American Cut Glass Association

T. G. Hawkes & Company

The Obituary of Samuel Hawkes

(The Evening Leader, Corning, NY, Friday 26 Jun 1959, p. 14)

SAMUEL HAWKES, HEAD OF GLASS FIRM, DIES

Samuel Hawkes, president and treasurer of T. G. Hawkes & Co., one of the glass industries that had made the name of Corning internationally known in glass, died at 1:30 this morning at the Clifton Springs Sanitarium, where he had been a patient for a few weeks. He had been critically ill for only a short time. Mr Hawkes was 82 years of age.

For many years the Hawkes family name has been very well known in Corning. The family residence was at 24 W. Second St., but it was sold a few years ago and in recent years Mr. Hawkes spent most of his time in Daytona Beach, Fla.

The Hawkes plant is at 77 W. Market St., and Mr. Hawkes made frequent business calls there since he established another home in Florida. It had also been his custom to spend some time every summer at Clifton Springs.

There will be a memorial service at 3:30 Saturday afternoon in the Sanitarium Chapel in Clifton Springs and burial will be later in the year at Daytona Beach. The family has requested the omission of flowers, but friends may contribute to the cancer fund.

Mr. Hawkes was born April 18, 1877 at Corning, a son of Thomas G. and Isidora Bissell Hawkes, and was educated in the public schools of Corning and at St. Paul's School in Concord, N. H.

He entered the T. G. Hawkes & Company firm in 1895. It had been established by his father, Thomas G. Hawkes, in 1880. In 1889, the company had won the Grand Prize at the Paris International Exposition. This honor established the prestige of high grade American glassware on an international scale.

In 1903 Samuel Hawkes, together with his father and Frederick Carder, established the Steuben Glass Works, which operated independently until its purchase by the Corning Glass Works in 1918.

Mr. Hawkes was a member and officer of the former Corning City Club. He was a member of the Corning Country Club, the Chamber of Commerce and Christ Episcopal Church. The Hawkes home in Daytona Beach is at 106 S. Hamilton St.

He was married on December 4, 1901, to Sarah Lucas, a native of Fall River, Mass. Later her family lived at Big Flats.

Mrs. Hawkes survives, as do two daughters, Mrs. Frederick Martin (Kathryn) and her three children, Hope, Frederick and Sarah, of Daytona Beach, Fla., and Mrs. James Thornton (Sarah) and two children, Lewis Henry and Jane, of Wellsville.

The Hawkes company, which Mr. Hawkes headed as president and treasurer, continues to uphold the tradition and ideal of fine hand-fashioned glassware, in a world where handicraft has been replaced largely by mass manufacturing methods.

The firm established by Mr. Hawkes' father became the largest "deepcut" glass plant in America and the largest business of its kind in the world. Thomas Hawkes had started in business for himself in 1880 with fewer than 20 employees. It grew steadily, however, and at one time employed 400 men.

It is reported that the secret of the success of the firm was due to its founder's determination to place the finest cut glass in the world on the market. Perfection in quality was required of every piece which left the shop. After the firm won the grand prize at Paris, many families of European nobility purchased Hawkes glassware. The company's glass continued to take prizes at subsequent expositions.

The business was incorporated in 1889, the same year in which it won the international prize.

Reprinted 7 Jul 2005