In 1857 Henry Greener left Sowerby in Gateshead and started glass-making in partnership with James Angus at the Wear Flint Glass Works in Sunderland, North East England. The company was known as Angus and Greener. After his partner’s death, Greener moved the business to a larger site in Millfield, on the south bank of the River Wear in Sunderland. In 1885 the company was re-named Greener and Co., a year later Greener and Co. was sold off to its principle creditor, James Augustus Jobling, a Newcastle industrialist.
The company stagnated until Jobling appointed his nephew Ernest Jobling-Purser as manager in 1902. He revitalised the company with an investment programme using technology from the USA and Germany. In 1921 he acquired a licence from the Corning Glass Co. to manufacture and market PYREX heat resistant glassware in Great Britain and the Empire (excluding Canada) which enabled Joblings to expand and survive the depression years.
In the early 1930’s Joblings introduced a range of decorative Art Glass using mechanised presses to produce beautiful but inexpensive pieces. These can be seen at the Sunderland Museum.
Although Jobling’s art glass was produced very briefly, it is some of the finest pressed glass ever produced in England. During World War II Jobling ceased Art Glass production in order to concentrate on more functional glassware.
Today they are part of the Corning Glass Company based at the Millfield site bought by Henry Greener over 125 years ago.
