Any history of American ceramics would be woefully incomplete without mention of English potter, designer, decorator, teacher, and author Frederick Hurten Rhead. Born in England in 1880, he hailed from a long line of Staffordshire potters that extended back to the eighteenth century. Rhead trained in ceramic techniques and ceramic history and was a voracious reader who continuously kept abreast of developments in the field. During his formative years at English potteries he learned the difficult “squeeze-bag” technique—the careful squeezing of clay through a tube onto ceramic wares—which he would carry with him through his entire career.

Rhead immigrated to the United States in 1902 and took up his first position as manager of artistic wares at Avon Faience Company in Ohio. It was there that he first introduced the squeeze-bag technique to the American ceramic vernacular, teaching it to the decorators who would then apply his designs to the pottery. Though his designs were received favorably, Avon’s art pottery efforts did not last long and Rhead departed in 1904 for Ohio-based Weller Pottery. He stayed at Weller for less than a year but developed three unique new lines that incorporated elements of other styles he saw at rival potteries. One of the enduring hallmarks of Rhead’s career, in fact, was his ability to not only remain informed on emerging techniques and trends, but to synthesize them into his own unique visual vocabulary.