The History Channel awarded The Corning Museum of Glass a Save Our History grant to partner with Corning Community College and the High School Learning Center for "Stories from the Crystal City," a history project to preserve the memories of Corning-area glass factory workers. The program

This clip is from an interview with Harry Phillips, former gaffer for Steuben, interviewed May 2011. Phillips started his career in glass at Corning Glass Works while still in high school. After leaving high school he went to Steuben where he continued for 46 years, working his way up to becoming a

This clip is from an interview with Gordon Casterline, retired from Corning, Inc., interviewed May 2010. Gordon Casterline talks about his career with Corning Glass Works/Corning Incorporated.

This clip is from an interview with Dan Keyes, former gaffer for Steuben, interviewed October 2010. Daniel Keyes reminisces about his career in glass at Corning Glass Works, starting as a teenager with working papers. He was hired as a section tender and steadily moved through different areas of

This clip is from an interview with Bill Anderson, former Corning Glass Works employee, interviewed May 2011. Bill Anderson was born and raised in Corning, N.Y. He reminisces about growing up in the area, his father's employment as a gaffer at Corning Glass Works, his own employment, and the

Explore the Rakow Research Library.

"Our goal was to overcome defeatism before it ever had a chance to set in, and to provide encouragement for the stricken people of the community," declared Dr. Robert H. Brill, director of the Museum during the post-flood restoration period. The Flood of '72: Community, Collections,

Listen as Joe Maio and William Warmus talk about the clean up efforts after the flood. The Flood of '72: Community, Collections, and Conservation chronicles the determination of Museum staff and the community to rebuild, and sheds light on the unique conservation techniques that were used to

Listen as John Fox, director of the Corning Glass Center in 1972, recalls an attempted rescue of a Venetian dragon-stem goblet, which at the time was believed to be a rare 16th century piece. The effort was unsuccessful. It was impossible to get into the case without damaging the goblet, and Fox

The Library was established as part of the Museum in 1951. Today, it houses the world's largest and finest collection of resources on the art and history of glass. Much of the collection consists of unique items, such as the archives and original design drawings for stained glass. This video

First printed edition published by Johannes de Spira, Venice, 1469 A chief idea in ancient thought and in Renaissance Humanism was the centrality of the individual in the world. Accordingly, the natural world was considered to be less a manifestation of a divine creator and more a stage for the

The technology of printing with movable type, which had been invented in the mid-15th century, was still in its youth when Vannoccio Biringuccio’s comprehensive work on metallurgy, De la pirotechnia, was published in Venice in 1540. The phenomenon of the printed book spread knowledge and encouraged

This clip is from an interview with Jerry Kersting, retired engineer for Corning, Inc., interviewed May 2010. Jerry Kersting was born in Jersey City, N.J., in 1939. He attended Rutgers University where he obtained a degree in civil engineering for the Facilities Group. In 1960, after spending a

On June 23, 1972, Corning, New York and the surrounding communities were devastated by a major flood, as a result of the tropical storm Agnes. At The Corning Museum of Glass, hundreds of objects were broken, more than half of the Library's materials were saturated with flood water, and the

This clip is from an interview with Max Erlacher, former master engraver for Steuben, interviewed May 2010. Max Erlacher was born in Innsbruck, Austria. As a young man he attended a glass technical school to learn the craft of glass engraving. Upon the completion of training, he worked in Vienna

A select group of rare books in the Rakow Research Library’s collection serve not only as repositories of early glass knowledge but also as artifacts of fine bookmaking. They were written by ancient authors and printed some 1,000 years later during the first century of modern printing (about 1450

When Johannes de Spira died in 1470, the printing business he had started was taken over by his brother, Vindelinus. Two years later, Vindelinus published Strabo’s De situ orbis, an ancient geographical text consisting of 17 books. A first edition of this work had been issued in Rome in 1469 by

Isaac Newton (1642–1727) is often described as the greatest of all scientific thinkers. He is most famous, perhaps, for having formulated the universal law of gravitation, as well as the laws of motion. However, his interests also included alchemy, theology, mathematics, and the branch of physics

One might say that the 16 th century scholar-printer Robert Estienne (1503-1559) inherited from Aldus Manutius the mantle of Greek printing. At the very least, he must have felt an affinity with Aldus based on his love for the ancient Greek writings and his desire to render them in modern

The scientific resources housed in the Rakow Library chronicle the mutual history of glass and science. They reveal how glass was both a subject and a tool of scientific study. They also highlight the different channels of scientific communication, beginning with the Medieval manuscript of the

One of the most reliable sources of ancient Jewish history is Flavius Josephus (about 37–97 A.D.), a native of Jerusalem and a learned statesman who became a favorite of Roman emperors. His two chief works, De bello Judaico (The Jewish war) and De antiquitate Judaica (Jewish antiquities), are bound

The Saggi di naturali esperienze / fatte nell’Accademia del cimento sotto la protezione del serenissimo principe Leopoldo di Toscana e descritte del segretario di essa Accademia is a landmark publication in the history of experimental science. It describes experiments conducted by members of the

Seimi Kaiso plays an important role in the remarkable story of Western scientific influences in Japan. When this work first appeared in 1837, Japan had been almost completely isolated from the larger world for two centuries. The Japanese were not allowed to travel abroad, and only the Chinese and

The encyclopedia titled De Proprietatibus Rerum (On the properties of things) was one of the most influential and widely published pedagogical works of the late medieval period. Originally written in Latin in the mid-13th century, it contained 19 books in a single volume that was meant to encompass

As the Italian Renaissance entered its last century and Galileo Galilei was using his telescope to advance the science of astronomy, a Florentine priest named Antonio Neri was writing a guide for glassmakers that would inform their craft for the next 200 years. Titled L’Arte vetraria (The art of

In the canon of architectural writings, this ancient Roman Latin text stands at the summit. It was written by Marcus Vitruvius Pollio (fl. first century B.C.) sometime in the late first century B.C. Today’s architecture students find it on their reading lists, and it is still available in paperback

One of the most learned scholar-printers in Venice was Aldus Manutius (1449–1515). He designed a Greek type font that, beginning about 1495, he used to print a series of texts by the ancient Greek masters. The Rakow Research Library has two of these original Aldine editions in its collection. One

Although many people have either heard about or visited the Harvard collection of glass flowers, few are familiar with their creators, the father and son model makers, Leopold (1822-1895) and Rudolf (1857-1939) Blaschka. Fewer still know about the Blaschkas’ models of soft-bodied undersea creatures

Visitors to The Corning Museum of Glass may see everything from an edgy, disturbing sculpture by Sylvia Levenson to an Islamic perfume bottle from the Middle Ages.  At times, it can seem as if the vast array of objects has only silica in common.  There are objects that provoke debate and objects