distance, decorated by Sarah R. McLaughlin (1885-1939), circa 1920, earthenware.