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American Ceramic Society 1898-2007
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It all started in 1898 with an idea born out of necessity. Now, The American Ceramic Society is more than 6,000 members strong and is truly global with members representing more than 80 countries worldwide. This organization is a volunteer organization, distinguished by people who care, who are enthusiastic about their own work and the work of others, and who remain committed to keeping up the connections that give the Society its life. Here is our story.
The Beginning
Brick men setting out for the 1898 convention of the National Brick Manufacturers’ Association had no reason to think that year’s event was going to be extraordinary. They didn’t expect much difference from every meeting from the previous 11 years, and most of them were not looking for change. They liked what they had in store – a holiday that relieved the year’s bleakest season with the promise of three days in Pittsburgh’s luxurious Monongahela House. They knew they’d find plenty of good company, good food, brandy and cigars, and brick discussed from every angle. They planned to trade tips, indulge in conviviality and present papers with titles such as “The Use of Electric Tramways in Hauling Clay.”
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Historical Notes…
“It may be something of a surprise to clay works and scientists generally that an association composed of such men as form the roster of this Society should hold a regular formal meeting with absolutely no program in the way of papers or addresses.
The experience of this Society has shown and abundantly proven that what makes the scientific or technical society chiefly valuable is not the papers and addresses and literature brought out in meetings…but the personal transfer of information and inspiration which accompanies these meetings. Most societies recognize this as a powerful factor, but few go boldly to the limit and say that this inspiration alone is sufficient.
The summer meeting is now pretty well established in this Society as the occasion for learning to know each other and by contact and by observation to acquire ideas from the plants of other ceramic and allied industries. The winter meeting is for the formal interchange of opinion by debate and papers on the technical problems of the day. Each meeting is of incalculable value and neither can be spared.”
--Editorial appearing in The Clay-Worker, August 1900
“Our American Ceramic Society is truly a society by all definitions. It is an organization of people – warm, cordial people, who thoroughly enjoy both the professional and social camaraderie of our meetings. Many non-member attendees continually voice their surprise at this obvious difference between our meetings and those of other professional scientific or engineering organizations. May it always be so!”
-- President James I. Mueller, 1982
Source: The American Ceramic Society 100 Years, published by The American Ceramics Society, 1998, 88-89.
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But among the practical, meat-and-potatoes topics, one presentation stood out. On February 16, a young man named Elmer E. Gorton, representing the American Terra Cotta & Ceramic Co. of Terra Cotta, Illinois, addressed the gathered conventioneers to deliver his paper, “Experimental Work, Wise and Otherwise.”
It was change in the making, although most of the brick men didn’t recognize it at the time. The substance of the paper was deceptively simple. It was the energy of the question it raised that would mark the ceramic industry for the next 100 years.
In this paper, Gorton described his efforts to develop a glaze for terra cotta. The topic wasn’t out of line with the sort of thing that the Brick Manufacturers were hearing from other presenters, but Gorton’s approach was unique. It was the first paper on a chemical topic ever presented to the National Brick Manufacturer’s Association. It became the spark that created The American Ceramic Society.
Edward Orton was named as provisional secretary. They determined that membership shall be selected from those who are actively engaged in technical ceramic operations and who are qualified by education and experience to contribute to the advancement of ceramic arts. It was agreed that “…the subjects which we wish to discuss are those connected with the application of science to the practical needs of the clay industry…chemical technology, the physics of drying and burning, the mechanics of manufacturing and in short all and any branches of technology touching this great industry will find welcome admission to our program.” At the next meeting, participants were to be “…prepared with a paper or note or some specific item of interest as his contribution to our first meeting.”
Society organizers were determined that theirs be a scientific, not a commercial organization, one emphasizing the free exchange of ideas and research. “The status of its members in the industry commercially shall not be of importance in determining their attendance to the Association,” read an early statement of intentions. “Their interest in the work and their attainments as ceramic technologists only will be considered.”
A second important action – and one that set a precedent for important publications from the Society – was the approval of a proposal to translate into English the writings of Hermann A. Seger, the world’s pioneer scientific ceramist. The decision to publish important works secured the Society’s position as a leader in the dissemination of scientific information in the ceramic field.
Recalled Orton of the first society meeting: “The technical session to which we adjourned that day set a pattern of high scientific excellence that has been carefully emulated in the Society’s annual meetings and publications in the years that followed.”
The First Organization Meeting for The American Ceramic Society
This can be best described by the words of the president at the Society’s second Annual Meeting in 1900. “…some of the younger more aggressive members of the National Brick Manufacturers’ Association (NBMA) concluded the time was ripe for organizing a society that would cover a broader field, and especially to take up the higher and more technical branches of the ceramic arts, than was possible among the brickmakers. Accordingly, at the Pittsburgh meeting of the NBMA, in February 17, 1898, Messrs. Geijsbeek, Gorton, Orton, Bleininger, Fiske, Gates, Gressen, Holl, Lovejoy and Richardson held an informal meeting, and outlined a scheme for starting a society of ceramic technologists, to which they invited Messrs. Binns, Burt, Griffin, Langebeck, Mayer, Mueller, Pass, Ries, Stover, Waller, Wheeler and Zimmer to join them at Columbus, Ohio on February 6, 1899, to effect a permanent organization.” Hence the first meeting to discuss the formation of ACerS took place in Pittsburgh and the Society’s first Annual Meeting was held in Columbus, Ohio on February 6, 1899.
Source: Our Ceramic Heritage, The American Ceramic Society Bulletin, July 1975, Volume 54, No. 7, p. 681.
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The Original 9 Society Founders
These are the nine members of the National Brick Manufacturer’s Association who on February 18, 1898, in the Monongahela House in Pittsburgh, formed the nucleus of what a year later would become The American Ceramic Society.
Charter Members of The Society
The 19 men who were the charter members of the American Ceramic Society were men of stature and devoted to the advancement of ceramics. While most were born in America, eight of the 19 were born in Europe. At the time of the founding of the organization they worked as teachers, industrialists, engineers, geologists, chemists and artists. Their specific product interests included china, pottery, structural products, tile, refractories, etc.
All were dedicated to the founding purposes of the Society and these individuals devoted much time to the organization especially as contributors to early Society literature.
It is significant that 13 of the founders went on to become presidents of The American Ceramic Society. It should also be noted that Edward Orton, Jr. served as secretary of the Society for 20 years and was editor of the first nine volumes of the Society’s Transactions.
Source: Our Ceramic Heritage, The American Ceramic Society Bulletin, November 1975, Volume 54, No. 11, p. 1027
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The Early Years
During the early years of the Society, the ceramics industry was truly clay-based and the most common ceramic products – bricks, sewer pipe, tiles, glass, dinnerware and china, and fine art ceramics – were made using techniques that had, in most instances, been around for centuries. Brickyard and pottery operations jealously guarded their individual formulas and processes. The American Ceramic Society played a large role in turning the industry from narrow commercial interest to a broader scientific outlook.
Source: The American Ceramic Society 100 Years, published by The American Ceramics Society, 1998, 143.
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Section Q – The Secret Society
Section Q was the earliest form of ceramic cooperative research!
Many of the members were working alone so far as scientific sympathy or understanding was concerned. All of them had problems; all of them had a little knowledge. Put together, the bits of knowledge gradually began to penetrate the problems.
From the beginning, this opportunity to meet with other ceramists to exchange experiences and ideas was the heart of The American Ceramic Society.
“…the early members of the society liked to mix their business with pleasure. The most famed recreation in the early years of the Society was the acclaimed “Section Q” – a no-holds-barred bull session marked by much conviviality and, often, some real problem solving.”
Source: The American Ceramic Society 100 Years, published by The American Ceramics Society, 1998, 88.
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"Ask any member of the first five years what he enjoyed most [about early annual meetings] and he will say ‘Section Q’,” Norah W. Binns wrote in 1923.
“At the outset, when there was a warm, cordial intimacy among the members,” reminisced a member in a 1934 article in the Bulletin. “We would hold uncatalogued session in some quiet rathskeller and, with corncob pipes and a stein of beer, would hold informal, enthusiastic meetings where intimate experiences could be safely exchanged that our employers would not permit in open sessions. Stanley Burt, the able technician of the Rookwood Pottery, the pride of American ceramics, was a leading spirit in the camaraderie of Section Q, where the formality of Professor Orton was notably absent.”
“The need for recreation was not satisfied by dancing and moving pictures. It was talk and more talk that these men craved. Formal papers were given morning and afternoon, but in the evening, in a private room or around a table, refreshments of the good old variety were made available, cigars and pipes were lit, and Section Q was on.”
Source: The American Ceramic Society 100 Years, published by The American Ceramics Society, 1998, 92.
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The Future
What holds us together?
The Society’s diversity is a celebration of the diversity of ceramics itself as a field of study and achievement. People are drawn to work in ceramics for reasons as myriad as the properties and possibilities of the materials and processes themselves. And they are drawn to the Society to share what they know and hope to learn about work that belongs to the dawn of humankind on Earth and still holds promise to reach the stars.
Ceramics are essential to human life and are among the oldest, the largest and the most essential of all of man’s endeavors. When we consider that the oxygen, silicon and aluminum so important to ceramics form approximately 85 percent, by weight, of the elements of the Earth’s crust, we can form some concept of the magnitude of the foundation upon which the ceramic industry stands. The discovery and use of ceramics were fundamental as human beings developed, found the value and applications of tools and began to create societies.
Source: The American Ceramic Society 100 Years, published by The American Ceramics Society, 1998, 4.
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