Located in Newark Ohio, the Heisey Glass Museum houses a large collection of glass items made by the A.H. Heisey & Company.

Augustus Heisey was born in Hanover, Germany in 1842. His family emigrated to America in 1843, putting down roots in Merrittown, PA.

Augustus first worked in glass in 1861 for the King Glass Company out of Pittsburgh. That was short lived as he soon went on to enlist in the Union Army and served as Captain of Company C during the Civil War.

Returning from the war in 1865, he would leave the King Glass Company and started working for the Ripley Glass Company.

He would work in glass for many years, Heisey started considering his own glass company in 1893. He started putting his plans into motion and started construction of a factory in Newark, OH which was completed in 1896.

For more detail and a longer history of the Heisey Glass Company, we recommend checking out the National Heisey Glass Museum website.

The Heisey Glass Company is no longer producing products, as their run ended in 1957.

Impression

Located in a row of other historical museums, the Heisey Glass Museum has a unique glass front door.

The fee for touring the museum is a small one – just $5 per person. If you love glass or have an interest, this fee is very reasonable. Not only is there a lot of great history to be learned here, but the museum is much larger than you’d think.

This image above is just the front lobby area. There is much more to this floor, plus 2 additional floors and an attachment to another building!

These is a wide variety of pieces here. You have purely decorative to functional items.

The etching and frosting are like nothing I’ve seen before. The quality and craftsmanship is simply amazing.

The museum tries to get all the original Heisey pieces and show them in the collection. Even broken items can be transformed into something special that they can sell in the gift shop.

Many of the Heisey glass and crystal pieces have been used in classic Hollywood movies. In the staircase between the first and second floor of the museum, you’ll find a history of some of the Heisey’s in Hollywood.

I never would have thought that a visit to a glass museum would be so fascinating, educational, and fun.

The exhibits are wonderful and the staff that works there are super helpful. If you are in the Newark area and want to see something spectacular and wonderful, take some time and visit the Heisey Glass Museum.